Ramfins59

You got that absolutely right John. It's always a real treat when any of Modelhaus' products arrive.

Great story and great looking dog John.

Welcome to our plastic playground Justin.

Thanks Johann. I always get Google reference pictures and color charts of the 50's cars that I've been building for the past year or so. I look until I find either a solid color or a 2 tone color combo that really strikes me for a particular car and then I try to match it as closely as I can. In addition, I also try to get the interiors to match or compliment the body colors. As far as laying down the paint, I don't have any special techniques or secrets. I just prep the body, prime it, let it dry for a day, then paint it, let that dry for a day, do any needed touchups, then clearcoat it. I'll let the clearcoat dry for at least a full day, then polish it out with Novus 2 polish. Then comes BMF work and final assembly. I'm glad that you've been able to "expand your horizons", so to speak, paintwise. There are some pretty cool looking color combinations out there. You only have to look for them and use your imagination and of course good color sense. I will admit though, that masking off some of these 50's cars for a 2 tone paint scheme is a real pain in the butt.

Hey thanks John. As soon as I can find paint that matches the baby BLAH_BLAH_BLAH_BLAH brown on the car I'll start working on it.

Thank you Jonathan, I appreciate your kind words.

Carl, thank you so much for your encouragement. I'm not so overwhelmed that I'll stop working on the 1950's cars. It's just that I've built a bunch of them already and haven't made a dent in "the pile" yet to be done. I'm enjoying the heck out of this "50's build mission of mine, and I really love finding and building a subject that we don't see everyday on this Forum or at shows. I've got quite a few of those lined up to be worked on..... and to be bought as the budget permits. Also, thanks for "being a fan". I hope your wife likes what you have showed her of my work and I thank her too. Wives can be great critics and advisers in our hobby. Mine critiques all of my builds and is totally supportive of my work. She brings home modeling "goodies" as surprises for me all the time, in addition to chauffeuring .me to shows and hobby shops since I don't drive any more.

Derrick, that car is absolutely fabulous..!! Your paint and foil work is just great, and I love the wheel treatment with the valve stems and blackwash... absolutely dynamite. Great job.

Yep, been there, done that.... but I only did that with the tanks and halftracks that I built, never with my cars. I also once floated a PT boat out onto a huge, deep puddle and blew it up with firecrackers.

Today I finished painting the body on this car. Yesterday I sprayed Chrysler Yellow and today I masked that off (It was a real pain to do too...... I used Frog Tape) and sprayed the second color of Tamiya Red Brown. Only very minor touchups were needed after peeling off the Frog Tape. It will obviously look a lot neater once the BMF is applied. Tomorrow I will clearcoat the body and give it a day or so to fully dry before I polish that out and then apply the BMF (that should be a real tedious chore with all the trim on this car.) I also pretty much finished the interior, except for the dashboard and steering wheel. I flocked the carpet brown and brush painted the seat and door panel inserts with Insignia Yellow paint. Then I brush painted the rest of the seats and door panels with Floquil flat Roof Brown. After that I applied BMF around the yellow door panel inserts. The cranks and handles are painted chrome silver (for some reason BMF always fights me when I try to cover cranks and handles so I find it easier to just paint them chrome silver.) I still have to detail the dashboard and steering wheel and I also have to add gas and brake pedals because there aren't any there or in the kit. This project is moving along pretty quickly as is usually the case with curbside models. Thanks for following along. Further progress reports will come as they happen.

Thanks Don, yeah I am also a fan of the Mopar styling of the late 50's. I'm still working on the interior and hope to be able to post some pictures soon.

Jeff, that looks pretty sweet just the way it is. I see that you also like redoing the diecasts when we can't get that particular car in resin or plastic kit form. They definitely fill in the gaps.

Hey Tom, that car reminds me of the "way back time" when we tried to glue every single part that came in the kit to the body. You talk about my basement eventually becoming a 50's car museum.... well you must have a nostalgia model collection that would rival Mr. Gustavson...!!!

Thank you Richard and John. John I hope all is well with you and Amy. Did you go to the LIARS Show?

That looks great Tom, I love the color.

Thanks guys. Rob, at the rate I'm going I'll have to restock my BMF supply again. I'm not a "specialist" at working with BMF, but I'm not intimidated by it like some modelers seem to be. I enjoy all aspects of building my cars. Of course I enjoy some parts of the building process more than others but overall the whole project is worth it when the end result comes out looking like you imagined it in your mind's eye.

I enjoy competing at contests. I participate in several local shows and sometimes my models do well and win awards. It all depends on the judging... a model may do great at one show and do nothing at the next. I also attend the NNL East show every year which is a GREAT show for displaying your latest work. There is no competing and I get to see great models and meet all the modeling friends I've made over the years in this great hobby. Plus I get to buy new stuff from great vendors.

Welcome to our plastic playground Pat.

Thank you all very much everyone. I'm starting to feel a little overwhelmed with all of the 50's cars that I still have lined up to be worked on. I've got 3 55's, 1 '56, 4 57's, 1 '58 and 7 '59's. Not to forget another half dozen from '50 to 54...... I'm gonna be very busy for awhile. Plus there are about 2 dozen others that I don't have yet either in resin, promo or kit form. As I keep saying, so many models... so little time. I'm determined to keep plodding along to get them ALL done.

Thanks guys. The interior work has started and I'll post some progress shots as soon as I can.

Hey James. Yeah I'm thinking that this interior will be great for detailing with those separate side panels. I'll probably go with shades of browns and tans with some yellow thrown in for contrast. I think I'll have fun doing this one, even though they're ALL fun to do.

Today I started working on a 1957 Dodge curbside resin kit from The Modelhaus. It is a beautiful new casting that they recently released. After soaking all the unplated parts in Westley's, the body required only a very minimal amount of flash cleanup around the window openings and there were only 3 small pinhole bubbles that required filling at the bottom of the body. The molded on windshield wipers were so shallow that they wouldn't really show up well after paint and BMF so I sanded them off and will use chromed pieces from my parts stash. I primed the body with Duplicolor primer/sealer. The interior is in 6 pieces; floor pan with rear seat, front seat, dashboard, steering wheel, and separate side panels with excellent detail. This will be a great interior for me to detail. The rest of the parts supplied are; Front bumper & grille, 2 front bumper additions, rear bumper, hood ornament (2 pcs.), taillight bezels, head and taillight lenses, whitewall tires, crossbar hubcaps, wheel backs, 2 metal axles, torsion bars for the chassis and vacuum formed front & rear glass. The chassis is a one piece deal with all detail molded in. I also primed this in Duplicolor primer/sealer. As far as planned color choice, I Googled reference pictures of cars, as I usually do, and this picture of a '58 Dodge in yellow and brown really struck me, so I'm thinking that will be the way I'll paint this car. Thanks for looking in on this new project. Stay tuned for further progress reports as they happen.

Thanks a lot Bruce. It's not too often that I score a cheap deal like this one, but I keep looking for them.

Harry, you continue to dazzle us with your craftsmanship. Bravo sir!!!!

Tye, that color is just gorgeous.