Zoom Zoom

It was IMHO the best looking of all the mid-size GM cars of the time. Same can be said for the 1st generation Grand Am, though the Laguna S3 is arguably as good. Occasionally a '73-77 Grand Prix could look as good, but most looked a bit over-adorned. I never saw one rusted out; moved south in 1976 and never, ever looked back. Life is too short to deal with 4 months of brutal winter weather and the effect it has on cars (and everything else). I wish what you said about an MPC Grand Am were true; there was never a kit of this Grand Am. You might be remembering a Ventura II. If there had been an MPC (or Monogram) Grand Am I would have build a case of them A couple people did Grand Am conversions; I saw them at Toledo years ago. One was a replica of a Grand Am that had an aftermarket bodykit much like a Trans Am, with fender spats and a shaker hood. The real one was in the parking lot. Also had a very rare factory 4-speed.

It's about time F1 faced a future w/o the major players due to the utter incompetency from the top. Bernie and Max need to go. Yesterday wouldn't be too soon. I was so over F1 by the end of last year I promised to never watch it again until those two clowns are gone, and then only again if F1 raced in North America again. F1 doesn't deserve any fans from North America.

In my experience Tamiya tape had never left any residue, what looks like residue is a pattern in the paint left behind from the tape itself that's etched in the paint. That's why adhesive removers aren't working because the only way to remove the pattern is to cut into the paint by polishing it. Read my explanation above why this happens (it can happen regardless of whether it was dehydrated). If by chance there is any sticky adhesive residue left over, which I highly doubt due to how the Tamiya tape is made (and how often I've used it with different kinds of paint-never any adhesive left behind, but often the telltale signs that I masked too soon and the paint needs to be polished out again to remove the etching), it should polish off with Novus, or any similar polish. That's what I've done whenever I used a cheaper kind of masking tape that did leave residue, or an old sheet of BMF that leaves behind some adhesive residue.

Hmmmm...I see a small but telling amount of trickery going on here

1. It's the pattern of the tape that's etched into the surface of the paint, not adhesive residue. 2. Yes, the damage is definitely there because you left the tape in place when you put it in the dehydrator. The tape traps solvents underneath from gassing out, if you apply it over paint that is not thoroughly cured this will happen regardless if you use a dehydrator or not. Masking tape should only stay on long enough to mask, shoot new paint and let the paint flash off. Remove it ASAP, I generally remove it within 10 minutes of the last coat of paint, because I don't want any potential problems. If you have enough paint applied you might be able to wetsand and polish out the tape damage. If you had let the base color cure for a week in the dehydrator before masking, and applied the new mask and new paint and removed the masking tape right after the second color, you wouldn't have had this problem.

Other sites load a lot faster than this one on a more regular basis, I'd say you have some slow server issues at times. My computer is pretty clean and mean, and this site can be slow at times. Other times it blazes right along.

I agree. The wheels alone gave me the instant answer to this week's ROM. Unbelievable that someone would spend a lot of time and $$ to build a car-especially a "replica" of a legend, and then kill it with nasty wheels. Modelers do the same...but since Cobra Daytonas are very expensive models, I can't fathom a model builder putting these stupid wheels on their model.

Micro Set and Micro Sol are intended to be used together; Microset under the decal, Micro Sol over it. Some decals need little help, so Micro Set is okay on it's own (smells like vinegar). Micro Sol helps to get decals to soften and conform. It can look scary when it's applied (wrinkling the decal), but the decal should shrink-to-fit as it cures. Further applications might be necessary to get the decals completely adhered. This system works pretty well, and you can speed the dry/cure by using a dehydrator and careful application of a hair dryer. I've had some good experience w/Solvaset, but it's also damaged some decals. Be very careful with it the first time. Micro Set/Micro Sol seems to be milder. Dale aka 935K3 swears by a method that also works most of the time for me, and that's to use a very hot/damp cloth to set the decal in place. If it's hot enough the heat/steam will do the same tricks to the decals as solvents. As always, test ahead of time to see what really works. In your case where you are in need of something ASAP/now, this might do the trick until you can get another supply of your preferred decal solvent.

You need hot water hotter than tap water and cooler than boiling. A wide pan on the stove that you can dunk most of the body into all at once once the pan starts getting a few bubbles forming. Dunk it for just a second or so, that may be all it needs, and try to shape it back. You'll know quickly if it was enough or not. Redunk as necessary. It should never take more than a few seconds. The resin is pretty forgiving, it won't do anything (like warp out of control) without you doing the flexing. Just flex it carefully in the opposite direction of the warp, hold it, check it...it's pretty easy. I have the same resin GP, and it was perfect when I got it but it warped a bit in the storage box when repacked it carelessly. It will go back to the right shape; I use a container of cool water to hold the new shape.

A Cobra Daytona Coupe should never, ever look like it's from "Pimp my Ride".

I saw about a half dozen of them (2010 V6) today at Road Atlanta, they were all rentals. V6, side stripes, saw bright red, metallic red, metallic gold, grabber blue. The blue is awesome. I really like the look of the new car, taillights included. That was the one gray area, now that I've seen 'em in the wild, I like it. The new V6 front end is much like the 09 GT500. I like the V6 front end better than the fussy GT front end, but the new GT500 is really sweet.

If you post the question/photo on the Spotlight Hobbies message board, you'll likely get an answer as there seem to be more kit historians there than here. The Chrysler was reissued sometime in the past 10 years or so by Revell. It's a Revell kit, don't know why AMT is on the box.

THANK YOU! for the photo. This is the first in-public proof that it's really coming that I've seen, and surprising nobody else took photos or even mentioned this kit was at the Milwaukee NNL. So the NNL East took all the thunder that weekend, or are people that apathetic?

You might have more luck w/a white metal or resin antenna base drilled out and use wire or hypodermic needle/wire for antenna, which should be plenty strong. Mirror bases...if it's as soft as white metal it's still going to be prone to breaking, you bend it a few times it's likely to break. Most mirrors I use are modern so I drill a hole in the base and insert a wire, drill a hole in the body, and I have a much stronger attachment point.

Read through the entire thread, I think you'll get a good idea of what opinions are. I don't have any of their product. I would never buy it unless I saw it in person and could inspect.

Looks awful. Are we talking about the same resin caster? The Frontier I know about does factory stock type stuff, mostly trucks, forward cab Jeep, a wagon or two, a Mercury Marauder. His feedback is 100%. I think he's based in PA and pretty much only deals on Ebay. Frontier

Sweet. You can build a model of it

I would bet that the metal cast in rubber molds like that would be softer than resin. White metal sure is softer than resin. I hate the stuff...

And the Vauxhaul GT is a rebadged Opel GT (so that makes 3 rebadges, not including Solstice) which is mostly a badge-engineered Solstice. The exterior and interior are different enough to whittle down to two cars; Solstice and the Opel/Sky/Vauxhaul variant. Whatever. Making four different specialty/boutique badges of essentially the same car (all two seat roadsters) from one car...this is one very good reason why GM is in such dire straits. The Pontiac Solstice was it's own unique concept, but GM just couldn't help itself and allowed (encouraged?) their divisions cannibalize each other. The Solstice was the last "true" Pontiac, designed from the outset to be a Pontiac first. All the smack-talk compared to the Mazda MX-5 when it came out. The only thing it had over the MX-5 was sexy GM styling. Everything else the MX-5 did was better. And after all the chest-beating and smack talk by GM when the Solstice came out...the Solstice is dying after one generation, the MX-5 is still alive, still racing every weekend, still satisfying owners worldwide, still being developed. Gee, I never saw that coming The Solstice HT will be one of the few collectible GM cars from this era. Seriously, it has all the right stuff to be a future collectible...last true Pontiac, sports car, head-turning "hey, it looks a bit like the Cheetah" style. I'd own one. RIP Pontiac. My only 1:1 Pontiac, loved it...wish I still had it: '78 Grand Am, this car defined "road manners". '79 Rally wheels swapped from my Mom's '79 Grand Am sedan (this was hers first, then Dad got it, buying her a new '79, I got it 5 years later when he was ready for a new car). Handled like a dream, amazingly quiet ride. These were rare enough when new, and pretty much extinct now.

While those headlights might be fascinating to see operate, I think they look pretty goofy raised up. I would never build any model w/retractable headlights fixed in the open position. The only way they'd be up is if they also go back down. Some models do have that option.

You may not have the same opinion of the back:

Nice work After building all three of them, what is the best kit overall from your standpoint? Take into consideration ease of build, accuracy, price, "fun to build", final appearance. I've built the Tamiya and Aoshima; Tamiya's is definitely better, as it should be for the higher cost. I have an unbuilt Fujimi GTR and it looks to have the ability to be the best GTR kit overall, not only in overall detail but from a cost standpoint as well; it even exceeds Tamiya quality in some areas. Building it will be the ultimate test of that. I have to wonder how many ex-Tamiya kit designers are now working for Fujimi. Just looking at the product I suspect there's at least some bit of influence there.

I also thought it was something in or under my bodywork...it was, it was that brush-on primer! I use Plastikote and Tamiya spray primers, what primer were you using? If it's a different brand of primer, it might be less porous than the ones I use and seals the Tamiya brush primer well enough that you got the blisters/pimples in the primer. Having it never happen before, and then twice in a row on a pair of projects, and never since...sure wish I'd have figured it out sooner! Not sure if I ever tried thinning it and running it through the airbrush to see if it happens in that case. What is bizarre is the parts I brushed the primer on spent time in the dehydrator long before paint. One would think the solvents would have completely outgassed by the time it was coated w/paint.

That stuff is evil if you use a dehydrator and don't want to spend weeks/months on a project. I had a custom Ferrari I was working on, and instead of continually spraying primer over the whole car, I was dabbing it on areas that I was working (mostly the hood) before an overall priming job. I'd get to spray painting color, throw the car in the dehydrator, and blisters/pimples would appear. I nearly went mad, it kept happening over and over. It had never happened before on any other project. I eventually overcame the problem, not knowing what was causing the problem. The problem never occurred in the primer stage, always in the color stage. A second model I was working on shortly thereafter, a vintage Revell Porsche 914, I molded in the windshield frame to the body. I brushed this stuff on just the area I was working on around the windshield frame. The paint blistered again only where I had brushed the Tamiya surface primer. It dawned on me that it was this stuff that I previously thought I loved. I guess it's okay if you like to wait for primer/bodywork and paint to dry the old-fashioned way. It does evil stuff if put in a dehydrator with a layer of solid color over it (doesn't happen w/primers, which are porous). Lesson learned... As for the original post, primer can cause ghosting. If it's sanded smooth after the primer is dry, and it recurs upon subsequent layers of primer, a sealer will have to be used.

Looks fantastic I'm sure the real car is a 20 footer