Ace-Garageguy

The Kirkham cars are alloy-bodied, and are actually more symmetrical and better made than real factory Cobras, as one side of the car was digitally modeled and flopped to mirror-image the other side. Then, production body-panel press dies were made in Eastern Europe, and panels were welded together on precise steel jigs. But real Cobra bodies were hand-hammered over wooden bucks, and no two are absolutely identical. Shelby used Kirkhams for the alloy-bodied continuation cars. Years ago I subcontracted to Chuck Gutke / Cobra Restorers making repops of factory fiberglass Cobra parts (brake cooling scoops, hinge covers, etc.) and saw a Kirkham car being built. They are wondrous things, and you REALLY have to know your stuff to tell one from a factory original. https://www.fordfe.com/the-kirkham-cobra-story-the-real-story-long-but-in-t56166.html

5-minute epoxy is, in a word, garbage. In general, the longer any epoxy takes to fully cure, the stronger it is. The epoxy I usually use for modeling is out-of-date material made for full-scale aircraft work. I assure you...it does NOT fall off over time if used correctly. It also requires 24 hours to cure at room temperature, and a further post-cure at elevated temperatures to achieve full strength. It costs $400 per gallon. If you want good long lasting epoxy joints, use at LEAST the 30-minute stuff made for model airplanes. AND CLEAN AND SAND THE AREAS YOU'RE APPLYING IT TO THOROUGHLY. ANY epoxy applied to a shiny or contaminated surface is a recipe for failure. EDIT: Inaccurate or inadequate mixing is more likely than a "bad batch" of material...but 6 months to a year is usually the longest you can really trust the hardware-store or hobby-shop stuff anyway. Cheapo consumer grade epoxies allow for a lot of latitude in mixing proportions, but that negatively affects strength. Insufficient mixing also negatively affects strength...and mixing the 5-minute stuff is often rushed because it starts to set so fast.

Unicorn-hunting can leave you with nothing but a horn.

Paying bills on time can be difficult for the self-employed when clients put you on the "90 days ignore invoices" plan.

Lotsa work, looking good... Since you're doing so much work, you might consider addressing the too-low cowl on the AMT body (all the AMT '32 kits share the same problem). The correction isn't difficult, especially in light of how much other major work you're doing, and it makes a big difference in first impressions. Below is the in-progress corrected AMT Vicky body on Revell fenders and rails:

"Goes that's the way it" isn't even Yoda's scrambled syntax.

Scratch building a bucket-T frame should be easy, as a lot of 'em are fabbed from 2X4 rectangular steel tube, closely represented by .080" X 3/16" styrene strip. https://www.ebay.com/itm/114521205475? Model-A frames have been used as starting points too. Minicraft makes several flavors of 1/16 model-A, and they're great kits to build, or as parts sources for 1/16 rods. ETC.

A Google search of "mercury was used to preserve parchment" brings up a lot of hits. Your answer may be among them.

Way cool. I spent several years off-and-on doing modifications and structural repairs on a variety of European sailplanes...Schleicher, Grob, DG, etc. Any chance you have a DG-400 file?

You guys may or may not know that very nice weld-beads are available as "decals", 3D resin parts on decal film with adhesive backing. These went away for a while, but appear to be back in production...along with rivets and other stuff. https://www.archertransfers.com/collections/welds

I've never seen one of these in the flesh, but knew Brazil built cars on the Mopar "A" body. An image search for "Brazilian Mopar A body" brought this car right up.

Cool cool cool. Looks like you have the same frame bench we do, too.

Documentaries on trains, engineering, motor racing, tools, and all kinds of interesting mechanical stuff (produced long before the AI-made clickbait gibberish that's so prevalent now) on YooToob are some of the things I value there.

Shopping deals on full sets of can-can dancers don't come up all that often.

Fake. Underside of the hood is an immediate giveaway. Real hoods have aluminum skins built on tubular frames. The hood on this car is obviously a fiberglass molding. There are other things I see wrong that could possibly be due to inaccurate restoration, and I'm not a Cobra expert. But the hood is dead wrong.

Different strokes work in different situations.

Hobbies like collecting fast cars and women take boxcars full of cast to sustain, so it helps if you have a few oil wells or diamond mines.

Legs should go all the way up to whatever they're intended to support.

"Dazzlers" always meant knockout babes in my lexicon.

If the files are utilized to make a product to SELL, the originator of the file should be entitled to a cut of every part SOLD. In the big-boy world, the cost of design work is amortized by spreading it through the cost of product. Individuals purchasing a file probably ought to be able to make as many parts for their own use as they want. But sellers of parts who have only paid for one file are getting free design work and making a profit on it. EDIT: When Model Railroader publishes scale drawings of buildings, locomotives, cars, whatever, there is a stipulation on the page that they can be photocopied and re-sized, but FOR NON-COMMERCIAL USE ONLY. Same basic idea.

Just take the bulb out.

Aunts who serve you baked ants (or even raw, fried, or fricasseed) aren't my preferred kinds of relatives.

Better results are usually achieved by people who have at least a basic understanding of SOMETHING in the physical world.

The whole point is to represent the "technique" chimps have been using since cars and stick-welders existed...slap a way-too-thick patch over a rust hole, secured by bubblegum "welds".

Definitely one of the coolest things I've seen in a long, long time. Twin blowers...who woulda thunk.