Ace-Garageguy

Couple more Fernando Pinto kits of historic subjects 1936 Auto Union type C, a 620HP, mid-engined GP car, pretty spectacular for the period And a 1955 Bugatti Type 251 GP car, a fascinating piece of engineering with its mid-transverse-mounted straight-8 engine designed by Gioacchino Columbo, well known for his work at Ferrari. It only ran once, at the 1956 French GP, and was not successful.

Common-core, though a seemingly admirable idea on the surface, has been failing in its stated goal of ensuring every American child becomes proficient in reading, writing, and arithmetic.

It does look kinda tail heavy, now that you mention it...

Older isn't so bad if it's accompanied by wiser.

Dinnertime is my and my cat's favorite time of day.

Some folks suggest storing your cans upside down, too. As the paint sits, solids will settle out, and can make a thick, gooey mass in the bottom of the can The thinking is that, though prolonged shaking will get everything back in suspension, random unmixed chunks might still possibly clog the dip-tube or valve inside the can more easily if the solids have accumulated on the bottom. I have no proof or experimental data to back this idea up, but it kinda makes sense...and once a dip-tube is clogged, the odds aren't good that anything you can do will save the paint...other than decanting it for airbrush use. I had a very old can just the other day that sprayed fine after several minutes of shaking, but quit when something clogged inside. If I can't clear it, I'll have to decant it, 'cause they don't make that particular paint anymore, and there's nothing else that works like it.

Looks really good.

Interesting shot of a real one shows shows the relationship between the windshield and side window frames, and the clear plexiglass. If I can hold the thickness of my f'glass frames to less than .010" (about a scale 1/4 inch), I believe I can get very close to this look, and the slight oversize of the PET screen shouldn't be a problem at all, due to the simple curvature allowing a tiny amount of material to be shaved from the edges to compensate. Another interesting feature in this shot is the apparent seam between the wing or cockpit fairing or whatever they called it on this car, and the rear body shell. Some restored cars show the two parts smoothly molded together, some with a visible seam like this. Time for more research. Another thing that differs from the Monogram kit parts is the relatively narrow outside-laced front wire wheels shown here, much deeper and inside laced on the rear. All the Monogram kit wheels represent the wide, inside laced design.

[BACK TO THE GAME] Steam comes out of my ears when really really simple rules are apparently too hard to follow.

I guess I missed the rule where it said "...unless you somehow miss the actual last post, in which case, just respond to anything randomly".

Agreed. These ancient monogram kits, essentially slot-car "hardboldies", were well designed from a "faithful to the lines and proportions of the original" standpoint. Minor upgrades have the potential to turn them into stunning models.

Do you intentionally refuse to play by the rules? Just curious, 'cause if rules are continually ignored, it ceases to be a game.

Last word was "seem".

VERY attractive model.

"Means to an end, it is" is often part of the rationalization process that precedes doing horribly wrong things.

Say...did you hear the one about two (redacted) who walked into a (redacted)?

Man...that is some serious slice-n-dice.

Thank you both for your interest and comments. It's kinda interesting to me, but I've found if I take the time to get on the model bench, even a little, it makes my real-world-work more pleasurable too...which I guess is kinda the whole idea of having a hobby anyway, eh? And hopefully I'll learn something from this one too.

Thank you very much, but I have a plan that should work one way or another (see above).

I do have a virgin kit that I could steal a windshield from, but they're kinda rare...and they also have the wiper molded in, which I'd need to file and sand and polish off to get the appearance I'm after. So I have a twofold plan: 1) Make a negative mold of the windshield frame, which is part of the clear molded kit part. I've given it some thought, and purchased the thinnest fiberglass woven cloth on the planet specifically so I could do a minimum 3-layer (positive part) lamination that would be reasonably close to scale thickness. My old thinnest cloth was about .0035", while the new stuff is .001"! With the very high strength aircraft epoxy I use, I can do extremely thin laminations that are way stronger and stiffer than an equivalent thickness of styrene, and strong enough to withstand filing, finishing, etc. The frame gets painted body color, so it needs to be tough enough to be handled. 2) Sand off the frame and wiper detail from the buggered kit part, repair it as necessary to form a perfect "plug", get as many waves out of it as possible for good optics, polish it, then make a negative mold of the windshield, and make a positive mold from that, that I can vacuum-form clear PET over. The part vacuum-formed over the positive mold will, of course, be oversized by the thickness of the PET...which may or may not be an issue. The f'glass frame and the PET windshield should be flexible enough (I think) that they can be mated, with the frame on the outside of the "glass" (just like the real car), held together with PVA glue, and correctly fit the body with minor fiddling. Sounds like a huge PITA, but I've seen one completed that used a vac-formed windshield with a painted-on frame (which is a fallback option if the fiberglass frame doesn't work out), and it looked really good...much better than the thick styrene kit piece. Wish me luck. EDIT: I do want to build a full-detail version of the 275P if I live long enough, so having the windshield molds already made saves a little time there.

Thanks. If I recall the rules correctly (I ought to check) only the class winners are required to have engines. As I'm doing the #23 car, which I believe finished second in the race, she'll be curbside only. I specifically picked cars that wouldn't require full detail, as knowing my propensity for getting bogged down in scale engineering, I figured I should avoid the temptation if I wanted to finish this thing before I die.

Agreed, but my comment was specifically directed at the OP's mention that... ...which is entirely possible, but hardly a replacement for more conventional approaches, as this is a scale modeling site, if I'm not mistaken, and not a scattershot appeal to the lowest common denominator...as is YT.

"Slowly", or more accurately "a little more slowly than I used to" is the way I do most things these days...including eating burritos.

"Afternoon delight" has become a trip to Taco Bell, rather than time out at the girlfriend's place.

Man, I'd love to have one of those as a real shop truck over here.