Zoom Zoom

Dave, I can't fault any fun $10 build, I have plenty of them myself and there is a certain satisfaction that comes from "saving" a turkey of a kit, or turning a sow's ear into a silk purse. However, let's look at the AMT F&F Evo for a minute (Dave, yours is the only one I've ever seen built; the younger builders on a couple other forums I visit avoided it like the plague)...here they had a chance to satisfy a market that had been ignored; every Evo kit out there is a curbside. Fujimi's Evo VII/VIII/IX has a few minor issues with appearance and the wheels all look too small. Had AMT designed the Evo like Revell did their "Uptown" kits, I'd have been relatively happy. At least Revell keeps the stock body proportions, including wheel openings. AMT made the Evo a complete caricature; not only does it have the huge wheels, but the wheel openings themselves are huge. It went from "bling" to "cartoon" with that one decision; I can't even justify it for parts, it's just too over-the-top. The Mustang kit was another example; the tuner wheel design was far too big; had they included wheels that were of the proper size, it would have been pretty cool. The Skyline GTR engine was a nice touch, but the wheels are obnoxious. AMT just didn't "get it", they were simply filling Wal Mart orders with little care for content inside the boxes. Thankfully the Model King makes sure the content is something we want, and the boxart is accurate, and we get some great new decals that AMT never included. That adds tremendous value to the models. The AMT team as of late was anything but "value added", they were just churning out reissues and somewhat half-hearted new stuff that look embarrassing next to anything by Revell. I have seen a couple AMT F&F 350Z's built, it seems to fare a lot better than the Evo for proportions, but nobody is fooled that it's a Tamiya kit that's been customized. The shape of the car is more adaptable to a wild tuner, and the Z car already has huge wheel flares and wheel openings. Let's just hope whomever buys AMT returns the competence that they were previously known for. I'm not expecting miracles, but the Model King is proving that there's plenty of life left w/AMT when there are competent people making the decisions and working on the details. Heck, there are plenty of Model King issues coming to pretty much satisfy the entire AMT lineup without needing to bother with big-box retailers. Something like 16 kits expected by the end of the year, and a couple for early '08.

Amen to that; unfortunately the very few new releases AMT did in the past couple years, the Camaro Concept, 300C, Escalade EXT, a couple of Fast and Furious Tuners, all missed the mark in some fashion. The Camaro was probably the best overall, but issues such as sink marks (especially on the wheels), & some missing body engraving showed them to be somewhat asleep at the wheel; the 300C is riddled with clumsy detailing, the body is mis-proportioned (compare it to the Revell 300C which captures the shape/details better, even if it is a bling-mobile), the engine is generic, the wheels seem far too small, the stance on most built ones seems off, the Escalade has the generic motor, the tuners are Jada-like. AMT lost the battle of enthusiasm when they canned the US design team, therefore the only kits that are any good are the Model King kits because the Model King understands the customer and product in a way that RC2's people cannot comprehend. Let's hope whomever purchases AMT has a soul, as the minions running the AMT brand from RC2 certainly haven't a clue, and haven't since they fired the whole team.

Persistence pays off!

If it won't spray water or thinner alone without trouble, there's a blockage in the system somewhere. You may want to disassemble it and clean everything, if you are using the bottle/cap make sure the small hole in the cap is there to vent, make sure the o-ring bushing that the needle goes through from the body into the chamber isn't damaged or worn out. Hard to say what it is w/o seeing it in person, but the symptoms indicate a blockage somewhere restricting the flow of either air and/or paint.

That's sad indeed; what's happening is that the biggest, best-run shows tend to be thriving, and the smaller shows are hurting in this period of change w/in our hobby. It's hard to get vendors to a show if they don't feel confident they'll make the sales necessary. With Ebay and the internet, they don't have to travel nearly as much anymore. A show also thrives if the "show" part is well-run and especially if there's a contingent of well-known and talented builders that are likely to show up. Running a show is a lot of work, year after year, and a bit of luck as well. Our local NNL took years to get where it is today; it's become the largest in the region and we've got a great group of club members that all pitch in and make it the best show possible. It seems to be working; we're still experiencing growth and big crowds, and our vendor tables are nearly sold out now, 2 months prior to the event, earlier than ever.

At the current time, AMT is pretty much out of the kit business. I believe they have one more kit to produce, a reissue '66 Wildcat, and that's it until they sell the brand. Since the line is being discontinued, retail stores are no longer able to order more if the warehouse is empty; so most chain stores put AMT kits on closeout. They're disappearing fast. But AMT produced a ton of reissue kits in the late part of last year and early this year, so the pinch hasn't really been felt yet. Next year may be a different story. We all hope someone who cares buys AMT. They are doing private runs of older kits for the Model King and a few others. To be honest, these private run kits are a lot more desirable as they haven't been reissued over and over and over and over and over and over as they have the standard kits. Our closets are full of that stuff. They need to either reissue the kits that haven't seen the light of day in decades, or tool up new kits, if they're going to survive or thrive. I feel no need to hoard any AMT kits; I have plenty to see me through. And I'm enjoying a good number of the Model King reissues.

Hey Jackie, glad to see you made it here! I think you'll like this place just fine. Any progress of note on the Marauder X100? I really don't wanna have to do one myself, but I will if I have to-though I'm rooting for the one you're doing to be in resin at some point, considering I have 3 or 4 of the '69 Galaxies No hurry though, I only have an inbox of front-burner stuff that's almost punishing right now

Wow, that color is awesome on that! I have a 308 painted in a similar color. I believe Ismael does as well. Wait 'til he sees this too! Looks almost like "Grigio Alloy" that debuted on the 360 Modena. That's the old Italeri kit, not bad at all for a start, just adjust the wheel location/ride height and it's a nice model, as we can certainly see. The Fujimi kit is a labor of love, it's got about 3,876,592.25 parts, 80% of which need lots of TLC like mold line removal and filling of sink marks on parts you'll never see once assembled

Hey Yankee! Welcome aboard. This board isn't subdivided; post in-progress stuff there, and finished models in "under glass". One of these days when I go up to G'ville I'm going to sneak over to Mauldin (if I don't get caught in a speed trap...uh, at least that's what Mauldin used to be known worldwide for ) to say "hey!"

Here's the kicker: Paints that are intended to be glossy have a lot of clear carrier in them; so the color pigment will be less dense, you'll need to apply more coats simply to cover and get the color to one solid shade. Testors MM lacquers are nice because they cover so well and you let the final clearcoat bring up your gloss. I don't find them more time consuming in the least, in fact a quick-covering base coat w/gloss overcoats generally gives a thinner overall paint layer and saves time overall. I'm hoping these new colors are just like the MM lacquers; fast coverage, fast drying. I prefer to airbrush them, and I wish they'd be available in bottles. Hopefully the pearls/metallics are finely ground. Some of the MM lacquers have awfully large, almost "metalflake" sized metallic particles that are terribly out of scale.

My recent experience shooting Cobra Colors paint over one coat of Tamiya white primer on my '49 Merc resulted in some mild crazing in a few areas. Other areas where I did more bodywork (removing mold lines which were much worse than the average Japanese kit ) and treated to Plastikote primer didn't show any signs of crazing when shooting the Cobra Colors paint. I used BIN sealer as a spot-sealer over the heavily-sanded styrene where I removed the mold lines, sanded/reshot the Plastikote primer. I honestly can't say that Plastikote itself blocks etching better than Tamiya, or if it was because the body itself got a lot more primer in general. The areas I sanded did ghost slightly w/ the reapplication of Plastikote over those areas before I used the sealer. There was no sanding on the underhood/chassis parts that I only shot w/Tamiya primer before shooting Cobra Colors paint. I always cut my Black Gold paint w/Gunze Mr. Thinner and have no problems there, but I spray Cobra Colors straight from the bottle as they flow well through my airbrush w/o thinning. Therefore my results really don't say a whole lot other than a single coat of Tamiya primer wasn't enough to block Cobra Colors from mildly etching the plastic. I've had the same happen using MCW over a light coat of Tamiya primer on a Fujimi GT40. Had I not sanded those body areas on the Merc, or had I used Plastikote instead of Tamiya on the chassis/underhood areas, I don't know if I would have had the same crazing appear. Needless to say, it was easy enough to fix and avoid.

Go for it! I think it's fun.

Great model Has anyone attempted a convertible from this kit? Seems like a natural, whether by Revell or by a builder's own modifications.

Yes, the '70 is and always has been a promo-style kit with an engine plate, as were all of the "Motor City Stockers" kits from that year. The '69 Wildcat was full-detail. I'm getting my Wildcat and the Torino stock car today

That's absolutely stunning, Harry! Looks like it just came off the winning platform at Pebble Beach. The average builder has no idea the amount of re-engineering to make a Pocher kit look as intended. The majority of them that are ever finished end up looking a little rough around the edges of it because they're so complicated and imperfect. Most people give up the dream long before finishing the model. Seeing a model like this is a treat; this is the first one I've ever seen of this particular kit built to such a lofty standard. I'd love to see it in person! Can we convince you to come join the party here in November at our NNL? We'd love to have you. I'd need oxygen if you and Mark both attended and parked your Alfas next to each other

Yowza! Can I hop on it for a daytrip to the mountains? I've got my helmet, gloves, boots ready to go...that thing looks real! Nice work on a subject I haven't seen built!

I'm a member of ACME the host club. Thanks for the comments. Please carefully read the list of 2006 winners below, and where they came from: TOP TEN: Randy Derr Foyt USAC Camaro (best in show) (Bellbrook, Ohio) Jerel Wolfe custom '67 GTX (Greenville, SC) Paul Grala-Corvette C6 (ACME member) Dirk Joseph-VW Crew Cab (Jacksonville, FL) Chris Chapman-Big Bomber "rat" truck (Knoxville, TN) David Morton-mostly scratchbuilt Brockway (Somewhere on East Coast, between Virginia and Florida) Ken Mouton-Porsche 910 (Simpsonville, SC) Clay Kemp-Brut funnycar (Indianapolis, IN) Chuck Sears-Zesto diorama (Atlanta, not an ACME club member) Winston Mitchell Magna Custom (he's an ACME member now, but not before the '06 show) Best Porsche: Eric Cole 1/12 Tamiya Porsche 935 (ACME member) Best NASCAR-Clay Kemp Monte Carlo (Indianapolis, IN) Best Junior-Jordan Rhymer Camaro (Chattanooga, TN) Augie Hiscano Best Engineered-Dan Smith '25 Dodge der Black Max (Danville, VA) Best Pony Car-Randy Derr Foyt USAC Camaro (Bellbrook, Ohio) Steve Linngren won the ACME President's award, which is given to an ACME club member every year, voted on by the president and previous winners.

Ismael, I haven't tried DC primer recently, in years past it seemed pretty hot. I'm working on Revell's newest plastic, and I'll tell you that a coat of Tamiya white primer wasn't enough to block Cobra Color from mildly etching some of the plastic after a wet final coat Those areas were under the hood and the chassis, not a big deal. A few other parts had not been painted yet, and I applied the CC paint over them in very light coats and the crazing problem didn't recur. The body had a lot of sanding of mold lines, PK primer definitely made the mold lines ghost after sanding, I spotted Zinsser BIN via airbrush over those areas only, sanded and reprimed the entire body w/PK primer, sanded and then applied Cobra Colors paint and had zero problems w/ghosting or crazing. I had spotted in just the mold line areas w/PK primer before any sanding so the lines would show up easier; it didn't craze the virgin plastic. I think PK is milder than Duplicolor. Thankfully I know one Wal Mart and several Michael's that still carry it. I can empathize with your inability to get PK primer...I really think it's the most plastic-friendly of the auto primers. Tamiya spray paint is lacquer, but it doesn't eat plastic, it doesn't need a primer, but it does need to be applied over a color that complements Tamiya's rather thin pigment. Tamiya primer is the best/smoothest, but it's expensive and it's not as effective a solvent block as other primers and sealers. If I'm doing much bodywork/sanding and using auto paint for the color I'm at a point where I'll use Plastikote and BIN as my preferred primer and sealer combo. Requires a bit more wetsanding w/micromesh before the color coats, but it's worth the extra effort when the plastic doesn't craze.

!sdrawkcab gnidaer etah I !sgnoleb ti yaw eht ot kcab ti gninrut rof sknahT

Don't fix it unless it's broke. It weren't broke. The way this post is set up doesn't make much sense. There's a reason most forums have the original post first, and all other subsequent replies in order below it. If you could arrange it with the original post first, then the replies in order from the newest down to the oldest, that might be okay.

Wow The license plate truly says it all!

Sounds good so far, but I'm guardedly optimistic until I see a correct grille and an effective solution to the taillight panel differences between the two. Wish Revell would take the yawn-worthy '99 Cobra and turn it into an '03 Mach I.

The Nova HT is great; but the roof does have one inaccuracy. The drip rail molding is dead flat, where it should have a gentle arc to it. Nothing major, and oddly enough it's exactly the same inaccuracy as the AMT annual '62-65 Nova HT's. The Nova CV windshield looks way off to me, and the tonneau cover is rather tall. The '60 Pontiac...well, it's been beaten to death. And deservedly so

Has anyone tried fitting the "stock" Cosmopolitan taillights from the inside of the body? Seems they might mount there w/o too much trouble, and would look better frenched. I want to try making the "stock" fender skirts fit flush to the body as well.

Actually the taillights are chrome; the bigger ones are from a Lincoln Cosmopolitan and the smaller bullets are '59 Caddy units. Both need clear red applied. There are small clear lenses for the front turn signals, the larger ones that look the size of the taillights are the spotlight lenses. Perhaps they'll work as taillight lenses too if you don't use the spotlights.