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The one thing I have noticed with this question, every ones opinion is largely based on personal experiences early in life when we are most impressionable.

In the past I did devote more time to the headliner if it was going to be easily seen. The way I did it would require that all of the interior painting of window frames and such was completed. With the area for the headliner masked off and being sure none of the over spray would escape on to the body I would spray one of the Fabric colors from Model Master. I have used their Gray and the Tan and both give a very nice finish. You just have to remember that this paint can't be masked off in a later stage or you will lose the texture of the headliner.

I usually paint them a flat or semi gloss color to match the interior. The thing with headliners is that they are often not seen or even noticed.

The Gladiator looks cool and if you're only going off road and far into rough country it should do everything people would want of it. The only thing that I can see that would be a problem off road is the departure angels aren't as great as the normal Wrangler or even the Unlimited. They will sell all of them they can build. We looked at one on display at the Costco this weekend and thought that if it was offered as a 2 door that the wheelbase would be such that it would go some of the places that our JK 2 door will go. But it is a handsome looking vehicle.

We stopped using the plastic bags from the market or anywhere else a few years ago. The main reason was as mentioned they will crash and burn if more than two items are placed in them and the first corner on the way home the contents scatters all over the inside of the trunk. But a couple of years ago I was reading some issues of National Geographic and they were covering the floating islands of trash in the oceans made up mostly of plastic waste. The local markets started selling the canvas bags cheep and we bought some. They were also offering .05 off your bill for every canvas bag you used. As an aside, I remember when I was very young I would be embarrassed going shopping with my grandmother because she always used canvas bags at the market. This was when everything was put in brown paper bags. You must remember she was a young women during the depression and knew hardships we can only imagine. As it turns out granny was ahead of the times when it came to shopping.

Please post any pictures here for those of use that can't make it.

I have a question about the convertible top. I have this kit but haven't looked at it in some time. Is this a top from the kit or from something else ? The top looks like it might be a little wide where it meets the tulip panel.

Even as a Belvedere II and maybe a 273 v8 it is still a good looking car and if someone wanted to make it into a big block or even a Hemi it would be a great car to have.

I'm enjoying watching this come together. I never realized that the early AMT NASCAR kits had such a simplified chassis and no engine.

Great fabrication work here.

My apologies for some of my reparks to others and taking this in another direction. Please continue with any updates on your build and I promise I'll contain myself.

First off you have a great looking Javelin and you should be proud of it. I agree the 6+ inches seems a little much, but if you do it right it isn't supposed to be noticeable. Looking at the side view of your car, ands it may just be the angle, but the front tire looks almost as if it is set to far back in the fender flair. Looking under the hood on the Ring car you can see how much additional space there is between the engine and the grill area. These guys have built several amazing cars and they really know what they're doing so I'd have to take their word for the wheel base changes.

Could that be a GTX ? Ya I would consider looking at that depending on how much and what it was and of course condition.

Neat looking Type 1. The rear end damage doesn't look that bad as long as it didn't get into the engine. Like so many others who have had VW's they are great to work on and they really are a durable little car. I had a '67 that had taken a hard hit in the right front. I bought it as a total with the idea of building a Baja out of it. I was lucky to know a guy at a body shop that pulled the right front pan area straight for me. The body was repaired with a fiberglass Baja kit that replaced the front fenders, hood and center section with the headlights. The rear fenders were replaced along with a semi engine cover with the license mounting provided. Great fun and it was done in the garage except for the paint and I did have a VW/Porsche shop build the engine.

I, like so many others, have had the same thing happen when it comes to insurance companies. They focus on anything they can think of to charge a higher rate for their coverage. They seem to pay to little attention to the drivers rate of claims or if they have had any claims at all. I'll bore you with a personal story from my past. As a young man just married and a few tickets but no accidents or claims ever, I purchased a new '66 Impala Super Sport with the 396/325 engine and a 4-speed. You would think I was trying to insure a rocket ship since the insurance payments were greater than my car payment. MY prior car insured with the same company was a '57 Ford Mainliner 2 door with the 312/245 engine and a 3-speed with O/D. My rates were nominal on that car but if you mention words like Super Sport the insurance companies would go straight up the wall and turn right. After talking with my agent about the rates on various other models I found that they seemed to like Bel Air 2-doors and only asked if it was a v8 or a 6. So I ordered a new '68 Bel Air with the 427/385 engine and a 4-sped and my insurance dropped almost in half. Go figure. The insurance companies are more interested in generating income than serving their customers.

Another problem has popped up, insurance. Based on my most recent conversation with the insurance agent I'm thinking I better start shopping now. My former agent has retired and she was a car enthusiast which made dealing with her much easier to deal with than I realized. She drove a Corvette and she and her husband also had other hiperformance cars also. The new lady kept making remarks about our Chargers and my wife's Avenger. The names sounded very aggressive to her and she was sure that there would be a sur charge of some type. I had to remind her that they had never ever had to pay a claim on use and that my wife has only received one ticket in her life and that was dismissed by the officers Sargent after I spoke to him and he reviewed the dash cam video. I had one speeding ticket in a KCK speed trap at 10 mph over four years ago and the only other was in '98 when I had it coming at 75 in a 60. Prior to that it had been more than 20 years with no moving violations. She still thinks we're high risk.

I always thought a deposit would be non-refundable. If not then the deposit is of no value and may keep you from a chance of selling the car to someone else. We had something like this happen several years ago. We were selling my wife's car since we got her a new Jeep. This young man gave her a couple hundred dollars to hold the car until his father could get a loan for him. The dad called back and wanted to renegotiate the selling price. I'm out in the driveway giving the car a good detailing and making sure it is all serviced and ready. A couple drives up and wanted to pay us full price for the car but the wife was feeling sorry for the young man and we ended up selling it to the first guy for less and waiting a couple of weeks before he could get his money. With the dad trying to get us to lower the price I told my wife to just tell him we would return his deposit since we could sell it then and there at full price in cash.

Very cool looking project. I also followed the "Bearded Wonders" exploits with his Falcon and enjoyed everything he did. While you're getting close to finishing this, and it doesn't really matter, but the hardtop roof from the Trumpster kit might give you the originals roof if it matters to you at this point.

The Club Coupe, at lest in my mind, refers to the short roof two door body style. The AMT '49 Ford issued kit is a very good representation of this body style. This 1:1 model was offered with a full interior in both standard and deluxe. Ford also offered this as a "Business Man" special with no back seat. At that time it was somewhat common for a salesman to travel with samples or even delivering of their products. An interesting side note about engines. Most people think of the Flat Head V8 and I do think Ford sold far more of them than their standard Flat Head in line 6 cylinder. In stock form the 6 cylinder was short of the V8's horse power by very little and the torque out put of the 6 was almost the same.

We recently replaced our '10 Charger RT with the HEMI and AWD in dark gray with a 'left over '18 Charger GT with the v6 and AWD. This one is white and has the black front bumper and I had the rear spoiler painted white to match the body. I guess from a distance some think it's a patrol car but this only seems to fool real patrol cars since they are the only ones waving at us. I admit to sometimes driving over the speed limit when conditions allow and I have even driven past a patrol car and they never even seem to care. I attribute this to the color as much as anything else. Because of my style of driving and past experience with brightly colored high eye vehicles I have found maintaining a low profile is in my best interest.

It just seems like everything the Ring Brothers touch is perfection.

I also share your appreciation of the "Shoe Box" Fords from '49 thru '51. I personally have owned a few and had a '51 that I have always regretted selling. Your story of your families '50 Ford remind me of the new '49 black 4 door that we had. I remember as a child ridding in the back seat when my father couldn't stop in the snow and ran into the rear of a school bus. I bounced around in the back ricocheting off the back of the front seat and landing on the floor. I guess that's why I have always thought seat belts are a good idea. The Ford dealer repaired the car by replacing almost all the sheet metal from the windshield forward.

You mention that your paint booth is vented into the room and not outside ? Besides being messy and paint residue build up in the room I can't help but worry abut you breathing all of these fumes. I would suggest you find someway to get the venting to reach the outside away from where you are painting.

Check around at the local Home Depot or Lowe's type stores in there furnace filter area for posable air filters. I got mine at an ACE Hardware store, they had some cut to size material that works fine and cost very little.

I can remember owning cars that don't look this good and there was no restoring going on, I was just trying to keep them running.