Ace-Garageguy

I've found, by experimenting, that I can get out of the endlessly repeating quotes by using the backspace function. Sometimes you just have to keep hammering the backspace key, but eventually it will clear all the prior quotes and you can post clean in a virgin text field. Works for me, anyway. There are subtle differences in how specific browsers interact with different sites.

I switched to Chrome and like it. So far, no issues. So far.

There are a few 1/24 radial-engined warbird kits around. Not this particular engine, but the Jap Zero and P-47 are both available, for instance. Kinda expensive donor for just an engine at $60-$150 a shot though.

So...now you know what a lot of life is going to be like "in the cloud". First time I changed my hard drive, I was able to get my Firefox profile back up. The Firefox server had everything. Second time too. Last time, no dice. Even with everything that should have been necessary, no go. Profile gone or mysteriously inaccessible along with a lot of tagged and archived research and reference sites and pages. No "procedure" worked to get it back. Just gone. And I'm not exactly a computer noob. These days, everything that could conceivably be important I save to my own hard drive, and back it up once a week. i wish you luck. If you recover it, please let us know how you did it. Good thing it's not an autonomous vehicle, huh?

Nice hack-'n-whack. Very clean work for such a heavy conversion.

Oh baby baby. Good looking little rod. Very clean work on your chop filling and finishing, much better than is the norm too. Great work.

I made a glooey fingerprinted poorly-fitting gap-ridden mess of just about everything I built when I was a kid lacking sufficient eye-hand coordination, fine-motor control, and a well-developed self-critical feedback loop...and patience. I remember being horribly frustrated because my results looked like dog droppings, and try as I might, improvement in my skills was glacially slow. By the time I was 14 or so, I'd learned to take my time, let things dry, test-fit before gluing, etc...and that if my models looked like carp, it was due more to my own incompetence, not "bad" kits...though there were certainly some that took a LOT more effort to fit and correct to become acceptable models than others. The IMC kits noted above, and others, the Revell Thompson Challenger I and opening-panel tri-5 Chebbys and '56 Ford pickup...there were quite a few I wasn't satisfied with on 'completion', but they looked pretty OK. I really have to thank this hobby for kindling an interest in how cars and aircraft worked and what all the parts actually were supposed to do on the real versions. I'm also grateful that poorly translated models like Palmer produced made me realize early in life that the manufacturers weren't always right, and just because adults got paid to do something didn't guarantee they'd do it WELL. I'm also grateful that I learned patience, and to rely on my own judgement when things didn't fit, and the confidence to cut into something that wasn't designed intelligently and change it. I wish I had the first Revell '57 Ford wagon that I think was my first 1/25 scale car kit. Man, it makes me cringe to remember how awful that was when I got done with it. I've come a long way since then.

Another clean, well thought-out hot-rod.

Next time someone asks me if I play golf (I don't), I hope I remember to be suitably offended .

Lot's of trick stuff going on here. Nice.

Excellent points. Though there's a fair bit of resin casting going on, the majority of it isn't really very good quality...if we're going to be honest. Most of the stuff I've seen is either too thick, not symmetrical, poorly scaled, misshapen, full of pinholes and bubbles, etc. Top-quality resin is somewhat rare, and Modelhaus has the reputation for producing some of the best. Also, I tend to think the majority of car modelers don't really have any idea of the level of care and skill goes into making top-quality resin parts, or anything else. Much of the popular perception seems to be that you just mix up some goo and pour it in a mold. Done. Nothing could be farther from the truth. I'm always annoyed when I hear people complaining about the price of quality resin parts. The reality is that if you're getting GOOD resin, whoever is making it is not making much money at all, considering the time and talent it takes to do it.

It's not hard at all to get a primer-show-through effect with sandpaper. This is the only one of mine I could find any online pix of, and I'm too lazy this AM to go looking on my own hard drive, but you get the idea. This was a completed shiny AMT '32 body shell of someone's I got with a bunch of parts. Several areas have been sanded through to various depths to give it a worn-paint effect, with the decklid area being the best example of the look I think you're after. The shell was also scrubbed with Comet first to break the gloss.

If you have a shiny model you want to make look dull, all you need to do is to scrub it with a toothbrush and something like old-fashioned Comet or another abrasive cleanser. Besides being excellent for prepping bare plastic for good primer adhesion, it also works beautifully for removing gloss to get a weathered effect. To me, shooting a coat of flat or dull clear over everything looks fake, as it evens the surface out too much. Again, this is an area where YOU need to experiment with various techniques to get an effect that looks real to you.

Perhaps it's begun... http://www.ebay.com/itm/MODELHAUS-1992-BUICK-ROADMASTER-RESIN-RESIN-1-25-Model-Car-Mountain-/142049174371?hash=item2112ca6363:g:1mIAAOSwRQlXf~9w

Saturday night I listen to WABE streaming their "Jazz Classics" show. 8PM-2AM. S'bout the best mood music I've found for building period hot-rods and customs. Think I'll go work on something now. http://player.wabe.org/wabe_simulcast.html

Or skulls.

Probably not, but it's going to depend on the exact look you want. There's a trend in 1:1 patina'd cars now to shoot clear over rust and faded /weathered paint and primer, but I think it looks goofy. I've only done a couple, but sanded-through paint looks exactly like paint that's worn off to primer...'cause it is. There are several guys on here who do a lot of it and do it really well. They can tell you more, like if you want rust showing through your primer in spots as well...which is beyond my current pay grade.

That's what I said.

Best way to do it is to really do it. Primer your model the color you want as primer to show through. Then paint it whatever "worn" color you want. Then simply sand through the color coat to expose the primer in the appropriate areas. You need to use really fine paper...wet-or-dry paper, used wet...so you get a very fine and subtle feather-edge transition between your topcoat and primer show-through areas. PRACTICE / EXPERIMENT FIRST.

I'm still waiting to get more info on the models I PM'd him about. I'm STILL interested (hint hint).

Wow...yeah,now that you mention it...he built some really interesting and imaginative models. Hope he's OK.

I've got one on the way, should be here Monday or Tuesday. First thing will be to test-fit the ancient (and excellent) Revell 1/25 '30-'31 Ford firewall, hood and grille... just to see how they actually work with the new-tool version. Second thing I'm going to do is to look into making it into a '29, as there's been some interest expressed here as to how that could be most easily achieved. I just got a Revell '29 truck cab specifically to use as a donor for the forward section. I have dimensioned drawings of all the relevant 1:1 bodies, so it ought to be interesting to see what really works relative to all the speculation.

Yeah, some of the websites say $500-$750 for a timing belt job, but by the time you deal with the extra complexity of the turbo model, and the really required tensioners, seals and water pump (you HAVE to remove the timing belt to do a water pump or any of the seals on the end of the engine, so you may as well do them all when you do the belt) plus the almost inevitable broken fasteners...then throw in an oil change, air filter, plugs and wires that will most likely be finished by the time you do the belt, you're up to two grand easy. A design flaw also allows the water pump to leak coolant on to the timing belt if the pump seal goes bad, which will hasten the belt's demise considerably. The Chinee pumps, even the "lifetime guarantee" aftermarket pumps, last about a year. And the guarantee DOES NOT COVER LABOR TO REPLACE THE THING ALONG WITH THE TIMING BELT, which drives it. That's why it's IMPERATIVE TO USE OEM PARTS. There's another potential problem too. "Mechanics" who quote lowball prices to do the job will often FORCE the timing belt on the sprockets without getting everything out of the way..."saving money". The problem with this is that IF the side of the timing belt gets nicked, it WILL fail prematurely, leaving you stranded by the side of the road, or worse yet, resulting in a full engine shut-down on an interstate with potentially dangerous or fatal results...because when the engine quits, the power steering and power brake assist quit too. The engine compartment is EXTREMELY tight due to the cute retro styling, and though it could have EASILY been engineered to be simple to service by allowing only ONE MORE INCH between some components, nobody in the design chain thought it was necessary to make the thing reasonably easy to work on. So it's a double-barreled bugger. Cute and fun to drive though. Keep it well maintained by NON-CHIMPS with USA-quality parts and it will give you hundreds of thousands of miles.