Zoom Zoom

Nice color combo

Greetings; getting model cars to look really good requires a bit of a steep learning curve; though some people seem better adapted towards conquering it than others. Your occupation should help in some respects. There are a couple spots on the 'net that can help with basic questions, if you want to do some reading/learning before buying a bunch of stuff. ScaleWiki Car Modeling Tutorials Those can help, and if you have questions about the best paint/supplies/tools to get, you can ask here before you buy.

Cool! Just wondered...also wonder if the owner of "Manhatten Movers" drove a Camero with Cragers?

Neat model; did you intentionally mis-spell "Manhattan"?

Speed Channel has cut LeMans coverage this year...nothing between noon - 9 PM on Saturday I figure by next year, if they cover LeMans at all, it will be an hour in the morning, an hour in the evening to recap, and an hour at the end on Sunday morning. You know those "test drives" and practice sessions and talk shows and Pinks are far more lucrative

For the life of me, I can't fathom how they think this model will sell...odd scale, toylike quality...can't compare with the Fresh Cherries diecast...seems to me like a model that besides a few oddballs (yes, we know who they are, and we all have oddball stuff we'd buy that the rest of the world could care less about ) that Lindberg couldn't give these things away.

Should be a great race, as usual. What are the odds on a close 3-way race between Peugeot, Porsche, and Audi? Is anyone else doing a LeMans build during the race? A group of us will be meeting for the third year in a row for a LeMans palooza. Start with a model in primer, have the model finished by the end of the race. There are other groups around the continent that also do LeMans builds during the race. We all have various "rules", ours is simply that the model may be in primer. Other groups allow X number of parts to be prepped. I'm prepping a Fischer D-Type for this year's event. It's so simple, I should be able to get some sleep...I hope Last year I finished this Profil24 Jaguar E Type low drag aero coupe by 1 AM. Thanks mostly to spraying Tamiya paint outside on a hot/sunny day, using a food dehydrator to speed-dry the paint and decals, and partly because it's a simple curbside kit w/o too many parts and not covered in decals. 3 hours to prep/prime, 15 hours on race day.

If GM is sending those, all I can say they are pathetically out of the loop as they severed their ties with Subaru/Fuji Heavy Industries. As Terry mentioned, they sold their stake in Fuji Heavy Industries. On October 5, 2005 Toyota purchased 8.7% of FHI shares from GM who had owned 20.1% of FHI. GM later divested its remaining 11.4% stake, selling its shares on the open market to sever all ties with FHI. Perhaps Toyota will purchase GM? Read About Shareholders Here GM Sells Subaru Shares to Toyota Subaru and Toyota to build cars together at Subaru plant in Indiana

From my perspective, which is often about bumper height on a truck or SUV, all I can say is "hallelujah!" Large SUV's & trucks are easy to live with if/when gas is too cheap. But we've known for decades that oil isn't going to last forever, that supply issues (real or imagined) will grab us by the short hairs, and yet people reversed the downsizing trend from the late 70's when gas got cheap again and SUV's and trucks became so fashionable in the past 15 or so years. You can imagine what the rest of the world thinks about us when we cry foul at the price of gas, when we've been sucking the gasoline pumps dry because so many people here in the US drive so many gas guzzling trucks and SUV's. Now the US mfg's who feasted on profits from the SUV/large truck fad and neglected the car market are caught yet again with their pants down, while the offshore companies who make sensibly sized and fuel-efficient cars for the rest of the world gain more and more of the market here yet again. And for anyone who really needs a large truck or SUV, it's a buyers market right now.

Yes you can, but you have to follow directions to the letter. I couldn't just go to the new site and sign in either, but their customer service emailed me exact instructions and it was painless. Or you can call their customer service and they'll walk you through it. You can choose your old screenname or come up with a new one. I got my old screenname and post count. The new site design takes some getting used to, but that happens with any site that changes. The new forum there is neither fish nor fowl; I'm not crazy about it's design but it does work fine. SA forum members who are subscribers have a good deal more online content to peruse. Face it, the world is moving towards paperless. I don't buy car magazines anymore, everything I need/want I can find online and generally for free. The only time I read car magazines is in a waiting room.

The FWD Cougar was a coupe version of the first generation Ford Contour/Mondeo. I'm afraid you are badly mistaken about any Mitsubishi influence or joint venture, because there was none. Where in the world did you hear about a Mercubishi? Failure of the FWD Cougar was because Mercury didn't know how to sell the car to an audience they had no clue about, along with the fact that the car only had barely average performance and was hampered by odd and contrived "new edge" styling cues. Yeah, the young ladies were lined up for miles to visit the L-M dealers....NOT The Chrysler/Mitsubishi joint venture continued past the death of the Eagle line (Sebring/Avenger, anyone?), and don't forget that Eagle also sold non-Mitsubishi badge engineered Chrysler and even Renault products through the years. History of Diamond Star Motors History of Eagle Automobiles

Very nice

That dedicated and loyal fanbase is dying off at a rapid rate (dying is forever, last time I checked) and isn't buying and therefore paying for enough cars to keep the division alive. It's hard enough to keep Ford alive, why should Ford shovel borrowed money that they don't have straight into another grave? If Mercury really means anything to anyone, they they should buy the division from Ford. Somehow I don't think anyone would really consider that...unless they want to make a small fortune. After starting with a large fortune...

Real.

Close enough for gummint work. Top of the line 1976 Citroen CX Pallas 2200, not sure if it was diesel or not; "Pallas" was the lettering I removed from the emblem. The car was immaculate, especially inside. It's held up very well, especially for a '70's era Euro car. This is the car that succeeded the revolutionary Citroen DS, aka la déesse "the goddess". I believe they chose the CX name for it's aerodynamic "coeffiecient of drag" reference. Citroens could be considered like an early Lexus; they rode like a cloud, were nearly silent going down the road, and were supremely comfortable. Family friends drove a '72 DS, and I always loved riding in that weird car that looked like a cockroach on wheels!

Dub/Olle...you are close...you have the era, nationality and make...how 'bout the model? (the exact model is a bit tough to decipher)

Okay, can anyone guess the make/model/approximate date of mfg. from this interior photo? I obscured the nameplate on the steering wheel...otherwise this immaculate interior is untouched. Seen this past Sunday.

Beancounters/beancounter mentality with management that clearly does not love cars first and foremost, or put people who do love them in the right positions. There is a whole lot of blame to go around, the main thing is they slept and only really invested in trucks, cars were way down the ladder. They handed the car market to the competition by mostly ignoring it. And when they did make good cars, the people who they really wanted to notice didn't care anymore. They were well catered to by other makes. It's not rocket science; if the American companies really want to compete, all they have to do is offer uniquely American style, reliability and quality that is at least comparable to the Japanese, and spend some money advertising them so people know they're out there, and quit cannibalizing with too many divisions selling the same thing under the same parent company banner. Camry/Accord can be beaten if they really try. There's nothing magic about them, other than a lot of people bought them, loved them, and realized that ownership was so easy because the cars were reliable and cheap to maintain, and they were worth a lot when traded in. New ones aren't nearly as bulletproof as the older ones. I wanted to like the Marauder, sat in one at the car show and was severely disappointed. I like the subdued looks. But it was significantly overpriced, and the driver's seat was a complete joke. It squished down like a car that the Marauder supposedly wasn't, and not only that but the seat actually made my whole body tilt towards the door. It was awful. Note to Ford: performance cars should have proper seats, with no excuses! No problem like this with the Impala SS that preceded it by 10 years, it had better performance for much less $$. Impalas sold for a premium. Marauders had to be sold with rebates and discounts. The Milan and Sable are both excellent, but they aren't anything more than badge-engineered Fords. That's not good enough in today's market. The Sable, to me at least, is far more desirable than the Grand Marquis...much more comfortable, much roomier (Grand Marquis has awful rear seat legroom for such a huge car), and better driving (the one to have is the '07/'08 with the bigger motor and the real transmission, not the pencil-sharpener CVT). But it's too close to a Five Hundred/Taurus, also a good car, but hampered by overly boring styling. The Lincoln MKWhatever is the Lincoln version of the Taurus, and it's a fine Mercury, looks a lot more modern than Taurus/Sable, to me it's what Mercury should be, but Ford calls it a Lincoln...and it's a V6 only.

Styling is always subjective. I love how the Prius looks! A lot more than how it drives. It drives like...an old person's car More Mercury buyers would go to Prius if they could get past the styling and actually drive it! Smooth, ultra-quiet, reluctant to change direction with any sort of speed and lots of tire squeal at ridiculously low speeds...People buy Prius more for the "statement" than for anything else. Yes, they do get great mileage. People choose Prius over other hybrids because it looks different...it looks like a hybrid, the are using the Prius as a status symbol of "doing their part to save the environment" even though there are serious problems with hybrids being truly "green"...but that's a whole 'nother story. Meanwhile, hybrids from GM that look far better or more mainstream (Aura/Malibu/Tahoe) are simply not selling. Partially because hybrid status seekers don't acknowledge GM on their radar, and partly because the GM hybrids aren't nearly as efficient as the Prius. The Prius has love-it-or-hate-it styling. It's become completely mainstream; it's on the top ten list of overall sales now. That in itself is amazing. Just commute in a big city like Atlanta, the Prius are ubiquitous. I guess if I had to have a car for driving 20-30K miles/year it would be a good choice for low cost of total ownership. But it would bore me to tears in the driving department just as much as a Grand Marquis Mercury won't be missed by me. Since my Grandfather owned them, and I still remember his '62 Mercury, I've always had them pegged as "old persons cars". My trips to my Mom's retirement village, to the grocery store, and around town seem to indicate that those who actually buy new Mercurys are far above my age bracket. Around here, if you see a younger person driving a Mercury or Buick, either they are driving a relative's car, inherited it, or bought it used. I'd never think twice about buying a Mercury or Buick used if the deal was right. But I'd never spend new car $ on something like that. When I look at Lincoln-Mercury, I see a lost pair of divisions. In actuality, Lincoln has become the "default" Mercury. A not so big step above Ford, with subdued sort-of-distinctive style. There really is no need for Mercury now that Ford has ignored it and let Lincoln slip down a notch in exclusivity. The American companies have no trouble coming out with tasty concepts, but they can't seem to get stuff into production that doesn't scream "rental car quality". Don't blame the designers, blame the beancounters.

Great news! Have you seen what Tapani Rauramo has been casting over in Finland? He's currently casting a Ford Anglia, Saab 96, and Volvo P1800 in 1/25 scale. I have the Saab, and a couple friends have the Volvos and Anglias. Wayne Webers just finished this Anglia for his brother-in-law, who owned the 1:1. I helped him w/paint/foil, finished it up Monday: Very cool/obscure stuff out there. Tapani is working on a Citroen DS master. Prices are high due to the dollar being relatively worthless vs. the Euro.

Looks kewl I'm getting Kevin's Ron Fellows decals soon to build one of the white Sebring cars.

It's very hot here in the summer, A/C costs a fortune, I keep the thermostat up pretty high and my basement workshop is the coolest place in my house. Needless to say, I enjoy building during the summer months.

Bravo Bill! Thanks Len for the coverage. Nice build; this is gonna be a very popular kit

And I was just noticing this kit is now discontinued again Should be fun...I have some Corvette Americas in a similar state. Having seen a handful of them when I lived in Pasadena, I've always had a soft spot for that very long Corvette. One of these days I'll get one of them back up to snuff. Part of me wonders what a C6 America would look like

I've seen the Uptown kits in normal Revell boxes at Michaels; I think the flat boxes were a "Wal Mart" thing...