Ace-Garageguy

Part of the problem is cultural. The notion of "copyright" is really considered to be mean and old-fashioned by many (in the minority who have even HEARD of it) owing to the widespread ripping and copying of music and video files with no payment. The idea that an artist's work should be freely available to everyone has somehow invaded the minds of those who don't make anything original, and many of them just don't get it. Part of it is ignorance of the whole idea that it's wrong to copy someone else's work for resale. It may be hard to believe, but it just never occurs to some of these clowns...and these are the ones who actually believe that once you buy a part, it's yours to do whatever you want with, including copying and selling copies. Then there's plain old stupid. I actually had one fool get really angry with me, threatening to sue, after he bought a carp quality ripoff of one of my body kits, warped out of shape and made WAY too thick out of bottom-of-the-barrel resin, heavy and brittle. He actually screamed that because I had designed and made the originals, I should be responsible for making sure all the copies anywhere in the universe were made correctly...even the unauthorized copies that I made zero money on. And don't forget cheapness. A lot of people JUST DON'T CARE if they're getting an original or a copy, as long as it doesn't cost much. Those of you who produce ORIGINAL work need to seriously look into copyright law, and at the very least, include a little slip of paper in with your parts explaining that IT IS ILLEGAL TO COPY THEM WITHOUT WRITTEN PERMISSION. If you sell direct, you also need to get your customers to tick a box stating specifically that they will NOT copy them, and they know it's illegal to do so. This constitutes a legally binding contract, and though you'd STILL have to spend money to shut violators down, forcing buyers to acknowledge their awareness of the situation at least keeps the basically honest people honest.

I have a Chevy and a GMC of similar vintages, and as you say, they're exactly the same truck. Were then, still are for the most part, except for badging, trim and a few options. Sometimes it's just amazing the erroneous conclusions people can come up with. In times past, GMC vehicles could be a little more different from their Chevy brethren. The big 'ol GMC inline 6. though it looked very much like the smaller displacement Chevy engine, was actually an entirely different piece, bigger externally as well as internally, and longer overall. GMC also sourced V8 engines from Pontiac before going all Chevy corporate. PS. Not being in sales myself, I long ago abandoned any pretext that "the customer is always right".

Over the years I've made several lines of one-off full-scale aftermarket fiberglass parts for real cars (mostly Porsches, Datsun Z-cars and fairly recently some tuners and Fieros). I did all the design work, the full-scale model work, the mold work, and the production. These things sold on average for several hundred dollars, and often, shortly after MY parts hit the market, I started seeing cheap knockoffs that were poor quality. I countered by laminating my own business card (with a secret little trick) under clear resin on the back side of my own parts...difficult for the average slop-jockey knockoff jerk to copy. This didn't stop the ripoffs, but it DID shut up the bozos who called me saying they'd bought my parts and they were carp. No laminated card, it just ain't mine. Next time, buy it from ME.

And AGAIN, just now. I tried to post the offending few lines HERE in THIS thread, and STILL got the 404 BS. No bad words, no communist subversive messages, no non-PC remarks, no secret codes...just refusing to take a simple few-line response. So...there's something in the response that's triggering the 404 message. How truly odd.

Baking paint in the oven tends to make your next meal taste like paint, too.

The "thin stuff" is called "sandable", not "scratch filler".

Again tried to post the same answer to the 1/24 history thread and got this... 404 ErrorSORRY. WE CAN'T SEEM TO FIND THE PAGE YOU'RE LOOKING FOR.

Just tried to post a reply to the "1/24" thread and got the idiot " 404 can't find the page you're looking for " message. This is getting old.

Yes.

He mentioned that he uses the dental material to make molds for vacuum-forming clear parts, as it doesn't have the grain that wood molds would have. Plain old bondo would work quite well in that application too. He also mentions using clear acrylic material (towards the end of the video) to repair cracks in a vac-molded canopy, and to create additional contours on clear parts. "Styrene monomer" you mention is a large component of polyester resins (for fiberglass and the glue in bondo) and shouldn't really be inhaled or handled. Today's dental "acrylics" are intended to be used in somebody's mouth, can even be cast in-place in the mouth under certain circumstances, and are essentially non-toxic when cured and of relatively low toxicity when wet.

Thank you for the link! I've been doing similar edge-filling and reinforcing for years...but using expensive aircraft-grade epoxy and microballoon that has to be mixed on a gram-scale. My technique is slow, takes hours to cure, and is generally a real PITA. Thanks to this video, I have a great new alternative.

if you pull up some Of Harry's brass-era builds, and his old fire engine, you'll see his method for doing brass.

I should have said "metal' tubing, but I assumed it would be self-evident. My bad. Styrene tube thinned that much will become too weak to handle further. Even brass or aluminum tube will have a wall-thickness that's out of scale...which is why I suggested thinning the tubing edges from the inside, easily done with a small round file, or a tight little roll of 180 grit sandpaper.

I just wonder why it has so much totally and completely useless "aero" stuck-on extra drag-making...stuff.

Remarkably well thought-out and integrated design work. Everything looks like it belongs together, and that's rare these days even on real cars. Exceptionally clean fabrication too, all the way through.

Boy, did I get that wrong. I beez goin get me sum.

I seriously doubt it.

To get anything that looks even close to scale-correct (the material would be prohibitively thin to injection mold without a LOT of care in tooling design...though it is possible, barely), you're going to have to scratch-build. Not that hard, actually. Just get appropriately sized pieces of tubing and thin the edges from the inside. Then make fins from .010" styrene or brass sheet (.005" would be better) and use CA to attach them to the inner tube first, let dry thoroughly, then final-trim and slip the assembly in to the outer tube, with a couple of drops of CA to hold it all together.

The well wishes and donations have tapered off to almost nothing, but you know what? Harry is very alone and very very sick. He gave selflessly of his time and talent here for many years, keeping the forum organized, working, and riding herd on the troublemakers. He inspired many of us with the beautiful models he built, and was in large part instrumental for making the magazine what it is. He logs on here occasionally, but I understand he usually doesn't feel well enough to post. WE NEED TO KEEP WRITING THE WORDS OF ENCOURAGEMENT HERE SO HE CAN SEE THEM, AND WE NEED TO KEEP SENDING DONATIONS TO HIS FUND, WHATEVER YOU CAN AFFORD. Let's show him we haven't forgotten him.

The well wishes and donations have tapered off to almost nothing, but you know what? Harry is very alone and very very sick. He gave selflessly of his time and talent here for many years, keeping the forum organized, working, and riding herd on the troublemakers. He inspired many of us with the beautiful models he built, and was in large part instrumental for making the magazine what it is. He logs on here occasionally, but I understand he usually doesn't feel well enough to post. WE NEED TO KEEP WRITING THE WORDS OF ENCOURAGEMENT HERE SO HE CAN SEE THEM, AND WE NEED TO KEEP SENDING DONATIONS TO HIS FUND, WHATEVER YOU CAN AFFORD. Let's show him we haven't forgotten him.

The Kawei K1 was a blatant ripoff of a US Ford design.

Here's a tutorial I did on zeeing '32 Ford frames. if you need to know anything else, feel free to ask. I build lots of model rods...and real ones for a living.

Good to know. I'll try one. I haven't bought a cheapo for over 5 years, so it's worth a shot.

It is. Just about every gravity-feed gun out there today is labeled HVLP though, kinda like the light brown white bread is labeled "whole wheat". The thing is, just by being gravity-feed, they don't have to run as high pressure to get the siphon to work. A decent gravity-feed touchup gun is a very nice tool to have in the arsenal, but of the five cheapo guns like this I've bought over the years, not ONE of them has lasted beyond two or at most three paint jobs. Why? The internal seals are made of some Chinese mystery elastomer that dissolves or hardens, no matter how well you maintain it. Just a few contacts with actual solvents, they're toast (your results may vary...the new ones MIGHT have decent seals).