Ace-Garageguy

So far I've only had time to do a cursory comparison with the Flintstone 550 Spyder, which has multiple issues of its own. The Profil kit has the same wheelbase, which is as it should be, but the width is significantly narrower. I need to check some 1:1 dimensions. The Profil kit also has symmetry issues, as in fender profiles are different from side to side. The resin is thick enough to sculpt these out however, appears to be good quality, and bubble-free. One upside of the Profil kit (which some would consider a downside) is the fact that the open panels are made very slightly oversize, so they can be precisely fitted to the openings. The little car also has a somewhat blobular engine, and a gearbox that doesn't look much like a real one, BUT the PE parts as well as the lights are gorgeous. Wheels and tires are pretty decent. Better engine and gearbox parts may end up being sourced from styrene kits. Overall, potentially a spectacular model. I'll shortly be comparing it to the FPP kit, which represents a '55-'56 Spyder, and should be very close dimensionally to my full-scale Beck 550 replica

I sprung for this one. It should be here today.

Yes, I LIKE the look of that one. Looks fast just sitting there.

Just ran the numbers on some questionable "junk" I pulled out of the scrap dumpster at one of the shops I work with last week. 1) A pair of 1965 Pontiac 389/421 open-chamber heads with 1.92 intake valves, 1.66 exhausts. Said to have come off a '65 GTO. Nothing wrong with them other than a burned exhaust valve. No cracks. Chrome factory valve covers. Correct for a '65 GTO. 2) A ''57-'59 283 Chevy engine, complete. 4-bbl "power pack" cylinder heads with the right casting marks. Said to have been "all bad inside", and pulled out of a '65 Malibu. Tear down revealed nothing but normal wear, another 2 burned exhaust valves, which would account for horrible running and low compression on 2 cylinders. Cam badly worn, otherwise in good shape. Cylinders have never been bored, no sign of overheating or water in the sump. The bonus: a forged steel crankshaft, lightly scored STANDARD sized main and rod journals. Engine's worth some change to anyone doing a period-correct resto or hot-rod. 3) A pair of perfectly good smallblock Chevy oil pans, one chromed and painted over, the other cadmium plated and also painted over, looks new other than the paint. I like to have core pans on hand to cut and modify for engine swaps, and I'll be needing to build a winged pan for an upcoming project. I will never ever understand "professional mechanics" who throw away perfectly usable vintage parts, parts that will NEVER EVER be made again, because they're "broken".

You have a good eye for line and proportion, Peter. All too often, on real cars as well, modifications are made haphazardly with no overall concept that keeps everything integrated into a pleasing whole. I'll be following. If the Riv ends up looking as good as the other two, she'll be a stunner.

Man oh man. You did GOOD. All I got today was a bottle of ant bait/poison.

Yup. Just get them coming out the door. I bought several of these as partial builder kits, or started, etc., assuming the tooling was long gone...which I believe was the prevailing wisdom for some time. It would be great to have these things available again for something like reasonable money.

I understand. And I can see why kids, pretty much any kids, would think a full-size Lego vehicle was pretty wonderful.

I guess if you don't see a difference, there's no use arguing the point. It's simply a matter of personal perspective and preferences and interests. And I was actually kinda hoping somebody really WOULD explain what's cool about a huge Lego thing that does nothing. I'd like to know if I'm missing something here. But I'll say this...plastic models for me are a creative outlet to build in scale things I'd build in reality if I had unlimited funds. Which is why out-of-the-box stock vehicles don't interest me much, though I certainly admire the work of those who excel at building in that style. Building real hot-rods, from my own perspective, takes a pile of cast-off junk and unrelated bits and turns it into a viable, useful machine. But I have little interest in catalog-specials that are "professionally" built, laden with CNC-machined billet this and CAD-designed that, and 3D-printed everything else...or send-piles-of-money-so-you-can-buy-a-little-individuality contemporary vehicles either. A friend's daughter LOVES Legos, she shows tremendous original thought and creativity in what she builds, and she's making mental connections as to how things actually work in physical reality. She shows every indication of being a gifted engineer. But I personally fail to see the point of making a useless full-scale replica of a manufactured product with Legos...unless, of course, it's for marketing attention-getting. Then it makes perfect sense. In the end, it's just a matter of different strokes. As they say, "It's all good", but I don't have to get it. EDIT: I guess I should stay with the wise old adage that goes something like "if you can't lavish something with fawning praise, it's best to say nothing at all; you will be less universally despised."

^^^ Fan-freakin'-tastic!! I'm curious...with the rated motor speed range being shown as 1450-1950 RPM (only a 500 RPM spread), are you intending to use a continuously-variable transmission?

Even if all the parts are from the same caster (which I assume from your post), it's impossible to make a blanket statement. Improperly catalyzed (mixed in the wrong ratio of resin to "hardener") will probably never cure completely, and no amount of baking or wishful thinking will fix it...probably...but it's worth a try. BUT...there ARE resin systems that are designed to remain flexible, and a caster could have possibly oops-ed and made your parts from that. Without having in-hand EXACTLY what you have, and experimenting to find out what the actual reality is, all the opinions in the world aren't worth the paper they're printed on here. Your best number one course of action is to get a definitive answer from the person who made the stuff, and preferably, get hard-cured replacements from him.

Yes. The vast majority of the conversions done in the 1970s (and there were a lot of them) used manual gearboxes. And when I say a lot, I mean a LOT. Many hundreds, if not thousands. There were conversion articles sprouting up everywhere, and kits, and companies doing the swaps. The gas price hike when OPEC began turning off the tap scared a lot of folks. Conversions ran the gamut from bodged hack-jobs that were so heavy with batteries, they rode like buckboards bottomed on the bump-stops (don't anybody panic...I didn't say bump-stocks), to fairly sophisticated and well engineered vehicles, some of which even boasted solid-state logic-controlled energy-management and limited regenerative charging capability on deceleration. And range was generally poor...realistically about 40 miles or so. So, I think it's terrifically funny how this recent trend has been appropriated as if it's something new and millenial-generational, when it's actually old farts like me who started it four-and-a-half decades ago, and electric vehicles have been around about as long as cars have been around anyway. Ferdinand Porsche even designed some, including a fantastic military road-train with hub-motors in the wheels. Battery technology was and still is the primary limiting hardware factor, but recent advances have made it possible to use some of the things like real cars instead of toys with very limited range. Batteries will continue to improve, most likely significantly, but as noted in this thread elsewhere, batteries themselves pose serious environmental and recycling and raw-material questions. And most people STILL overlook the power-generation and power-distribution infrastructure. It's simply not ready yet for hundreds of thousands of electrics to be plugged in virtually simultaneously to recharge overnight. And the typical head-in-the-sand attitude of most people concerning the fact that most electricity generation STILL comes from the hated hydro (rapidly dwindling if Lake Mead is any indicator), fossil-fuel-burning (coal and stupidly, natural gas), and the horror-story show-stopper of them all...nuclear. The cost to replace the US's power generating and distribution system with 100% renewables ?...estimates are around 3 TRILLION dollars. And that's only to get it to the point where it can deal with TODAY'S loads...not the vastly increased loads of hundreds of thousands or ultimately millions of plugged-in cars. You're going to be paying significantly more for electricity, period. Another problem is that the numbers surrounding electric vehicle efficiency and grid requirements are as skewed and exaggerated and contradictory, depending on whose agenda they're shoring up, as the whole global-warming controversy. I would advise everyone... before you blindly accept a total electric future is the best possible future, take off the rose-tinted glasses, do some research, and try to understand enough about science and economics so you can make informed interpretations of the available data for yourselves.

Very nice proportions. Well done, sir.

Yes. The real deal.

It's not easy. And it's even harder if you make the effort and take the time to master the required skills rather than muddling through settling for half-assed mediocrity. I've seen things built in people's garages that rival the best of the best from top-line shops and manufacturers. And I've seen stuff that looks like it was built by drunk monkeys. It's a choice as to what level of quality you're willing to accept from yourself and define as "good enough". And all efforts are not equal.

Agreed, and true to the original spirit of hot-rodding. We'll surely be seeing more voltswagons in the future. But in general, we see a far smaller percentage of the population in pursuit of home-built anything these days, reflecting a culture that largely denigrates, ignores, and has no interest in developing "dirty, difficult, and dangerous" physical skills.

Why?

Thanks Randy and Bill. Very much. And Randy...soon as I see how the Porsche looks, I'll most likely be visiting your store for more. I need a few sets of those beautiful wire wheels too.

My uncle has a country place that no one knows about. He says it used to be a farm before the Motor Law. On Sundays I elude the eyes and hop the Turbine Freight To far outside the wire where my white-haired uncle waits Jump to the ground as the turbo slows to cross the borderline. Run like the wind as excitement shivers up and down my spine. Down in his barn my uncle preserved for me an old machine for fifty odd years. To keep it as new has been his dearest dream I strip away the old debris that hides a shining car, a brilliant red Barchetta from a better vanished time. I fire up the willing engine: responding with a roar, tires spitting gravel I commit my weekly crime Wind In my hair. Shifting and drifting. Mechanical music. Adrenaline surge... Well-weathered leather. Hot metal and oil. The scented country air. Sunlight on chrome. The blur of the landscape. Every nerve aware Suddenly ahead of me across the mountainside, a gleaming alloy air car shoots towards me, two lanes wide. I spin around with shrieking tires to run the deadly race, go screaming through the valley as another joins the chase Drive like the wind, straining the limits of machine and man. Laughing out loud with fear and hope, I've got a desperate plan. At the one-lane bridge I leave the giants stranded at the riverside, race back to the farm to dream with my uncle at the fireside

People claiming 95% "efficiency" for battery-electrics are generally changing the definition of same to suit their agendas. Or they're grossly ignorant of reality. I agree when the masses are riding around in glorified silent soul-free golf-carts, there MAY be less pressure on IC folks, but just try firing up a steam engine in regulated-to-death Cali and see how far you get. Far as sound goes, my manual-gearbox GMC sounds entirely different from my auto-box Chevy pickup. My 911 sounds wonderful like only a 911 can, the 550 Spyder repop sounds like a hot 4-cylinder VW or Porsche, and my big Jag sounds like a Jag. The MR2 makes its own sweet music, as does the old Kawasaki. And I love 'em all.

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