Great looking build. I remember when you were looking for additional information for your build. I always wondered what happened, and now I know. My '57 was white with a blue and white interior.
The gauge pod with the 5 gauges was for mounting on the bottom edge of the dash board. This was a common practice on 1:1 cars . The factory gauges were for the fuel and water temp only. The '57 Chevy had small parking/turn signal lights on the ends of the grill bar. These maybe lenses for that.
Your build, it should be what ever you want it to be. On the outside chance that you wanted to back date the engine a four barrel carb. and manifold could put it back to 1963 when Ford started the small block anyway.
Yesterday I applied the final color coats of paint and today I got the clear coats done. I'm going to wait a couple of days before I do anything else with the body until I'm sure the paint has dried.
Having some issues with posting the pictures. I'm sure it's me and not the Forum. For the interior I used some scale siding for the tuck & roll effect on the seats, door panels and the rear package try.
This is something very unusual looking. The paint, both quality and the colors, is outstanding. The subject looks like anything but an inexpensive 2 seater.
Beautiful looking build of a subject not seen much anymore. Would seem that he has picked up on your style of building, very clean looking example here.
I noticed in one of your pictures of the interior showing the rear wheel tubs that it looks as if the black paint didn't go into the area around the tubs and the floor folds. I don't know if this was you intent or not but I like the way it looks. I think it helps to show additional detail in this area.
Very sorry to hear of your sight issues. As others here have mentioned their problems with their eye sight the bottom line is that eye surgery advancements of the last few years has been huge. Perhaps your Optometrist can refer you to someone that can repair your eye sight.
I lived in some mountainous areas before and always enjoyed the way the clouds would react in some weather conditions. We would be in the clouds for days and snow or rains. Drive down to the valley below and they would be having a beautiful sunny day .
Looks like you have some great looking half done builds going. The thing I like is they seem to be something not often seen and they look real clean at this point.
I see what you mean with the two tone paint job. When we redid our deck we used the main posts from before and painted them white. The railings were replaced with black powder coated metal so zero repainting needed. This does look good thou.
Just pulled their on line ad for the KC area and it lists all model kits at 40% off with out coupon. They may want to have an extra cashier or two on call with 40 % off across the board I might even buy some "parts" kits.