Ramfins59

Andrew, that looks really cool.

Thanks John, I'll remember that tip for the next time I use a diode for a filter. Hope all is well with you & your family. James, I'm finally using one of your laminated, teardrop shifter knobs on this car (blue and white). It looks great and hopefully tomorrow I'll have the interior finished and assembled so I can post some progress pics..

This is definitely going to be a great, fun show, as it always is.

I've got "Going to GSL" on my Bucket List. Don't know when that'll happen though...... Have to save up a lot of modeling money to make that trip.

Thanks for the tip Mike, I'll have to do that.

That is looking soooo sharp John. I can't wait to see it in person at the NNL. See you there buddy.

Congratulations Danno. That's quite a feat.

Yeah Tom, it's easy to get carried away isn't it? Thanks again for the front seat, you're a lifesaver!

Casey, that is looking really great so far.

Thanks again Carl. Please feel free to pick up any tips you want, there are no secrets involved here... just some tedious and sometimes time-consuming detailing. It all depends on just how crazy you want to get when working on a model. Since this has been coming along so well so far I'm deciding to put in a little extra effort on details.

Thanks a lot Carl, I appreciate it.

Tom Valenta and myself will be arriving Friday afternoon or early evening and we'll be staying at the Host Hotel. Looking forward to meeting a bunch of you both in the Lobby get-together and in the Tilted Kilt later on. Hope none of us get too "tilted".

Welcome to our plastic playground Robin.

Thank you Dave. It's coming along nicely.

I always clear before I apply BMF so that there is less of a chance of cutting through to the paint and having the trimmed foil peel up the paint with it.

Congratulations to both you and Mrs. Chivers on your new "bundle of joy". Have fun in the "no sleep zone" for awhile.

Thank you very much for those kind words Skip. The interior is starting to come together. I'm working on the dashboard and door panels today. Lots of little detailing to do which is really hard on the eyes. I'm thankful for my Optivisor.

Bruce, that's looking pretty good so far. Isn't all that sanding, priming and resanding sooooo much fun...??

Tom, yes I DO need a front seat and seat back from the Fleetline kit. I'll PM you my address...... Thanks a lot buddy..!! Bruce, thanks very much. I honestly don't know which kit's decal sheets the pinstriping decals came from. A lot of my decal sheets are cut up and I keep them in several ziplock bags in a drawer of my workbench. I think that the large one on the trunk came on a sheet of pinstripes that I got from Slixx. The hood stripes are actually 2 decals pieced together. The flames on the sides are pieced together from the Revell '58 Impala's decal sheet. Yes I do very much enjoy building old school, traditional style Customs. As I said earlier, I haven't built a full-on Custom in quite awhile and this one is fulfilling all my urges and scratching all my itches. Plus, it's still a 50's car and is fitting into my 1950's buildups perfectly. I'm taking my time and trying to get everything neat and right.

Here's a bit of an update. I have the engine "almost finished" as I'm waiting for an M.A.D. prewired, 6 cylinder distributor to arrive from my friend Tom. I'm borrowing one from him which I will replace when we get to the NNL East Show in a couple of weeks. Once the engine is installed onto the chassis I can complete the entire chassis assembly. In the meantime, here's the deal on the engine assembly so far. It has an aluminum finned valve cover from Bob Dudek with an MCG aluminum oil filler/breather cap. I added a Radio Shack diode for an inline fuel filter and a smaller gauge wire for the vacuum advance line, I "upgraded" to an alternator (which I pinned to the engine block) instead of the kit's generator and used some PE brackets and bolt heads so it wouldn't just be hanging there. I used some aluminum pulleys that I've been wanting to use along with some really thin adhesive backed black tape for the fan belt. This tape came with one of the pulley sets that I had. I'm happy with the way this engine looks so far and the distributor and wiring should top it off nicely. Here's how it looks so far...... I've also "upgraded" to a 12 Volt battery which will be wired and mounted to the passenger side inner fender. I will also be adding heater hoses once everything is installed in the engine compartment. The driver side inner fender will have an Aaooogah horn attached which will be wired to the firewall. An aluminum Beehive oil filter is mounted to the passenger side of the firewall and hopefully I'll be able to install the lines correctly. Now I'm finally starting work on the interior. I've had this kit in my stash for years and somewhere along the line I must have used the front seat for another project. I'm waiting to hear back from a Forum member who may have one to spare for me to use. The seats will have tuck 'n roll added with half round Evergreen strips. The dash has been painted the body color and clearcoated, and will be detailed as soon as it is fully dry. That's it for now. More progress to report as it happens. Thanks for following along. All comments are welcomed and appreciated.

Thanks very much Bruce and Bill. As I said earlier, there is definitely an advantage to warming up the paint before spraying as it helps the paint to lay down nice and smooth. I also got lucky in that no dusties landed on the paint before it dried. It looks even better after I polished it out. The engine is 95% finished. I'm waiting on an M.A.D. 6 cylinder distributor from a friend so I can install it and connect all the wires. Once the engine is complete I can then complete the chassis assembly. Yesterday I started working on the interior and discovered that the front seat and seat back are missing..!!! I don't know when, but at some point in time over the years that I've had this kit I must have "borrowed" the front seat for another project. I'm waiting to hear back from a Forum member who might have one to spare. My plans are to make tuck 'n roll front & rear seats using half round Evergreen strips. I'll post more progress pics once I finish some additional assemblies.

Just did a good trade with Mar Orr (DISABLED MODELER).

That looks great Stephen, and I love the color.

That looks fantastic, as usual Ira. You've got one helluv an imagination.

Thanks Shaun. No, there's no Pearl shot over the Navy Blue. I actually did think about spraying some White Pearl over it but did not do that. I think it looks pretty cool the way it is.