Ace-Garageguy

Yup. Unfortunately, that post I made was 5 years ago, and doubtless a lot of old fossils (like me) who know what the kits are and would want the stuff have fallen off their perches in the intervening time.

Sounds like a race shaping up to me...

Somebody goofed, nobody bothered to fix it. Just FYI, there's a Revell parts-pack labeled as a Cadillac "354". Cadillac never made a 354...which was a Chrysler hemi displacement. Revell's engine could be a 331, 365, or early 390, as they're all virtually identical visually. But nobody ever bothered to correct it, from the first run in the early '60s through the last run in 1998. And on occasion, two releases of the same exact vehicle kit have been box-labeled as both 1/24 and 1/25. But wait...there's more. The Pyro / Lindberg Gee Bee is almost universally listed as 1/32, but measuring the wingspan reveals it's actually about 1/26 (though the little pilot figure in the kit is indeed about 1/32). Numbers are hard.

It's all the above. 1/25 expresses the idea that something is a 25th of the actual size...pronounced one-twenty-fifth. Measure the real one, divide by 25. (The / in a fraction means "divided by") 1:25 expresses the exact same idea, but as a ratio, and is pronounced one-to-twenty-five. For scale modeling, the terms can be used interchangeably. Both are correct, and mean the same thing.

If y'all are wanting to do reasonably accurate period belly-tank lakes cars, I'd suggest investing time in some research. The frames were usually pretty simple, as weight is the enemy...even in cars with big honking blown hemi Chryslers. Proportions matter too. Here's a good start, as far as reality goes, very representative of the era. Be sure to look at all three pages. https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/found-ted-fryes-belly-tank.1238702/

With the door openings in the tub pretty much the way I want 'em, I was able to make cardstock templates for the inner door shells. I tried a Tamiya color on the RH seat, more to see how the gloo-smear repairs would look than anything else. I'm satisfied with the seat repairs and mods, but the color needs to be a little more purple. May just go with this though. We'll see. Need to kill the gloss. Just noticed the seat side bolsters are fatter on the real car. Maybe I'll address it, maybe not. Inner door shell made from .010" sheet stock, framed on the back face with rectangular stock...allowing me to round the edges to approximate the look of the real ones. Needs a little more tweaking, but compares pretty well with the reference shot.

Thanks for your continuing interest and comment.

I've been a little under the weather, moving kinda slow, but managed to make some progress. First shot just shows a spring liberated from its glooey prison, one installed, and the remaining control arm nearing completion. Next shot shows camber verification prior to final gluing, using round-head pins as kingpin centerlines. As the .021" pins are a tight fit in the .020" bores, reversed they make a great way to hold the ride height while measuring the spindles for stub-axle location. Maintaining the exact stance established during the mockup phase is critical for the look I'm after. RH stub-axle in position, LH measured and assembled to match. Both spindles mounted, with the final wheel/tire combo. Amazingly, all 4 wheels touch the ground.

Looking good.

Flat 12, Franklin O-805 aircraft engine. About 500HP supercharged; produced in very limited numbers for a canceled military drone program in the 1940s. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Franklin_O-805 https://www.motortrend.com/features/franlkin-0-805-air-cooled-flat-twelve-engine-just-listed/

Great stuff. I want one now.

Repurposing genius.

For what it's worth, I bought a bunch of kit-sourced rectangular and round headlights, clear lenses and matching chrome reflectors, so cheap as to be almost free from an eBay parts seller some time back.

It's called "shrinkflation" and it's been going on as long as there have been things to buy. "Great New Package ! Same size, but there's less in it !! Costs more !!!" Yeah, what a deal.

Exactly.

Oh nooooooo. Say it isn't soooooooo...

I don't know how much credence I'd give that, though it's repeated several times over various websites. Typically, camera booms, and particularly booms for heavy motion picture film cameras with seats, have significant counterweights to offset the load at the long end. There's no such counterweight evident on the 451 salamander, and the boom itself is rather weak looking to support a fireman in the seat. It appears to be nothing more than a simple film prop. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9iyKI2pJbE&ab_channel=PabloFdezAlonso

The wheels (fronts anyway) do indeed look like a Leyland TD7. Not too difficult, really, to cosmetically extend the nose with sheetmetal, move the driving position forward a bit, and rework the steering linkage. The engine cover next to the salamander driver appears to be where it would be on a TD7 chassis too, sloping down to the gearbox. There were firetrucks based on the TD7 chassis (one above, another below), but the ladder turret base is positioned directly over the rear axle centerline on the real ones...but again, as the movie truck wouldn't have to carry anywhere near as much weight on the turret, it could have been repositioned as well. This PD1 chassis, below, followed the TD7, but is very similar in layout and general arrangement,

Very attractive model. Kinda makes me want to do a "de-tuned" streeterized version.

Very nice indeed. And my favorite daily-driver BeeMew too. An acquaintance has a ti in the same color that I lust after mightily.

Does that go for posing for avatar photos too?

I was concerned with this potential problem until I honed my skills re-scribing and deepening panel lines. Now that I've got it pretty much mastered, I'm frankly not really seeing a need to use accent colors for this...or at the most, a wash of solvent-stable black in the deepened lines, over the last primer coat, just prior to paint. I believe this is essentially the technique recommended by Cruz, and his results are outstanding by any standard.

Thanks for that. I had to miss the show due to illness, had intended to clean him out...and my most current list is a couple years old. Second chances are groovy.

When natural gas was "deregulated" here years ago, the "increased competition" was supposed to lower the rates. Yeah, right. The gas still came through the existing underground piping infrastructure, owned by the old gas company, and the new "providers" had to pay a fee for using it. And having no delivery infrastructure of their own, the new guys marked up the cost of the gas to cover the fees...and the original gas company, the piping owners, jacked their prices too, essentially adding on a fee for using their own piping. The net result was that costs went up for everyone, including those who stayed with the original company. My monthly base rate in summer jumped from $15 to $45. And anyone with a brain knew that was exactly what was going to happen.

For doing Goodyear "Blue Streaks", I've had good results from mounting the tire on a tight-fitting wheel, then chucking it up in the lathe and cutting the groove deeper with a specially ground cutter. Then white gel pen in the groove, followed by blue magic marker after the white is fully dry. Sorry...no pix currently available.