Mike999

I was in the closest HL a few days ago and a young woman was stocking the model aisle (but only with diecasts). She didn't know for sure, but guessed they will be doing the 40% off on all kits every other week, until Christmas.

Khils beat me to it! I did a great trade with him. Got some of the "geegaws" I'm always looking for.

Sort of the same idea as the 1914 Militaire. It was marketed to the rich as a "2-wheeled automobile" for city use. Those "training wheels" automatically lowered when the machine stopped, then retracted when it moved off again. The manufacturer provided a few of these to the U.S. Army during World War I, which shipped them to France for test and evaluation. Epic fail. This thing was just too heavy and clumsy to move around in muddy and shell-holed battlefield conditions. And the location of that shifter is downright scary. We do have a plastic model kit of it, in 1/16 scale from Entex and Aoshima. It is not known as an easy build.

There's a great hot rod chassis lurking under that kit, and it will fit under quite a few '30's and '40's kits. The same chassis is under the '38 Ford roadster. Those kits are easy to find and cheap. Some good '30's-'40's kits were first issued in the 1990's or later, so they're much better detailed than kits dating from the '60s. The Revell '41 Chevy pickup is one of those, along with their '37 Ford pickups and panel trucks already mentioned. The '37 trucks are 1/25 scale and the Revell '37 Ford cars are 1/24, if that matters. If you want to build a stock '37 sedan or coupe, the longer wheelbase on the 1/25 trucks might even work in your favor. The '37 cars have a hot rod chassis, like the Revell '32 Fords, but they can be converted to stock. You can find articles on this site showing how to do that. The Revell '40 and '48 Fords and '49 Mercurys are also newer tools and great kits. The '41 Ford Woody is a pretty nice newer-tooled AMT kit.

The California Park Rangers used to have a website where they vented about stupid park visitors. This included hikers who demanded an emergency rescue helicopter pick them up because they were "tired," etc. But by far, their biggest number of rescues involved people in SUV's. The tourists drove them into dry washes and deep gullies no vehicle could climb out of. The Rangers said they heard the same two things over and over: (1) "In the TV commercials, this SUV can go anywhere." (2) "My SUV is only 2-wheel drive? Really? I sure thought it was 4-wheel drive." The Rangers said they created a new call sign for these incidents: "TNS" That stood for "Thwarting Natural Selection."

Even the mighty Tamiya blew it with clear bodies. At least on their Mercedes CLK-GTR kit from back in the 1990's. They did a special "Full-View" version of that kit with a clear body. But the body had a very visible "Tamiya" copyright notice stamped into it. If you wanted to leave the body clear, that needed to be sanded down and polished out.

Amazon has the same problem with some Japanese model kits. The price and the shipping get translated straight over from Yen (badly). So a kit that obviously should sell for $45 becomes $4,500. Tokyo-Hobby is a good Japanese seller on eBay. When I search for a specific Japanese kit, I often get a page full of eBay listings with those "inflated prices and exorbitant shipping costs." Then I see a sane price and think, "Bet that's Tokyo-Hobby." It usually is. Another good one I've dealt with is Xfree Hobby.

Round 2 re-issued the '59 Imperial not so long ago. They're available at Hobby Lobby for $29.99. If you want one, you can order it directly from the Hobby Lobby website. Here's a link: https://www.hobbylobby.com/Crafts-Hobbies/Model-Kits/Cars-Trucks-Motorcycles/1959-Chrysler-Imperial-Model-Kit/p/80793355

I saw it on Showtime last night. I found a mention that it was on Netflix in 2019, so maybe it will come back around soon.

I just watched one of the creepiest movies I've ever seen, and I've watched a lot of horror. "The Witch" (2016). Set in 1630's New England. Celebrity endorsement: Stephen King said it terrified him. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4263482/

Thanks, I'll try to catch that. It's a fascinating subject, especially since I lived in Los Angeles when all that was happening. The rolling shoot-out between the two cops happened in North Hollywood, very close to where I once lived. If you can find it, you might like the 2018 movie on the same subject, "City of Lies." Johnny Depp plays Russell Poole. That's such a big, complex subject that it was hard to cram into 2 hours but I thought it was well done. IIRC, due to some weird legal hassle, the movie never got a theatrical release in the U.S.A. Only in Italy, of all places. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2677722/

For junkyard fans, here's Murilee Martin's "Junkyard Finds, Treasures and Gems." He roams junkyards all over the place with his camera, and has a very distinctive and enjoyable writing style. You may have seen him on The Truth About Cars and other websites. http://www.murileemartin.com/JunkyardGalleryHome.html

That's going to be an epic job! Working with vac-forms is nearly a lost art these days, so I'm looking forward to seeing your progress. You made me go check the old 1/35 scale vac-forms in my stash. Most have been released as regular plastic kits, like a Humvee ambulance conversion. But there are a couple of oddballs, like the Air Press M*A*N bus conversion (for the Italeri Opel Blitz truck). And my favorite, a Hobby-Modellbau-Schmidt vac-form of an Italian WWII "Desert Patrol" truck. It has a Breda 20-mm cannon and other parts made of white metal.

When I lived in Los Angeles, there were several "Pick-Your-Parts" junkyards around Sun Valley/San Fernando, all near each other. You paid $1 to get in and brought your own tools. I had a couple of old cars back then and spent nearly every Saturday in those yards. This was in the mid to late 1980's, when cars from the 1960's and 70's were still pretty common in junkyards. Still, they always caused a feeding frenzy. If the forklift dropped any muscle-related cars, like a 4-door '68 Olds Cutlass or Chevelle, it was like a swarm of piranhas attacking. One impossible find: I worked with a woman who drove a '61 Dodge Lancer, with a bashed in passenger door. Couldn't believe it, but I found a '61 Lancer in a yard and yanked the door off. Her husband painted and installed it. Good as new!

OK, I'll check if it has those suspension parts and get back to you. I'm in the middle of some Monday morning chores right now.

Found this one at a local flea market recently. Revell did a series of these C-cab customs, all with VW engines. This one was cheap because it's missing part of the 2-piece tires, the glass, and decals. It still has all the cab parts, roof and the interior shelves, since it's supposed to be a hot dog/snack wagon. I thought I might cross-kit those parts with an AMT '23 T delivery wagon, and build a stock-ish snack wagon. A quick check showed that the Revell roof is about the same width and length as the AMT kit. I might try to also use some parts from the old MPC Popcorn Wagon. But that one is 1/20 scale and might take some serious fiddling to fit.

Pyro made a Vespa and a Lambretta scooter, both in 1/16 scale. They're pretty nice little kits and sometimes turn up on eBay for fairly reasonable prices. The Italeri Vespa was originally a PROTAR kit from the 1970's. Back in 1995 it turned up in a Revell box. Here's a timeline of its releases from Scalemates: https://www.scalemates.com/products/product.php?id=101611&p=timeline

That looks fantastic! Especially your added details like the glovebox. That kit was originally issued back in the 1970's by PROTAR. Which, like Italeri, was an Italian model company. They kitted a bunch of 1/9 scale 2-wheelers that nobody else ever did, including a 750cc Norton Commando. If you want a Vespa, you're in luck. Italeri just re-issued that kit last year. And if you want to do something different with it...I shot this photo when I lived in Alexandria, Egypt from 2005-09. Most fast-food joints had a whole fleet of scooters, like this McDonalds. Yes, you could get McDonalds delivered right to your door!

Looks great! Especially the accessories.

Stopped at the closest Hobby Lobby this morning. "40% Off" signs were hanging all over the model aisle. But the store only had one new kit, the MPC 1/8 scale Schwinn "Krate" bicycle. It looked like they had re-stocked the Revell Land Rover and a couple of others. I may have to hit the stores a little further away, before this sale ends. Still looking for another "Supernatural" Impala.

That is looking great. These tractors may be simple kits but Revell sure molded a lot of detail into them. I built a Porsche Jr. and now I'm really looking forward to the Deutz. The clean shiny green looks fantastic, but I don't think I can resist some washes, just to pop out details. I'm thinking about doing this to either a Porsche Jr. tractor or the Deutz. I don't think the U.S. Air Force ever used either tractor. (The shiny olive drab one in the photo below is a Moline.) But the Air Force had a lot of bases in Germany, so I'll pretend they bought a tractor "on the local economy." Might even hang a big "Follow Me" sign on it!

The original "Goldfinger" Aston-Martin DB-5 ended up being sold as a used car. From Aston-Martin's own used car lot, no less. After the movie hoopla died down, in 1968 the DB-5 went back to Aston. They stripped out all the 007 toys, and had to weld in a whole new roof to get rid of the "ejection hatch." In August 2019, a replica of that DB-5 sold for $6.4 million at a Sotheby auction in California. https://www.hagerty.com/media/automotive-history/history-of-james-bond-aston-martin-db5-most-famous-car-in-the-world/

That really came out great! Just enough clutter without making it look cluttered, if you know what I mean. An easy mod, for those who want a slightly snazzier WW2 VW: way back in 1996 Scott Van Aken built the CMK kit as a Japanese Embassy car in Berlin during the war. Gloss black paint and red interior. The decals you'll need from the CMK kit are posted below. Use the license plate "IA-18." https://modelingmadness.com/scott/cars/vw.htm

Wespe Models in Romania makes a 1/24 scale GMC Deuce And A Half. It's resin and expensive. I think DAN Models in Romania has taken over the Wespe molds, since I'm seeing old Wespe 1/35 scale kits in DAN boxes recently. There's a thread in the Truck forum about DAN Models. Here's an eBay listing for the GMC. https://www.ebay.com/p/762926222

If you want the dropped front axle and other hot rod chassis parts, you'll need to find another kit exactly like the one you just got: the early 1980's "white box" re-issue with "2-in-1" on the box. Or an original double kit with the XR-7, but those are harder to find and more expensive. When AMT changed this kit to the '27 T police car, they deleted the dropped axle and some other parts. The hot-rod engine parts for the 4-cylinder are still in that kit, now called the "Police Pursuit" engine. But not the hot-rod chassis stuff. I think the one you have there, in the white box, was the last release with those parts.