Ace-Garageguy

Good call. One thing I forgot to mention is that I'm pretty sure the photo was shot in Australia.

Cool little truck, nice conversion, perfect colors for it.

I'm always surprised by the Ebay horror stories. In now well over 2000 transactions, I have never lost a cent, and have had only a handful turn unpleasant. Paying through PayPal gives you a money-back protection scheme, and using the "pay after delivery" option allows you to inspect the merchandise PRIOR to forking out any money. PayPal fronts the bucks for the purchase, and then if everything is satisfactory, they deduct the money from YOU after 2 full weeks.

I don't know anything about this rig, other than the trailer appears to possibly have been made from an old bus. I like the looks anyway. Anybody here know what the tractor is?

In this case, it was a single item with shipping listed as one price, and the invoice asking an additional $12+. As stated, an email to the seller got resolution.

Looks good. I'm probably going to need one at some point, had a 1:1 with a 428. Made a great race-car tow vehicle.

Nice

I like it. Lots of subtle custom touches that make this stand out, too. Very nice overall.

Looking good. The world needs more wagons in scale.

After I contacted the seller, he sent a revised invoice with shipping more in line with what was shown in the auction, but no explanation as to what happened. I honestly don't mind paying enough to cover the shipper's expenses and time, but put it up front so I can see it, and don't try to sneak it past me on the invoice. It's not the money, but the principle that chaps my behind.

I figured I'd give the seller the chance to make it right, as it's just possible it was an honest oversight. If he gets snippy, I will file a complaint. I usually try to give people the benefit of the doubt first, but I don't actually accept any BS in the long run.

You have two issues besides the possibility that Eric mentioned, and I'll expand on his thoughts. One, if you look CLOSELY at the metallic, you'll see it's grainy and not smoothly distributed like what's on your spoon. This appearance is the result of excessive film build as well as dry spray not self-leveling. As Eric rightly points out you CAN sand this flat prior to clear, as long as you shoot an additional coat of metallic to even out the metallic effect (which will be disturbed unevenly by sanding). Two, you also have definite orange peel in the clear itself. This is evident in the broken reflections of the light source. Again, not a wet enough application to allow self-leveling of the material. The problems with shooting spoons, as I've tried to explain multiple times, are also twofold. The plastic that spoons are made of is not necessarily the same as the plastic that models are made of, and shooting spoons DOES NOT help you to develop a good spray technique for much larger model car bodies. Practicing your spray technique on old junk bodies is ideal, if you strip them in between practice sessions...but priming and practicing your spray technique on small plastic soda bottles is much simpler. They're about the same size as a model body, allow you to get the feel for getting good overlapped coverage (without too much buildup) as you turn the things, and are entirely disposable. One more thought...automotive urethane clears are designed to provide much greater film thickness than is required for model work. This can be compensated for to some degree by over-thinning after the hardener is thoroughly mixed in. The film thickness of these products tends to fill details, and if shot wet enough to flow out well, as mixed (without additional reducer) often produces a finish that, though very slick and glossy, also has the appearance that the model has been dipped in syrup due the to rounding of panel edges and filling of panel lines.

Recently, we had a thread about what was fair to charge for shipping, and I believe the consensus was to ask a fair price that would cover your expenses...and LIST IT ON THE AUCTION PAGE. I also recently bid on and won an item, only to have the invoice be for almost $13 MORE for shipping than was stated on the auction page. Needless to say, I didn't pay it, and contacted the seller about the discrepancy...noting that I ALWAYS bid with the shipping charge in mind, and would NOT have bid on this item if the inflated shipping charge had been displayed. Anybody else have this happen?

Correct, and essentially the same answer I've been unable to post due to site problems for several weeks. I had explained this in more depth, but every attempt to post resulted in the 404 can't find the page you're looking for message.

Beautiful machine. I know nothing about this, but I do appreciate quality craftsmanship in whatever field I encounter it. If it sounds as good as it looks, it must be pretty sweet.

I do a bench reboot whenever I find myself spending more time looking for things than actually working. Not knowing how long I was going to be in my present digs (even though it's now been 3+ years) I've never really set up anything like a well organized workspace, so it can get fairly disorganized after a few days of building.

Just tried to copy / paste a post to the "1/24 history" thread in the "drag racing" heading. Same response I tried to post several days back. Got exactly the same result. 404 Error SORRY. WE CAN'T SEEM TO FIND THE PAGE YOU'RE LOOKING FOR.

TWO VERY INFORMATIVE THREADS:

About the only good "big" Hewland I know of is the 1/24 scale unit in the Accurate Miniatures McLaren kits (the "small" Hewlands were built in VW cases). You might be able to find a gluebomb or partial AM McLaren for reasonable money, though I occasionally see complete ones starting as low as $10.

And...if you want to remove the mold lines from the body, you can carefully sand them off with 400 grit, and go to progressively finer and finer grits (wet), finishing up with polishing compound to return the original gloss to the bare plastic. Unfortunately, it's not a really great kit and has rather a lot of scaling and proportion issues. The orange one was probably made as more of a "collectors" item, and a marketing piece to spur sales of a lackluster model.

Those bits are a type of miniature "end-mills", and your procedure is exactly what you'd do with a milling machine, only hand-held...so not as accurate...but still very effective.

Bill, you're certainly earning your handle on this one. Fantastic amount of effort, and fascinating to follow along. Something very special happening here.

Just glue some square stock to the backside of the corners, let it dry THOROUGHLY, and round them off with a sanding block. I do things like that frequently.

They only take 5%. That's a nickel out of a dollar. Pretty good deal if you ask me. To put it another way, for every $100 Harry gets, gofundme only gets $5. There is also a 2.9% WePay (like PayPal, but different) processing fee, plus 30 cents per donation. So for every $100 donated to Harry's account, a full $91.80 goes directly to Harry.

You guys who have donated the last few days are the greatest, and Harry's fund is growing. I'm sure if he looks in on it, he'll feel better knowing that he has so many generous and caring friends. As I write this, I see there are about 150 people viewing the board. Mikemodeler has a very good idea..."If you grab lunch out everyday, brown bag some leftovers or a PB&J sandwich and donate what you would have spent on lunch for a day or two a couple of times a month and help make a difference in Harry's life." That's not too much to ask to give back to someone who's given so much of his time, skill and talent to all of us. Please give whatever you can. Even $5 will help Harry to know he's not alone in his fight for his life. It's easy to donate on any credit card, it only takes a few minutes, and it's 100% safe. https://www.gofundme.com/2pndgj5w