Ace-Garageguy

Here's a quick video with a decent shot of the adapter, PTO, reduction box, and gearbox bolted to the Merlin at 3:05. You might have some luck searching for more images of this car.

The power takeoff comes off the prop end, naturally. Try to find photos of the "Big Al" '34 Ford drag car, several other Allison powered beasts, or "tractor pulling" vehicles in the US. The 1710 Allison used in all the above is similar in appearance to a Merlin from a Spitfire, and the installation and gearbox setup would be essentially identical. If I get a few minutes free, I'll see if I can find you some definitive pix.

Yup, I've done repairs similar to the ones above, styrene carefully fitted and installed with liquid cement, allowed to dry several days, but I use very fine fiberglass cloth and epoxy resin (not the 5-minute stuff, but real structural epoxy) for final reinforcement on the backside. No progress shots, but this one had zero pillars when I got it, after somebody tried to chop the top, realized they were in over their head, and gave up. The slender pillars withstood rather a lot of handling to get it to this point.

Great build. Like everyone said, the tires change the look entirely. I've been wanting to do one of the Hoover Dam APs.

Stocked up on bread and milk to get me through the coming snowstorm...'cause that's what you do, right? Anybody have a good recipe for milk sammiges?

Car things are being pushed to becoming as disposable as cheap offshore-made appliances and last-generation cellphones, but if you try to explain this to anyone who's not in the business, you get shouted down with "EVERYTHING NEW IS BETTER-LASTS LONGER-IS SAFER-MORE CONVENIENT-MAKES YOUR LUNCH-DOES YOUR LAUNDRY-PARALLEL PARKS ITSELF IF YOU HAVE ZERO PHYSICAL SKILLS-BLA BLA BLA" ad nauseam.

Support from the aftermarket is nonexistent for loads of late-model electronic bits, and some vehicles are configured specifically so you can't swap in used bits, so if a part is NLA from the OEM, you either re-engineer systems entirely (often cost-prohibitive even IF you can find anyone who has the skills), or in some cases, just junk an otherwise perfectly good vehicle.

Real car reference material, but very useful for "traditional" model rod builders who like to understand reality, and get things right.

Japan seems to be going down the questionable engineering road much of the rest of the world now favors, unnecessary complication that really doesn't make a product "better", just more prone to failure and more costly to repair.

You reminded me of a doofus move I made. I had a clear 1/24 Lotus 30 body with a cool fade paint job on one of the sidewinder chassis, probably Cox. I had seen the real Chaparrals with their big flapping wings and thought it would be pretty slick to try something similar. I made a rig that let the motor swing up under acceleration, down when you let off, with struts to a wing and a bellcrank to flatten it on go, flip it almost vertical for an air brake on decel. The mechanism worked great, but I made the wing out of something like .040" brass sheet. Way top heavy. You can guess the rest.

Nights in White Satin was so long ago it sometimes seems like another lifetime, but other times those memories are as vivid as yesterday.

Hope you feel better soon, Bob. Joint pain that seems to come out of nowhere can really ruin your outlook.

"Horn-dog" is a semi-mecha species of dachshund/trumpet hybrid. (not from Wiki...)

I've bought a few of these ancient MRC power packs as NOS or NIB, after testing one. The "pulse power" is amazing, especially for old tech. Even el cheapo old Tyco locomotives will creep pretty well, and anything with a 5-pole skew-wound motor will move so slow you can barely see it. Yes, sometimes they'll buzz a little, and might try to overheat if you leave 'em creeping too long, but they make realistic switching in block-wired yards very doable without DCC. (I do have some DCC equipped locomotives, but it's not hard to wire a layout to do both. You just have to remember which locos are which, where they are, and flip the right switches powering the blocks.) The ones with "momentum" are even better...

My too pence...I'd happily pay that for the funny cars.

Says who?

"Three world wars and you're out" could be humanity's ultimate legacy, but hey...we wouldn't have to worry about "climate change" as an "existential threat" anymore.

World War Four, it was once said, will be fought with sticks and stones.

I get inspiration everywhere, from real cars we get in the shops to ancient printed matter I've hoarded over the years, builds right here on this very board, and the seemingly limitless supply of stuff I've never seen before on the interwebs.

About time people were allowed to think for themselves again, eh wot?

Kinda half irked and half pleased. Friday A chance of snow before 1pm, then rain and snow. High near 36. Chance of precipitation is 80%. Friday Night Rain and freezing rain, possibly mixed with snow before 1am, then a chance of snow and freezing rain. Low around 29. Chance of precipitation is 90%. According to the NWS forecast, it looks like I'll get my snow day Friday, and I'm just not going anywhere 'round here with the way these people drive on anything frozen. Probably ought to put the truck all the way up on the lawn too, so's some numbnutz doesn't slide into it in the driveway "on accident" as they say now. HOWEVER...it looks like later we'll get a "wintry mix", which means freezing rain, which means almost for certain a huge dead limb is going to come down and take out either 1) my power line from the pole, or 2) my 2-axle trailer. Time to move the trailer and lay in a supply of candles, batteries, and propane, 'cause last time the same line went down, I was in the dark 3 days.

Kinda half pleased and half irked. According to the forecast, it looks like I'll get my snow day Friday, and I'm just not going anywhere 'round here with the way these people drive on anything frozen. Probably ought to put the truck all the way up on the lawn too, so's some numbnutz doesn't slide into it in the driveway "on accident" as they say now. HOWEVER...it looks like later we'll get a "wintry mix", which means freezing rain, which means almost for certain a huge dead limb is going to come down and take out either 1) my power line from the pole, or 2) my 2-axle trailer. Time to move the trailer and lay in a supply of candles, batteries, and propane, 'cause last time the same line went down, I was in the dark 3 days.

I'm disqualified. Wasn't the first three things I thought it was, so I used "image search" to find it, which at least used to be against the rules. But now I know.

Yup. And I had more than a few destroyed before I got a fast enough thumb to let off enough, early enough before turns.

Yup. Been there.