Ace-Garageguy

Nice to see her progressing so well.

Very nice.

Congratulations sir.

Two exquisite examples, certainly.

Same group...

Man...love it, love it, love it.

Absolutely. Looking forward to seeing what you do with this one.

A pair of real beauties. Hot-rods just don't get any more real than that.

Having brought a lot of worthless trash back from the dead myself, i would respectfully suggest you remove all of that horrible filler or bubblegum or whatever it is. You have no idea as to how well adhered it is to the substrate, or where air-bubbles might be. Nothing is more heartbreaking than to do a show-quality paint job over unknown filler work, and have it crack, split and blister because the person who did it didn't do it right. You might also want to check it for symmetry before you put a lot of effort in it, as a lot of inexperienced builders seem to be unable to get both sides to match. You need a square and symmetrical foundation to build on.

Google is your friend. "homemade food dehydrator" 301,000 hits.

A sleeve of .010" styrene sheet, and a couple of 36" sticks of 1/4" X 1/2" basswood. Pretty exciting, huh?

There's a very straightforward process if you bought on Ebay. This is the gist, but READ THE INSTRUCTIONS. The process is very user friendly and self-explanatory. 1) You can either go to the auction page and scroll down to the bottom, click on "ask a question" OR you go to the "orders" section under "My Ebay" look at the big blue "Leave Feedback" and click the "more actions" option to the right of the item you're having a problem with. You'll get a menu of possible problems. Click the one that best describes your issue and when prompted, write up exactly what the problem is. Be polite but firm. Press "send". You'll probably have to interpret a little blurry-lettered code thingy at the bottom of the page to verify you're not a robo-spammer. 2) Ebay gives a set time period for the seller to respond before they'll do anything. When the time expires (just READ the instructions), you "open a case". It's another few button clicks. You'll forward your correspondence with the seller to Ebay's resolution people. Again, Ebay gives the seller a reasonable amount of time to respond. READ the directions. 3) If the seller fails to respond and Ebay decides in your favor, you get your money back from PayPal...if that's how you paid. YOU NEED TO START THE PROCESS SO YOU DON'T RUN OUT OF THE TIME WINDOWS. And there's no point complaining about it here if you're not going to follow up with the people who can actually DO something to help you. The seller MAY very well acknowledge the problem and send you a free replacement that's made well. In well over 2000 transactions on Ebay, I've only needed to resort to mediation 3 times, and I haven't lost a single penny.

Man, that's harsh...but I gotta agree too. Pretty funny, Snake.

Whatsamatter Ray? You wanna be stranded on the side of the road? I bet you're still running on your original kniffler pins too, and if you are, your framislator bearings are definitely shot. If those pins and bearings seize up, you can just forget about getting them out without having to pull the engine. Better get them done soon, son. Better get the photon reservoir for your headlights replaced too. I've seen cars with bad photon reservoirs get dimmer and dimmer headlights as they get older. Could certainly cause an accident at night.

The engine in the kit looks to be a not-too-bad smallblock Chevy, oddly fitted with a vintage (and somewhat blobular) Rochester fuel-injection setup. Just about any small- or big-block Chevy engine should be right at home in a pickup / plow application, and you have dozens to choose from. Pretty much ALL smallblock Chebbys (265-283-302-327-350-400) and all big-block Chebbys (396-427-454) look pretty much like each other externally, with the exception of the specific valve covers, intake setups, and exhaust manifolds. A "camper special" should be happy with either a big-block or a 350 smallblock, single-carb engine. Headers would be a plus in the real world too...if you can find some that will fit neatly in the engine bay and clear the inner-fenders and frame. Anyone have specific suggestions for a good 350 or 454 single-4bbl Chebby mill?

That's interesting, Bill. Occasionally, just after I get the "404" message here, I'll get timed-out of THIS board when I try to get back from the 404 message. If I check to see if the site is up, I'll get that it indeed IS up, but I still time-out for, sometimes, a couple of hours before I can get back on here. Like you, I had thought maybe I was being blocked because of something I had posted being seen as offensive. It happened today, just after I started this thread.

The single top bolt location in the exhaust manifolds positively identifies it as a second-generation Oldsmobile V8. It shares many characteristics with other engines, but that is unique to the gen-2 V8 Olds OHV engine family. As to what kit it's from, I have no idea.

It's better to have your AC serviced in the winter because it's easier to capture enough cold to release during the summer months, so you don't run out when it's really hot. You should have the orbits of the planetary gears in your transmission adjusted semi-annually too, because if they get out of geosynchronization...well, let's just say it'll be expensive.

Yes sir, probably my favorite version of this kit so far. Nicely lowered, looks great.

Like it says, I'm getting "ERROR 404" "we can't seem to find the page you're looking for" again when I try to post replies in selected threads.

Here's another one I couldn't resist, from 1938, about the NYC 4-6-4 Hudsons.

I know some of you are into model railroading as well as cars, and it's been my observation that a lot of RR modelers are interested in the real ones. While looking around for some HO-layout videos this AM (to compensate for having nowhere to run trains this year), I found this mid-1930s film about building 4-6-2 "Princess Royal" class British Rail steam locomotive 6207 (but it's correct information for most steam locos built after the technology matured). Note the 2-part mold for the driving wheel. Though it's for sand-cast steel, the idea is basically the same as a mold for a plastic model car part, complete with casting lines and sprue-attachments that have to be removed and cleaned up (by machining in this case). I hope somebody will enjoy it as much as I did. Merry Christmas.

Line and proportion are everything, and just a little difference in how you do something can make a HUGE difference in how it looks when it's done. Slownlo's red Merc above has very nice lines and flows well, and it's the result of a "similar" pie-cut sectioning-and-chopping strategy that really isn't similar at all. Really looking at things critically and thinking-through what you want to achieve is key.

That right there is the key. If you want to build good models, it takes effort and commitment and...perish the thought...work. First-rate tools and materials definitely make building first-rate models easier, but they're just no substitute for paying attention, thinking about what you're doing, being careful, and honestly critiquing your own work.

Yup. You got both the big profit-center strategies at most dealerships today. Screw the customer, screw the "techs". Your "final straw" remark above is exactly what I was referring to in my earlier post, about why many dealerships no longer hire "real" mechanics, and prefer to pay cheap kids who know almost nothing except how to hook up the diagnostic tools and read codes...if you can get them to stop texting long enough to do even that. After working as an apprentice doing PDIs for a dealership in the '70s, progressing to the commission side and then going to several independent shops as a mechanic, I worked for a while as a service-writer. The policy I encountered at most dealer and chain shops was to sell sell sell as much as possible, whether the work was actually needed or not, and the more ignorant the customer the easier to screw them. And unfortunately, the old pay-the-mechanic-flat-rate system could easily be exploited by hack-job "mechanics" to boost their incomes by "beating the book". I have an ex-friend who did things like removing the plastic HVAC box from a Honda with a big pry-bar, breaking off all the mounting tabs rather than removing the fasteners. He put it back together with hot-glue. I know another guy who took a cutting-torch to an old Jag to get the trans out without having to pull the engine, then did a bodged stick-weld job putting it back in. "Hey man, it's just business. Gotta make a profit". I refused to do business that way, and went on my own. Proved conclusively to myself it just isn't necessary to be a thief, a hack, and a liar to make a comfortable living...if you're actually a competent mechanic and diagnose problems correctly the first time, charge fairly for the work, communicate honestly with your clients, explain things to them in terms they can understand, and work up a sweat occasionally. Unfortunately, most people still don't know enough about their cars to know if they're being bent over and reamed...whether by a dealership OR an independent shop. A good friend of 30 years who's retired but works part-time as a driver for a major parts chain (and knows the business from the inside, having been a real mechanic in the '60s and '70s) is amazed that most of the shops he delivers to can stay in business. He tells me they're predominantly idiots, technically ignorant, poorly organized morons. I believe him.