Zoom Zoom

Lookin' forward to seeing this one! The color choice sounds interesting. Good luck with it, and can't wait to see it finished. Nice choice of rolling stock, too

I read the other online tutorials and they say to wait at least an hour, perhaps overnight...I guess these are the same guys that say to leave enamel drying for a month before working with it When I decant the spray it tends to boil a bit in the cup for a few minutes. I use an open cup on my airbrush and haven't had any disasters, but capping the decanted spray could be messy upon reopening, like a soda bottle shaken then opened. I tend to decant small amounts, apply a few drops of thinner, let it gas out a couple minutes, and spray. No problems so far. And I've found new straws that fit tightly over Tamiya nozzles, so that I don't need any tape or fun-tack to hold the straw in place. It's so easy, even a cave man can do it

The '58 PM kit came with tampo-printed whitewalls that look pretty good. The white's a bit glossy, but can be dulled a bit with some dullcoat. If you want to paint them yourself, you can get a circle template from the drafting dept. of your favorite art/craft supply store, tape the tire to it securely, and airbrush flat white acrylic. You could add a little bit of flat yellow or tan to give the white more of an ivory appearance. Shabo makes pretty good wide white dry transfers as well.

I doubt it, but who knows? Plain old hardware store lacquer thinner is what I cut Testors enamel with. It's dirt cheap and hasn't ever caused any crazing. Dries faster too. I would save Mr. Color Thinner for cutting hotter paints like Black Gold HOK stuff, or thinning decanted Tamiya sprays. Tamiya's own lacquer thinner seems identical to Mr. Color Thinner.

Nice pics, thanks for sharing. Hope you don't mind me saving pics of the Alfa; I'm going to attempt to build my Heller Alfa 1750 Zagato prior to our NNL in November. Good reference

Strange indeed; I haven't had to log back in for about a week or longer, no problems with either Firefox or the couple of times I opened it w/IE.

It would help to know which Tamiya putty you are using. They make three very different kinds. Only the 2-part epoxy putty would work like modeling clay and be helped w/water for shaping. They also have a traditional style (gray), and a UV-light-curing putty.

I'm using Firefox and saved the login/password, but I haven't had any trouble-I'm always logged in when I visit without manually logging in.

Hands down the finest model I've ever seen of the '66. Very nice

That's really cool AMX's are one of the cooler cars that have been overshadowed by the other pony cars. This one looks almost like one of their factory concepts. I think Dick Teague would heartily approve of it.

I refuse to go on any Wally World expeditions looking for kits, because 99% of the time I never find what I want. I'll go into a store if I need something else, and there's a Wally World in the same shopping center as my local grocery store. My local store just shrank the big model dept. drastically. There are a ton of AMT kits up high on the shelves waiting to be marked down. A few Revell and Maisto kits as well. No new Mercs nor Lindberg kits. I realize every store independently determines the size/quantity/type of merchandise. My store grew the model dept. last year, but is shrinking it back. It's been in a constant state of flux ever since the store opened. Apparently Aug. 15 is the "official" sale date for the '49 Merc.

I put just as much effort into a paintjob on a race car as I would any street car. They simply look the best with the best finish possible; a fisheye on a 1:1 scale car wouldn't be visible on a model. You scale down factory orange peel to 1/24 or 1/25 and it's going to be awfully smooth on a model. IMHO you have to make the paint really smooth, and then make a decision whether the decals need to be a natural finish over the clear, or clearcoated over. A model is a depiction; you'll never be able to make an exact match of the finish in the right scale. Even when I've weathered a race car, I made the underlying paint job as smooth as possible.

Model Roundup will have them next week. Now guys won't have to burn $100 in gas on a wild goose chase searching Wally Worlds over several states My Wally World doesn't have them; they had a ton of models a week ago, they just greatly reduced the size of the model area, all the kits that I guess they'll be discounting are all up at the top of the shelves where I had no chance of reaching them. I guess they still need to put markdown stickers on them.

That looks great I'll have to get one of them next time I go visit the Model Roundup. I had several friends who worked as mechanics at a Dick Brooks Honda dealership. They always called it "Peter Creek" Honda

Actually the hot weather will help me get a bit more done; I have an unfinished basement that stays pretty cool and it does have some benefit from the A/C upstairs, but it's definitely cooler in the basement where my workbench is at. I'll be there a lot over the next few weeks.

The Sakatsu rims are too small, too many spokes. The BBS RE's for Challenge cars aren't quite it either. However, Scale Motorsports detail set for the C6R will have the proper BBS wheels. I would imagine someone may end up casting them in resin at some point, as they're a necessary wheel for a lot of road racing models, and so far the kit companies haven't come through. The Revell AG C6R LeMans is a waste; still has the OZ wheels Or perhaps SMS will offer the wheels separately (being aluminum they won't be cheap).

Okay, now take a deep breath...the kit gets "officially" released on the 15th, according to the Model Roundup. Soon everyone, even those w/o the elusive WM Mercs, will be able to get them. I quit doing WM expeditions long ago, never could find anything new/hot locally that I heard about people finding elsewhere. My local store has a ton of kits, but not the new Merc.

It could be renamed The Bomb. Bickering old modelers board

Scale Equipment, Ltd. has an excellent and very correct Nomad resin body. The master is based on the old-tool '57 which many feel looks more realistic than AMT's new-tool '57. Scale Equipment Ltd.

When you post a message, under the "Fonts" area above the typing rectangle, the second button from the left is the button that you hit to bring up a small box to insert your photo URL. If you put the cursor over it, it will highlight "insert image". Clicking this button and copying the URL in the box is easier than typing HTML code on the HHMB, once you get the hang of it. If you want to post more than one picture, you can copy/paste the as many times as you have pictures, and simply paste the URL's between the two brackets. Neat wagon

An awful lot of people think Future is a "wax" or polish of some kind. It is not. It's merely a clear acrylic coating. It's a very mild clearcoat paint. It can be brushed on, airbrushed on, or even applied w/a cotton ball or cotton swab. For airbrushing I find it's best to not thin it, but actually to let it sit and evaporate a bit, as it goes on runny. If you want to polish it after it's dry, it doesn't stand up well at all to wetsanding. Dry sand and buff only. Personally I've found it of limited use as a finish coat, I prefer clear lacquers instead. Future can be removed w/a bit of ammonia. I don't think Future is really what you may be looking for. If you've already done the polishing you mentioned, you don't need Future, properly dried enamel gives a harder finished surface with more durability against contact while building/finishing the model. You might want to buff the paint to a higher gloss and the Treatment applied w/the softest cloth possible will give you great results. You have to buff the paint w/enough friction to generate heat, and the heat helps to level out the paint and make the orange peel and microscopic scratches from the micromesh vanish.

I'm glad that Tom Carter posted a personal recommendation for his customers to try out Model Roundup. I've been friends w/Jack from Model Roundup for a number of years (he's local and a great supporter of our club ACME and a heck of a nice guy to talk with) and he told me recently that MR has been swamped w/orders this summer. So while the future may be kind of bleak if Revell/AMT etc. scale way back and change their focus (their lack of creative marketing to grow their business could almost be considered criminal neglect...) at least in the short term customers who liked Hobby Heaven will have an oasis w/Model Roundup, who have excellent friendly service, great prices and keep a good stock of new kits at all times so you shouldn't have to wait for backorders as you may have elsewhere. I just hope that all the malaise based upon the kit mfgs. doesn't make the majority of modelers still active just pack up and quit. Seems everyone has this doom and gloom prediction, and it's kind of sad to think that the driving force for the doom and gloom is the potential lack of cheap model kits in the future. We already have decades worth of them sitting in our closets, let's keep buying the ones we want and can get and building them before the paint and glue companies fold. It would be nice if we could go for months or years w/o so many doom and gloom predictions slapping us in the face constantly, whether they be real or just internet rumors, or some mixture of both.

I also noticed the numbers on the rear doors are the same green as the stripe and mountains. Not sure if there's an easy way to shoot some acrylic green over those stripes/numbers or not. Is their "printing" locked in stone, or can you change the color selection of those before they're cut?? Neat project!

RIP Hobby Heaven. Lots of changes in our hobby. This is a big one. I still remember our club ordering 2 cases of '63 Galaxie Prestige kits when they came out. That was just the beginning...

I hadn't noticed that they didn't have it out here yet. They brought out the Superamerica in US form pretty fast, and the 599 GTB Fiorano is coming soon too. Dunno why the Spider isn't on the list yet. Chris is right about the difference between the Revell and Fujimi F430's. The Fujimi is a better kit, even though it doesn't have a full engine. Everything that is visible under the clear engine cover is very well executed. The body, wheels, tires, and ride height are all much better on the Fujimi F430. That said, if you get a Revell it can look great but it will take more work to get there.