Ace-Garageguy

One of the biggest frustrations of living in the real world has always been, to me anyway, having to pay the price in restrictions and laws brought about by the actions of the irresponsible and the human lowest-common-denominator. Even though YOU may be a fully responsible adult at 16, most of your peers aren't, and the odds of someone your age doing something stupid in a car are very high. It may certainly not be fair to you, but that's the way it is, for now. This will most assuredly not be the last time that you as an individual will be penalized for the behavior of a particular group you may be classified as belonging to.

The numbers are out there. It simply is a matter of looking up the cost per kilowatt hour in your market and figuring out the re-charge cost, depending on the re-charge rate. An unfortunate truth about the appeal of electric vehicles is that the average consumer is often lulled into thinking electric energy for vehicles is somehow free, without carbon emission or petroleum-cost penalties. Without widely deployed wind farms, or solar generating capability (either photovoltaic or steam), the electricity is produced mainly by burning coal or natural gas. Coal emissions can be cleaned up pretty well, but utilities are dragging their feet, preferring to trade carbon credits than to make the heavy capital investment necessary. Burning natural gas to produce electricity to re-charge electric vehicles is, frankly, stupid. It is a wasteful, inneficient use of a resource, all American, that makes a wonderful motor-vehicle fuel, and that could be burned effectively by the existing vehicle fleet using relatively straightforward retrofits. There is so much ignorance, apathy and politization surrounding the energy problem however, that no real rational solutions are being brought on line. What we are getting is knee-jerk political rhetoric, and marketing.

I really like the lines on the big one....agressive but in an understated and sophisticated kind of way. Interesting that the designers kept the vestigial grille opening. I wonder if it serves any purpose at all, other than esthetic resemblence to the familiar, on an electric vehicle like this.

The FIRST series of Avanti II were supposedly on Studebaker frames. I've never seen one of these cars, so I don't know. I DO know that the tooling and presses to make pressed-steel factory-style frames are huge, heavy and expensive. When Stude folded, it's difficult to imagine a low-volume producer acquiring this stuff. Maybe the cars were built on stockpiled chassis....I just don't know. The SECOND series of Avanti II were built on GM frames and running gear (El Camino, Monte Carlo and Caprice). To do an accurate rendition of one of these, you'd need the appropriate frame and guts.

Beautiful model.

Man, that is really some fine, fine work.

What absolutely, almost unbelievably beautiful work. Wow wow wow.

Yes, a beautiful model.

What are you talking about? It's right next to my Rosie O'Donnell swimsuit poster...... Seriously, I always thought this version of the Caravan was the most attractive of the genre. Who DOES make the kit? I'd kinda like to use one for a jumping-off point on an updated Brubaker Box.

Great looking build with lots of attitude, and welcome to this side of things.

Beautiful little Cinquecento. Great looking build. Amazing cars, especailly as prepared and raced by Abarth / Faza / Cosentino.

Pretty amazing (really) stuff from Zimmerman. I have seen one set up to run Bonneville with fender skirts on all 4 wheel openings. Supremely uugly.

Great idea.

Wow and then some. Wow. Wow.

Great looking purposeful Cobra. No silly bee-ess, just clean go-fast. I like it.

Another beautiful bug build. The camber on the rear is a nice touch.....exactly how these look when lowered hard on stock swing-axles. I'd also like to know how you did the folding roof insert. I've got a Ford rat I'm wanting to do something similar on, and yours is perfect.

Absolutely beautiful job on this completely obsolete kit, by far the nicest build of this I've ever seen. I notice the spun alloy moon discs, the rear knockoffs, better taillights I think, a filled grille insert (instead of the ribbed kit part) , tubing headers ( the right number too, 3 instead of 4 per side) and carb stacks, a push bar and it looks like a rolled rear pan. Plus of course plug wires and much better rad hoses coming out the center of the heads. What am I missing? Beautiful job on filling the body seams too, the paint, and on making the hard-plastic two piece-tires look tread-worn. This shows conclusively that a careful builder with an eye for detail can make an outstandingly attractive model from the simplest of kits. Great work. PS....nice job on the taped headlights too, instead of the kit decals.

Wow, that's really cool. Certainly one-of-a-kind. A freight train indeed. Great imagination and build.

Exactly. And weather control too, so you can drive around with your engine hanging out in the breeze. Bubble tops, pedestrian spears on the front fenders....sounds pretty good to me.

More good info, Rob and Bob.. I personally prefer the square eyed cars. The AMT kit has both versions, by the way. Interesting aside is that a lot of guys seem to think the 289 engine was a Ford, because of the similar displacement. It was in fact all Studebaker, though the auto-trans was Borg Warner and had a lot in common with the Ford O Matic, other than the shift sequence. I'm pretty sure the factory top-line supercharged cars were referred to as R-3, and they didn't make many. The car was built on a modified Lark convertible chassis (X-braced to add rigidity to the 'glass body), which was itself a modified (shortened) '53 design, so the underpinnings were a little dated. The Bendix disc brakes were a first for American production cars, but several European makes had had discs for a while. Another interesting thing here is that if you want to do a full-detail Lark from the old Johan kit, the AMT Avanti chassis makes a good donor. Man, this has me wanting to add a couple of Studebakers to my to-do list,

This thing really has some sweet lines. It takes some talent to integrate all these design elements and have it actually work, and you're doing a fine job. Looking forward to seeing it slicked out. This is definitely something that would be worth building in 1:1.

This thing looks great, whatever version you finally go with. I really really like them all. What were the wheels / tires on the original version from?

Yup, Georgia clay. Where'd you source the WWII military tires? Maybe a 1/35 6X6? Great truck. Love your impressionist cammo.

You know, that was the world I always thought I'd grow up to. Must have taken the wrong alternate-reality turning somewhere along the line. How to get back.........

A Mommyrari......mommyvan + Ferrari? Very interesting. Or maybe Carrrari? Ferraravan? Super nice work, whatever you decide to call it.