Gluhead

Thumbs up, bud! Good to see you're still wrecking perfectly good plastic.

That was the second thing that popped into my mind, (after initially drooling a bit over the colors). When a finish is so thick that panel lines get either filled in or start ballooning out and making the edges look pillowey, it kinda dilutes the initial drool factor. Sometimes less is more. They are still beauties, but that is something that could take it from "wow" to pickmeupi'vefallenandcan'tgetupholycrapthat'sstunning".

I'm sure you've seen it, but I think hamber Plowboy's Spacetruck should be tossed out here as reference. He pretty much nailed the proportion challenges. Maybe it'll give you some more to noodle around with while you're still in "what if i" mode. http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=12434&highlight=spacetruck&showall=1 Lunar Lander and Atomic Punk are a couple more of his big-car-body-turned-hot-rod-roadster/bubbletop builds. Worth a search if you aren't already familiar, especially if you're leaning towards topless. I will surely be attacking one kit or another with this in mind before too long. 62 'Bird and 58 Plymouth are the two I keep gravitating towards, but so many big butts out there with a lot of potential.

Our phone number while I was growing up was 1 digit off from the local suicide hotline. It's a very good thing that I hadn't yet fully developed my snarkastic side...

One of my first cars was the Coronet version of this body. Of course, mine was so rusted out that the rear of the thing was held up by a stack of 2x6's between the tops of the quarters and the leaf springs......haha. That car was embarrassing... Yours is not, though. That thing rocks.

I didn't read much of this thread. To me, there won't be much to this stuff until they have to turn left...AND right. A lot. In one lap. One of these races is a 2-3 hour commercial. That's about it. If you think otherwise, you're fooling yourself (and clearly, a lot of people in the states do exactly that). Sorry fans. You've been had.

Came out real nice, Nick.

Those Enthusiast Series 356's are one of my favorite kits, too. I've only had one, and built it very early in my adult modeling, Needless to say, I didn't do it justice at all and very much want to get my hands on one again for another go. BMF'ing is one of my favorite parts. lol. Guess I'm weird. Anyway, love the project. Type III's were my 1:1 VW fixation, but of course it spills over into the other models like some sort of sickness. heheh. As for the huge honkin' muffler issue, have you considered painting it black to trick the eye a bit? Can't wait to see more.

Like Art said...just paint it black (I hear Mick Jagger all the sudden). Depending on the degree of weathering you want, you can start out with a black primer and rub it down to the slight sheen you'd find on a top, or take it farther and start drybrushing edges and high points with graphite or pastel powders to get anything from "few years well maintained" to "kinda neglected" to "time to hit the powerwash." Point is, though, that convertible tops are never really one pure color. There should always be some shade variation around edges and high points even if it's just in the sheen, or it'll look...well...two dimensional, for lack of a better expression.

NAILHEAD!

Front end came out great. Nice trick with the insulation. I'm totally stealing that.

Hey look at it this way...at least it didn't vanish into parts unknown when you sat down. Seriously, though, no fun. I haven't sat on one myself but I've had a couple "stepped on" by one of my exmonsters. Maybe it's a good time to practice your use of liquid cement.

I'm the type who learns most easily by watching then doing, so this is invaluable. I've used a few of these processes to make parts and small sections of bodywork, but seeing them put to use on the scale of an entire car is inspiring. Fantastic subject, too. I can never get enough of 40's-60's concept cars. Also, THANK YOU for the link to US Plastics. I would love to try that out. The sheets are huge and one would probably last me a lifetime, but at that price it would be well worth it if the properties make it more viable for forming. I'm sure I speak for everyone when I say I hope to see you continue this thread. Cheers, Glu

Great start. I'll be watching this.

Slick build. I'm with the un-bobbed crowd. I'm glad ya didn't. How was the JF body? Did it require much effort?

Love it. Actually, after clicking on the link, I remember voting for it.

Kit prices are crazy enough as it is. Granted, I've been out of it for several years but not THAT long. Seems kits were $15-17 at the shops last I bought one, and we were wondering how kids could afford to try it out even then.

Rad.

Agreed. A thread title should be specific and concise. That's just standard netiquette, but it's amazing how frequently this is disregarded. "OH BOY!" or "some stuff" as a thread title is for little girlie men who want to show off their new dirtstache or their pokemon collection. It does help when people are in the habit of using the tag function, but even then half the tags I see are just as ambiguous. lol. Many of the forums I've frequented in the last few years utilize a preview of the first couple/few lines of the first post when you hover over the thread title. Not sure how long it will take me to break the habit of hover previewing here. Maybe Gregg knows if it's an option or not? If it's a feature that requires additional payment, it's not that important, but if it's just a matter of ticking a box it'd be great.

Hehe Love it.

Impressive.

Lookin' good. Nice work on getting the body de-TA'd. One suggestion if I may - pick up a sheet or two of real thick styrene sheet for when you need to build up a new shape. I've found I have a lot less nit-pick finish work to deal with when I use an oversize chuck of plastic whittled down in comparison to laminated thinner sheets. Just makes it a lil' easier. What I've ended up doing on several cars with the same color on the body and interior is give the interior a once-over with Dullcoat, but then rub it back to a semi-gloss with skin oil (yep, just like it sounds. lol). The Dullcoat clouds the color ever so slightly, and the oil from our skin rubbed into it is a pretty convincing vinyl sheen. Keep it up!

Real nice clean build. Lookin' good!

Great! I'll have to give the JF body another try. I've never taken the one I have all the way home because it has wonky panel lines all over the place, but clearly yours are fine. Really like what you've done with it.