Ace-Garageguy

Yeah, that's the way you do it. Nice...

Derived from this kinda rare kit...

I've successfully had brake fluid cut some automotive urethane clears and primers that none of the alcohols or lye-based products would touch. However...I have no idea what exactly the primers were. And a note of caution: (you probably already know this) Prolonged soaking in brake fluid can leach the plasticizers out of styrene and leave it brittle...very brittle.

I'm not a Marine, but I sure as hell respect them.

Lotta that around. There's always the guy who buys the biggest cam and bolts on two-750 double pumpers & a tunnel-ram. Stock engine otherwise, hooked to an automatic trans. Step on the gas and....nothing. Bog. Pop. Spit. Fart.

I think you're on the right track, Scott. The chop looks better to me without the fadeaway fenders, and keeping some of the other mods to a minimum is probably a good idea.

Yeah, and I've always kinda wondered why Revell didn't hire somebody like the gifted Mr. Boutte to design the chop for this thing. There are rather a lot of chopped '41-'48 Fords out there, and most of them miss the mark, far as I'm concerned. And it was, I believe, Gene Winfield (who oughta know) who said "if you're not going to go at least 3 inches, don't bother". Anything less doesn't change the look of the car dramatically enough to be worth all the trouble...and I believe Revell's version may be less-than-three (I don't have the stock Revell '48 to measure, though compared to the old IMC '48, it is...less-than-three). It seems to me that Revell went for a middle-of-the-road approach, when a more radical chop that flowed better would have been a bigger hit. With the fadeaway fenders, Mr. Boyd's very competent build of essentially what's in the box is, to me, about as interesting as a stock '49 Plymouth. Not a bad looking car, but ...yawn...boring. But I LIKE this one...

The initial inspiration when I started working on the thing was the '60s teen movies where the coolest kid had the coolest vehicle to haul his race-car. Think Frankie Avalon in Fireball 500. I wanted to do something contemporary (in an alternate universe where kids still like drag racing, surfing, girls in bikinis, etc.) completely over-the-top, and where the race-car would be in an enclosed trailer that doubled as a swanky bachelor pad at the race track, and the tow-vehicle was a head-turning tuna-trawler in its own right.

Actually, when a commercial adapter hasn't been available, I've often done something very similar in full-scale. Back in about '82, I swapped a Ford 302 into a manual-gearbox Triumph TR8 by machining a 9/16" (14 mm) thick alloy engine-side flange in the shape of a Ford bellhousing, and Tig-welded it to the Triumph bellhousing (after a suitable amount had been removed from the front of the TR part). Used the Ford flywheel, drilled for the TR clutch, and machined an input shaft pilot bushing from Delrin. Ford starter bolted to the stock location and meshed with the Ford ring gear. Used the TR trans, rear mount and driveshaft, Only had to fab new front engine mounts and higher capacity radiator. Think I had to notch the rear of the oil pan and the front of the crossmember a bit too. Not really much harder than doing a model.

...and why creativity can be as much a curse as a gift...

Very fine work on replacing all the molded hardware with actual threaded fasteners, scratch-built springs, etc. You're bringing this up to the level of a Pocher kit...possibly beyond. I see you've modified the trans output shaft to incorporate the correct style universal-joint yoke to work with the open driveline you'll need with the Poncho diff. A+ for engineering.

Hmmmmm... I was not previously aware any of those white-wall inserts came with the M&H lettering. Gots to get me some... That 5-spoke wheel comparison is most helpful as well (if you're going for a very specific look).

Though you don't want to soak parts in denatured alcohol, I've never had a problem soaking in 91% isopropyl. Of course, that was model railroad rolling stock with factory paint, and it came off in a few hours.

Most automotive valve trains are designed to have some clearance (commonly called "valve lash") between parts that transmit motion to the valves, in order to compensate for things like different expansion rates of different materials. For example, an aluminum cylinder head will expand at a different rate as it reaches operating temperature, and a different overall amount, than the cast-iron block it might be bolted to, and the steel valve train parts will also expand differently. Adjusting this clearance so all the valves go through identical motions once the engine fully warms up, and without binding, can be done in several ways. Hydraulic lifters do it automatically. Non-automatic means of adjusting lash include threaded parts and locknuts on the lifters themselves, or on the rocker arms, or by replacing valve "pads" or "lash caps" that come in varying thicknesses. Some BMW engines use a small cam device on the rocker arm that's rotated to obtain the correct clearance, and then locked in position with a jam nut. Some engines, like the old Aston Martin 6, have no provision for adjustment, and the lash is achieved by VERY careful measuring, assembly and light machining of the parts involved while the entire head is removed from the engine. Clearances may be adjusted hot, or cold, according to the manufacturer's specs, and may involve using a wrench, screwdriver and feeler gauges, or may require removal of the cams to allow replacement of the pads, whose required thickness is determined by a mechanic using feeler-gauges and micrometers. The manual operations require a great deal of care and precision, and can vary immensely from engine family to family.

It is indeed derived from the Little Deuce, and even though it's pretty simple, it's a nice kit and builds up to make a fine looking model. As there's no separate chassis, it's hard to make a fenderless car, and the scaling is sorta 1/25 ish 1/24...but I like it a lot actually. The front axle, brake backing plates, and louvered hood (if it's still in the McD kit) are particularly useful kitbash fodder. I personally think it's the most pleasingly proportioned of all the fendered '32 Fords in these scales. These are two other incarnations it's been through...

I see pretty much instantly that Bernard corrected the things that are most jarringly wrong with the kit... he's used larger rear tires that would have been appropriate for this class of car in this time period, and he's replaced the silly undersized scoop with something that doesn't make the engine look like Zippy the Pinhead. He's also used different valve covers; after measuring the hemi in the kit, I see it too is underscale for the Chrysler Firepower it's most likely supposed to represent (the Chebby looks a little small too). He's used a larger diameter front wheel as well, something closer to Revell's own 19" wires that came in just about every vintage Revell digger, rather than the acceptable but on the small side 16.5" kit fronts. Granted the PE wires make a huge difference in the initial first impression, but just supplying 19" plastic wires in the kit would have made me happy. If the Slingster had only gotten the three big things right...rear tire size, quick-change modeled and scaled correctly, and a decent sized blower scoop on correctly-scaled engines...frankly, I would have waxed poetic about what a great basis the thing was for any number of vintage dragsters, and a spectacular source of kitbash goodies. I could have lived with the other deficiencies, as I have enough stuff in stock to correct most of them easily. And the kit designers only had to look on their own shelves to get the correct measurements. The Miss Deal Studebaker funny car has one of the best old-school Chrysler hemi engines ever done. The Ivo Showboat has 2 QC rear ends...and the Ivo kit's parts are jewels. All the old Revell dragster kits have the right front and rear wheels, and tires. What would have been so hard about LOOKING at what they'd already done, 50 years ago, when they still were capable of measuring with a ruler? It would have been, in my mind anyway, an instant classic. I love this period in drag racing, and see it as part of the golden era when dragsters were as individual as their builders...not cookie cutter duplicates of what everybody else runs. I'd have wanted to build every version of the kit possible, and would have bought multiple kits to do so. As it stands, I won't pay much for another one, as my own stash is overflowing with "the right stuff" to build period dragsters. Though the Slingster kit really is a pretty OK parts source, it's a far, far cry from what it so easily could have been.

Yeah, now THAT'S a good looking chop.

Very VERY nice. Even with its myriad shortcomings, I've always liked this kit a lot...though your take on it is probably what it's best suited for. Your weathering and ragged interior are really among the best I've seen. Most impressive realism.

Looks like a good day to light the fire, put on a pot of coffee, and build models.

Regarding denatured alcohol, this is from one of the model railroad forums. Many railroad items come painted with lacquer, and stripping them to custom-finish is very common. Quoting from Model Railroader http://cs.trains.com/mrr/f/88/t/259148.aspx " "Denatured alcohol, appliance fuel/marine stove fuel, it is not only undrinkable, It is Poison. I use it exclusively on stripping paint from all plastic's...but I do not soak them in it. I pour some in a pie tin and brush it on the whole surface, within seconds, it bubbles the paint and then I use a stiffer smaller brush to brush it off with and add more if need be. Have not harmed any plastic models yet."

WHY does anyone who makes an honest appraisal of a scale or accuracy deficiency invariably get tarred with the taking-the-"fun"-out-of-the-hobby brush? I personally have FUN building scale and period correct models (as do many others) and we're damm tired of having to re-do work that could have easily been done by the manufacturer so that we can have "fun" OUR WAY. Even mentioning the shortcomings if a kit these days is apparently not politically-correct speech in the car-modeling community. Is everyone so thin-skinned and fearful of the truth now that to face reality and name it as such is frowned upon universally?

Scott, I suppose a lot depends on the particular audience. Some guys who know '57 Fords very well, for instance, spotted deficiencies that could have been avoided very easily had anyone cared to do their work a little more carefully. These were noted on the web, and many of the folks who had the audacity to speak the simple truth were ridiculed and insulted. I also have been ridiculed and insulted for speaking the truth about real issues. I am rather intimately familiar with many vintage engines, components, and hot-rods in general. For that reason I spot deficiencies pretty much instantly...again deficiencies that could have been very easily avoided by the manufacturer putting in a little extra effort. But putting in extra effort isn't a popular thing these days. Play to the lowest-common-denominator is the name of the game, as that's the widest market. I really wanted to like the Slingster kit, and it was worth the $12 I paid for it as a source of parts. If I'd paid full retail, I'd feel cheated, because there's so much wrong with it. That's all I've got.

I DON'T recall anyone saying the kit was a bla bla whatever. There ARE some serious scale deficiencies, and they scream out at anyone who's spent his life around real drag cars, or has ever seen a real quick-change rear end, or at least has some innate feel for relative sizes of things. The kit IS a curious mix of crisp, well-detailed and well-scaled parts, and poorly-rendered blobs worthy of Palmer. The kit IS also a great source of parts for building other stuff. SOME modelers may find the truth about a kit's shortcomings useful, and not feel their "fun" is being threatened, or that their acceptance of it is somehow personal criticism. I do NOT believe it's detrimental to the hobby to address the truth about kit shortcomings, because these are sold as "scale models" and not presented as "toys". Babies and little children play with toys, and most of them haven't developed any sense of the relative sizes of things yet. They're usually perfectly happy playing with a 9" long aircraft carrier and a 3" long airplane in the same scenario. They don't notice anything wrong, they don't care, and they seem to be having mindless fun...so let 'em. Adult modelers, on the other hand, deserve anything represented as a "scale" model of something to in fact be a scale representation...and that goes for all the parts in the box. (And it's not like Revell hasn't tooled a lot of scale-correct QC rear ends over the years, either. Nobody on staff has to travel to a vintage race car shop and burn time and money measuring a real one. All anyone who had any business designing new kits needed to do was to pull one of Revell's own old kits off the shelf and put a pair of calipers to one of several available vintage QC units. It's just not difficult.) Measuring accurately is not hard. Nor is doing a little extra research to get things right...if you have some clue about what you're doing. It only takes a little more effort, it's not going to be a financial deal-breaker, and no one is expecting "perfection". Just please...to the manufacturers... get it pretty damm close consistently. That's what you're being paid to do. It's not too much to ask.

Dodge Challenger Sportwagon (with Magnum rear greenhouse) Revell 1/25 '37 Ford truck combined with Monogram 1/24 '36 Ford to get a reasonably accurate '38 pickup Buncha stuff

Thank you sir. When I dropped the thing, I lost a couple of the parts...like a wheel-motor and one turbine. The turbines are from the Amtronic, and the wheel motors were made from the old and hard-to-find brakes for the '32 Ford in the AMT double kit with the Willys drag car included. I've sourced replacements, but that's as far as I've gone since then.