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T N I C L N E S S Hey, vintage build...vintage reply One of my favorites. One of these days I'll build mine. Might be an antique by the time I get to it...

Thanks for the updates and how-to. Looks like a great kit. My plans are more along the "mainstreamer" lines. Flat hood, vinyl top, poverty caps...closer to how I remember so many of these cars. Even w/the tame powerplants they were fun to drive!

Thanks! I'm pretty sure I have a set of these wheels as well, they're 23" Pegasus Vantage; they're 2 pieces with the center part being removable to paint, and you can adjust the offset a bit front to rear.

Now that's a gentleman's hot rod! Love it. Color/wheels look great. I too failed to make the taillights look better on mine. I'd drive one just like this in a heartbeat! Please Revell...new CTS-V...pleeeeeeeeeeze!

Because Venezuela is an oil-producing country, it's their top export. While the US has oil reserves, we import most of the oil we consume. US policy is for us to consume everyone else's oil, leaving ours mostly alone, a strategic policy for when oil is really running out. We put price controls on imported oil (which was a disaster), Venezuela's price control is for their own product. Their citizens get a break from their country selling oil to the rest of the world. You really cannot compare an oil producing country's price controls to our policy back then of controlling the price of imported oil.

Revell said a couple years back that they were going to shift all emphasis back towards plastic from diecast, and that may very well be because of the 4X rise in zinc prices (of course gasoline has gone up over 5X in under a decade). Their "Vanishing Point" Challenger is coming out in plastic, and I too hope the '62 Corvette and the '78 Smokey and the Bandit Trans Am both get made in plastic...each of those kits trounces the ones made by AMT.

Tamiya announced the 1/12 semi-finished GTO awhile back. Maybe a month or so...same series as their Enzo and F50. Same for Revell; this was announce awhile back. The '68 is a plastic version of their previous "American Dreams" diecast '68 kit; based upon the Bullitt diecast and also a '67 Shelby GT500. I built one of the American Dreams Mustangs, and was pretty happy with it.

Normally a new Ferrari has me excited. This one? No way. The face is okay, the rest is a disaster. Looks like Lexus said to their worst designer "we need to make the SC430 a bit sportier" and this is what we got. A fugly looking car, ruined by the ginormous back end to hide the retractable hardtop for Beverly Hills housewives and part time real estate agents. Truly a sad day, could only be worse if it were an SUV. The Porsche Cayenne GTS looks better to me. I cannot believe I just said that I cannot believe that it's absolutely true The original California Spyder is a timeless beauty and classic. This car is the polar opposite, just a touch of retro in the front, and then a mishmash of throwaway gimmicks behind the front wheels. Meanwhile, I'm awaiting the F430 Scuderia kit from Fujimi. It looks delicious.

Thanks for the photo coverage! Did you win anything?

Thanks for all the comments. I had to beef up the wheel retainers; I cut some styrene tubing and fit it over the stub axles on the Mustang and they attach to the backs of the brakes. Pretty primitive, but works. You want more accurate detail, rob a Revell Mustang For comparison with the Revell kit, here it is next to my Revell GT:

You'll get a faster answer through Kalmbach customer service. They emailed me back quickly; plus they had sent a general email out. Everyone has to re-register, but you can reclaim your screen name.

Got my Revell R8 and '68 Charger today, along with another set of Hasegawa P/E rims for my second Testa Rossa, also a stock Maisto VW Squareback, and a Cessna 180 to build for a friend who owns/flies a real one. I wasn't going to get a Charger until I saw the new wheels/hubcaps. Wonder if I can scare up a slant 6 for it? The R8 is very nice, the white plastic and normal box makes it a big improvement over the Revell AG version, not to mention the price is much lower.

Here's the deal: It wouldn't let me in either, it wouldn't recognize my email address. As a subscriber, I had to use my subscriber number (12 digits), enter my zip code, enter my password, and I retrieved my username. You can also start with a new username. Not sure how it works for non-subscribers. There's a whole lot more online goodies now for subscribers. It's definitely going to take time to figure it all out, but it's definitely a step in the right direction. I was able to access all of my reviews easily; I assume there will be a lot more of the magazine content available online. I'm on Firefox and I couldn't get in via IE either. You have to follow the directions to the letter. User-friendly it is not! They sent out an email explaining things; that helped me out as I couldn't figure it out on my own. If you're a subscriber or have an email address listed for forum use, you should get that email.

I just looked up prices; yes, there was an increase across the board. Glad my Charger and R8 were pre-increase prices. Seems prices are up anywhere from 50 cents to almost $2 per kit.

Thanks, I made styrene spacers. I'll shoot the chassis later; I have to repair one of the wheels and I need to beef up the attachment pieces w/some styrene tubing. I use a chisel-point black Sharpie for the black window masking. It's painfully easy, even freehand

I got mine today along with the '68 Charger. The R8 is better than the Euro version; all molded in white. I've got ideas...Cayman wheels like I put on the GT500 look great on the R8 as well.

It works great; just smash it on, use a toothpick/whatever to push it off the surface you want to paint. I learned about it when I wanted to buy vinyl masks for a camo pattern for an airplane, they were out of the masks and the guy told me that the IPMS builders loved using Silly Putty to do the camo masking. And he was right!

A few more pics:

I score the diecasts when they're cheap or on sale. Got the FX "assembly line" kit from Hobby Lobby, the kits have two sets of wheels. Probably paid 8 or 9 bucks for it. I have quite a scrapyard of Maisto models w/o any wheels

Thanks! I did the Revell kit immediately when it came out, and used Aoshima wheels on it. Had to do a lot of Dremel work to get the wheels inside the fenders, this kit's easier to modify. If it weren't for the big bling wheels and tubbed chassis to accept the gigantic wheels, the detail/quality of this kit really is superior to AMT, and rivals Revell, better in some respects. The plastic is much better than both Revell/AMT, and everything is very crisp. Jada can keep coming out with more kits like this, and I'll be perfectly happy. Here's my GT, painted in Ford Tungsten Gray. I bought Tungsten Gray/Legend Lime/Windveil Blue when they were available from Cobra Colors.

Finished the Jada GT500; overall I'm pretty happy with it. I ended up using Porsche Cayman wheels/Fujimi brakes. Paint is Ford Windveil Blue.

Another rethink of the wheels; I had a set of 19" Porsche Cayman wheels that look good, almost GT500 KR style. They will fit my Fujimi brakes very well. The engine/interior/glass went in w/o any problems. The kit seems very well engineered. I did replace the smallish and too-far-inset headlamps w/some craft store faux MV lenses.

The stripes also caused me to rethink the wheels. The bigger wheels started to look distracting, fighting for attention with the stripes (without stripes, the car seems to need the bigger wheels). I set the Maisto 1/24 scale Mustang 18's back under it, and to my eyes it just works, regardless of the mix 'n match nature of this model. If I were to have a stock set of 1/24 scale GT500 wheels I doubt they'd look any better. I may try some other wheels, though I think these GT wheels will be the final look:

Thanks for the comments! The white stripes really make a difference, lots of Ford racing heritage is showing through:

Last year F1 wasn't nearly so boring (far better than the year previous) with all the various surprises and the race for the championship that was close all the way to the end. This year it's been a yawner. The fact that so much of the "sport" is the pinnacle of engineering and talent and is lost by races that just aren't thrilling to watch, more like parades...sad to see so little true racing and lead changes (not just because of pit stops) and thrilling action on the track. I'd rather see them racing vintage F1 cars w/ skinny tires and no wings.