Monty

Gotta agree with this. When these sets first came out, my modeling buddies and I raided the hobby shops for all of the various combinations, but only a few ended up buying the Goodyears 'cuz AMT already offered a very similar tire in about half their kits. Long story short, our excitement at having alternative tires caused us to forget to do our own due diligence (look closely at tires on the box art before purchasing). Our disappointment at the shape of the Firestones and the word placement on the M/Ts meant most of those tires got thrown away. OTOH, if you detail their Keystone wheel with some black paint (I used Humbrol #85 Coal Black) it's probably the best version of this wheel in the hobby and still looks good on just about anything from the muscle car era.

Nice reference pics, Double D. Thanks!

The Academy angle was new to me, but the search results were about the same. Looks like hobby shops kept the imagery, but everybody has these listed as backordered or something that can be pre-ordered. Maybe that means they will be coming out again. I appreciate the tip, though!

I never bought any of the sets with Goodyear tires, so I can't offer an opinion on them. I have, however, had the other two tires, and it looks like we disagree somewhat. The Firestones at least give us an early '70s street tire that isn't marked Goodyear and the lettering is fairly well done, so points for that. The shoulders are where this tire really loses any sense of authenticity. They're just too square. The real tires taper off to the tread surface, while the kits' tires just take a 90* turn. I'd give them a grade of C- That said, I double-dog dare you to post up a pic of an MRC Mickey Thompson tire with painted lettering and put it next to a picture of a real Mickey Thompson street tire. Someone at MRC got the side lettering so screwed up it's ridiculous. There's an approximate 7" scale gap between the words "Mickey" and "Thompson" on the kit tire, which throws everything else off. Summary: I might use the Firestones for a bit of variety, but I wouldn't even consider lettering a set of these kit tires up and putting them on a model. Looks like we agree on the adapter pieces

I certainly appreciate your offer, but this was just an inquiry as to whether anyone knew if we might see these sets again. I thought the Keystones were very well done (I heard the Cragars were too) but I wish they would've tooled up a set of Ansen Sprints (5-slot wheels), since they were a commonly seen wheel back when these tires were popular. The kits also provided adapters of almost every sort so you could use these on a variety of models.

Just curious if they'll ever do another release of the wheel & tire sets that they created about a decade ago.

You'll never have to work too hard to convince me of the merits of Humbrol paints. I've got a ton of them, including a couple tins of #50 Green Mist metallic, but I haven't found a project to use the green on yet. Your pics show what a cool color it is, so thanks for posting them. Their #51 Sunset Red metallic is a unique shade as well if ya feel like doing another chopper.

Perhaps a phone call from Gregg is in order. Would you mind suggesting it?

This is getting sad. I had to go to the Model Cars Magazine site and click on the Forums button to get here. Is anybody working on this? Should we check the oil in the Rent-A-Server or see if someone blocked the slot where the quarters go in? I can pull up the Scale Auto or Spotlight Hobbies boards in a heartbeat.

It's not that common to see those three colors together, but that little gold pinstripe ties the green in with the black, resulting in a stellar combination. Thumbs up from me! PS Is that Tamiya metallic green?

Adam, I've read where other people building these older Cougars resolved the inner fenderwell issue by using the assembly that comes in the MPC '71-'73 Cougars. These kits are still fairly common, so you shouldn't have to spend a whole lot to get one. (I'm hoping someone who has done this will post with pictures) Apparently the MCM Rent-A-Server won't allow me to use this url to show a picture of the assembly as depicted in the instructions, so here's a link to it (See block #9). http://public.fotki.com/drasticplasticsmcc/instruction_sheetsh/instruction_sheets/mpc-4/mpc-the-cat-73-merc/mpccougar7308300004.html

I commend you for overcoming the misleading instructions and ending up with such a sharp truck. I can almost hear it idling...

I'm going to piggyback onto what Mark said here. It's obvious you enjoy the hobby, and I'd be the last person who'd want to take that away, but to put it bluntly, I don't think you've reached the level of building expertise I would expect of someone purporting to tell others which materials or techniques you consider best for sanding, gluing and painting. I'm hoping Harry or Gregg can dig up Mark's old tutorial written to help Nick W, among others. Mark has a gift for writing in a straightforward manner that doesn't "talk down" to anyone, while not being above anyone's comprehension either. When you write trite little paragraphs that barely skim the surface in terms of worthwhile information being passed on, it kinda comes off like this I hope you can be mature enough to consider what I'm saying here.

I recall Mark Taylor putting together a very nice "basics" tutorial for some of our less experienced modelers about a year or so ago. Assuming that it can still be found, do you think it might be useful?

Premise: with the advent of Google, there's no excuse for getting the details wrong. Some of my favorite pet peeves have already been covered: a mold seam across the top of the radiator, garden hose-sized plug wires, "angry spider" plug wire positioning & applying BMF over surfaces that should've been sanded smooth. Lotsa crinkly vent windows out there... Here are a couple more that don't take much time to do correctly, but make a difference: mold seams across the front and back end of mufflers - five minutes of sanding results in a subtle but effective change. Don't assume you can just detail by contrast, especially on chassis components. I see a lot of builders do this, and if called on it, say "I built it my way." Obviously. Seriously, make Google your friend. My biggest pet peeve (this used to be in our Rants section) is the assumption that the box art model is dead-on accurate and should be emulated. Favorite example: Monogram's Boss 429 Mustang. When this kit was first released, there were at least two Mustang magazines available as resources. If I could find 'em in my little town, they couldn't have been that scarce. By not taking the time to see how the grille looks on a 1:1 car (especially around the headlights) the builder convinced untold numbers of copycats that the front end should resemble a goldfish. Moral of the story: A little research pays huge dividends.

I don't know enough about tooling to say whether it'd be better to redo the original kit or start completely over. Lately it seems some of the mfrs are getting the small details down, but goofing up things like body proportions etc. I just want better kits of these two cars, for starters. You're absolutely right about MPC's '67 GTO. I still remember the disappointment I felt over 20 years ago when I bought that thing (molded in blue). Luckily I had a friend who was big into Pontiacs, so I traded it to him (for some magic beans, IIRC).

I was not aware of the 2+2, and I haven't built any of the others. Any pics of a chassis? (Molded-in exhaust really hacks me off).

I ventured into the MCM Slot Car section a couple weeks ago and saw your post about some new HO cars with white letter tires. I figured that since you were an HO fan and you had the ability to detail something as small as a Hot Wheels car, you might have also taken a stab at applying your talents to making Aurora's slot car more accurate (George Follmer version?) since they're both roughly 1/64 scale. My sincere apologies if I messed up your thread.

First, I'm confining the field to 1/25 and 1/24 scale cars, since that's what the majority of us build. By "better versions" I mean small but important things like bumpers not being attached to grilles, separate engine bay components, poseable front wheels & a chassis with no molded-in exhaust or suspension. (Quick example: Revell's '69 Charger proves this is all quite feasible). And above all, no metal axles through the engine block. OK, on to the cars: 1) The '65/'66 Ford Mustang fastback (your choice). The only fastback I can think of is Monogram's 1/24 Shelby GT350, which, while nice, doesn't allow you to build a stock Ford Mustang fastback. AMT offered a fastback gasser-type AWB Mustang way back when, as well as the '66 coupe and the Sonny and Cher Mustangs, and for those sins I think their penance should be to create a spectacular '65/'66 fastback. 2) The '63 Corvette coupe. Yeah, I can hear ya whinin' already: "There's too many Corvettes already, and besides, AMT and Revell already offer this." Read my opening paragraph again, then look at the AMT chassis. If you've ever seen what a correctly detailed IRS can do for a chassis (steet rod or 'Vette) you'll know why I'm making this point. As for what I think of snap kits, well...just think how you'd condense the instructions for suppositories into one pithy phrase. Revell/Monogram have already done some of the other C2s, so this shouldn't be much a stretch IMO. What would you add, and why? (I'm betting the Mopar guys are the first ones in regarding the 'Cuda fiasco).

Ya know, that's just about the size of the Aurora A/FX Javelin slot car... and I know you know your way around slot cars. Just sayin'...

Verizon/FIOS

Would you mind sharing your method for weathering mufflers? Those are exceptionally well done.

I've got a fairly new, very fast computer and my internet provider's top fiber-optic package. I can connect to any of my other favorite sites almost instantaneously, but for some reason I have problems connecting here. This doesn't happen every day, but far more often than it should, IMO. The only clues I have are 1) a pop-up box that says I can't be connected to this site and 2) a pop-up message indicating a sequel server error. (This one isn't quite as common as the first one). Admittedly, I'm not terribly knowledgeable about computers, but I can't figure out why I have so much trouble connecting here when all the other sites are a breeze. Anybody else experiencing this? 11:04 AM - Just happened again. Here's a copy/paste of the sequel server message: An error occured with the SQL server: This is not a problem with IP.Board but rather with your SQL server. Please contact your host and copy the message shown above.