Ace-Garageguy

Good idea. Too bad we can't get a few more thousand folks to do the same thing.

PJ Toys. Same clown has over 8,000 listings on ebay at the moment. Actions speak so much more eloquently than words though, don't they?

If you want a first-class undetectable repair, your best bet is really to shoot the whole hood. It's a small enough part, so why not? Even if you airbrush, you run into the possible difficulty of polishing out the blend-edges where the new line of paint leaves a slightly dry-spray edge overlapping the old paint. Polishing this out can often result in going through the paint somewhere else and repeating the whole problem. To get all the polish residue and any possible wax or silicone contaminants off (which can cause fish-eyes in your new paint) I'd recommend a thorough cleaning with 70% isopropyl alcohol. It shouldn't hurt fully cured enamel. Then, to insure good adhesion, I'd recommend scrubbing the surface with an abrasive cleanser like Comet, hot water, and a toothbrush. Rinse VERY well. There's also the potential problem of lifting and / or wrinkling you face when shooting enamel over enamel. You're fine as long as the old paint is COMPLETELY cured, but if it's still in the "recoat sensitivity" window, you can get a real mess. Even that's not a disaster though, as enamel strips easily.

My daily driver for several years was a red one of these, identical but for the color. Will be again in about 3 more months. Certainly not for everyone: no AC, no airbags, no computerized butt warmers or self-adjusting cup-holders, and if you get T-boned you're hamburger...but it sure works for me.

Investors. The checkbook car-guys. Just like now.

There's probably always going to be some small nucleus of old-machine or scale-model enthusiasts (and philatelists too) who'll keep the embers alive until they flare up into a passion again at some time in the future. There was a lull in the model car hobby for quite a while, but we're in a new golden age. Just that proves something. And after all, it's not a bunch of 80-year-old geriatrics who are restoring the magnificent Union Pacific Big Boy locomotive 4014 back to running condition, is it? Nope. It's younger, stronger people who respect it as something fine from the past that should be preserved and appreciated. Is the largest steam locomotive ever built any match for a string of modern diesel-electrics? No, but if you've never seen a big steam engine go charging past you at full tilt, you just don't know the real definition of "machine".

Hell...it's MY generation that made such a mess of things. They're the ones who started selling the American dream off piece by piece to the highest bidder, just to line their own pockets. It sure wasn't the millennials who dug us into this hole.

I'm NOT picking on you and I have absolutely NO quarrel with anyone here, but I'm just curious...you guys have actually encountered folks who prefer carping in a hole and watching fuzzy B&W TV? Really?

Yeah, ironically, one thing tech is really really good for is drivel spewing...no matter what generation is doing it.

...Just as hopeless as trying to "reason" with people who have little historical perspective gained from first-hand living it, and who insist that everything is better today because it's all computer-controlled.

And everything isn't better NOW just because we have more tech toys, either. There are some things that WERE most definitely better in the past, and there are some things that are most definitely better NOW. NO time is or ever was perfect, yet, and to pretend otherwise is limiting and short-sighted.

It would be nice if everybody could just kinda enjoy where we are TODAY. Some new stuff is great, and some old stuff is pretty damm fine too. I kinda try to stay abreast of what's happening and what's new, but I have a real fondness for some things I grew up with AND for some things that are WAY before my own time. EVERYTHING is accessible to everyone these days, and to simply pick NOW as having the best of everything just because it IS now...well, that really limits what you have to choose from, and certainly limits the perspective you use to understand the world you live in.

Good question. Nothing to learn, nothing allowed but attaboys. Sounds like a complete and utter waste of time. That's just MY 2 pence.

Question: why do so many of you younger guys have to attack anybody who makes a comparison between the way things are NOW and the way things were before? "Living in the past is a dead end"?. Yeah? Well, I gots my current tech AND I can keep something built 70 years ago running like a champ too. Carburetors and computers. Why does it have to be EITHER OR? Maybe an insecurity thing? And you know, SOME tech really IS stupid. Who said "guide"? I said help to make kids aware there's something more than sitting in front of an electronic pacifier.

Yeah, but if they don't even know something like model building exists, how are they going to pick it? Truth. I was at a little car show on the local square back in the fall. I overheard a cute young couple talking to one of the guys who had a car there. Somehow, they both (the kids) had made it into their 20s without realizing there was such a thing as an "old car" hobby, and were both just flabbergasted that machines 50 years old could even run, much less have lots of money and attention lavished on them, and be used regularly.

Glad to have you aboard sir, and your comment is another one that is dead-on-target. If kids aren't introduced to model-building, or at least encouraged to find their own interests beyond interacting with electronic pacifiers, most of them...not ALL...but most of them will pretty much do what their peers do, and what they've seen their parents do. Parents who don't take the time to show kids there's a big ol' world out there full of all kinds of interesting things are really the ones to blame, if anyone has to be singled out. Like scoutmasters who let pre-built Pinewood cars compete and don't enforce the rules, interest-free lazy adults make interest-free lazy kids. I certainly have to give my OWN parents credit for introducing me to a wide variety of ideas, experiences, and places, and for that part of my childhood I'm very grateful.

Look at the bid history. The winner has only one win on ebay to date. A total newb, and odds are he won't pay for the engine pieces. It happens a LOT. The other bidders on that auction only have 12 and 179 bids. Newbs too, and obviously have no clue as to what things are worth. I've actually seen clowns bid on model car parts thinking they were getting the deal of the century on REAL parts too, and that has occasionally sent the prices skyrocketing. It's happened so often, some sellers post in big red letters THESE ARE MODEL CAR PARTS, NOT FOR REAL CARS. There's still no shortage of morons.

That was my own Beck 550 Porsche Spyder replica. I'll post some pix of the Iso and a couple other interesting pieces we have in over on the "reference" board when I get home.

Tech's not about social media for you, and it's not about social media for me (other than this site) and it's not about social media for the 70-year old lead mechanic (!) who works in the shop I recently joined (he's highly reliant on his smart-phone to manage his work day too, by the way). But the 20-something who works in the bay next to me IS all about social media. His device is beeping and buzzing all day long, and he's constantly stopping what he's doing to check in with whoever has the most earth-shattering update about where they had lunch, took a dump, or bought awesome new shoes. All those texts and notifications and RSS feeds and voice-mails probably aren't from his lawyer, real-estate agent, accountant or NASA. Yeah, he uses his device to look up work-related things, but his knowledge-base is so limited, as is his attention span, that he rarely gets the right answer because he goes with the FIRST answer. He keeps his job simply because he's willing to work on greasy stuff relatively cheaply while he learns, and there's just not anyone standing in line to perform skilled work on older vehicles...who's either willing OR competent and certainly not BOTH. Interestingly...and one of the reasons I trend to cut him some slack when he does something idiotic...he's also a model car enthusiast. Not a skilled modeler, but at least he's interested. Tech is wonderful as a tool. I just found parts for a 1967 Iso Rivolta online that I NEVER would have been able to source otherwise (and one of the reasons the car has been allowed to sit and deteriorate for years). But it is really easy to let it get in the way of living in the here-and-now unless you're driven by something internally to actually accomplish something. Speaking of which, I have a lot of work I need to focus on.

This topic has been hammered in several threads recently, but you're newish, so you probably weren't here at the time. Welcome, by the way. Everyone's comments are on-target, and Lunajammer sums it up pretty succinctly with "Not our fault, nor theirs, it's just the nature of generational interests." It's somewhat the same in the real-car world. While there ARE some young guys who really get into it, the majority of the hot-rodders and muscle-and-vintage car enthusiasts are past 40. There's a serious cultural shift going on too. I see a LOT of younger guys riding shotgun in some girl's Prius or Camry, noses stuck to the smart-phone, and oblivious to everything else in the universe...especially, apparently, the functioning of the vehicle they're in, completely unaware of the idea that it might be fun to modify a vehicle or build one from junk.. And why on earth would anyone want to take the time to learn the skills to build a little MODEL of one? It's just not 'relevant' in a society that values instant gratification and communication about nothing above all else. Get off my lawn, indeed.

I've had a few go MIA, but I believe it happened during the period P-bucket apparently hired some IT chimps to implement "upgrades" on the site, and some data got shuffled into a PB black hole. Every now and then, I'll look at a very old thread of mine, and I'll find a missing image that was posted originally from my own PB account.

Good looking model. What scale?

Kinda looks like a Lotus 7 mated with a riding lawn mower.

So make a snow salad.

Ahhh...maybe the answer is in this article, that opens with: "With Don Garlits perfecting the rear engine top fuel dragster, the rear engine funny car should be the next nitro class to dominate the 1320, right?" http://www.dragracecentral.com/DRCStory.asp?ID=228621&Filter=Year2011 And the answer is...nobody ever got one to work right. Like I said earlier " I DO know that racing is a lot about winning, and if the thing... handled weird...nobody would jump on the bandwagon and say "let's build 'em all this way from now on". And my sincere apologies to the OP for letting this go so far off topic...but...as a result of your posting this most fascinating build, I've learned a whole lot more about the history of drag racing. For that I thank you, sincerely.