Lindberg Auburn Speedster

[mredjr]

Can anyone tell me what to expect with the Lindberg Auburn Speedster or maybe show photos. Elvin

[Dave Darby]

I have never had one, but I have seen them. First off, it was engineered by Pyro Plastics in the mid 1950's. It has a generally crude, multi pieced body (predated the multi-piece sliding insert molds pioneered by George Toteff of AMT models.) That said, as far as Auburn Speedsters go, I think it is the only game in town. Highly accurate it isn't, but it's still kind of neat.

Edited August 30, 2015 by Dave Darby

[Ace-Garageguy]

I have several, from pristine original Pyro and Lindberg boxed kits to awful gluebombs, one of which was salvaged from a dump. They fit together very well, build up easily, the engines are detailed enough to take farther and look quite good, and the proportions aren't too bad. The chassis is very simple and pretty much detail-free.

The scaling, however, isn't very accurate. The model is smaller than it should be for the scale, but it makes a great basis for a hot-rod-custom.

I've never formally measured one to see how far off it is, but I've driven and worked on real 1:1 Auburn boat-tails and fiberglass replicas, and the model is definitely undersize.

You could probably use the Pyro / Lindberg model as a good basis for making an accurate model of the subject, with some work.

[62rebel]

as has been said, it's an old tool, well-used and never properly updated. parts fit is fiddly and there are seams in the body that are a bear to deal with. the grille shell is the best part of the kit IMHO; the wheels and tires, the worst. ejection pin marks show up everywhere and some are problematic to remove. I heavily modified mine, put big astro rims on it, and i like the result but I would like to try it again just to get it closer to box-art style. For what it is, don't pay too much. but don't dismiss it as junk, it's tough, but not junk.

[sjordan2]

as has been said, it's an old tool, well-used and never properly updated. parts fit is fiddly and there are seams in the body that are a bear to deal with. the grille shell is the best part of the kit IMHO; the wheels and tires, the worst. ejection pin marks show up everywhere and some are problematic to remove. I heavily modified mine, put big astro rims on it, and i like the result but I would like to try it again just to get it closer to box-art style. For what it is, don't pay too much. but don't dismiss it as junk, it's tough, but not junk.

I agree with most of the posts above, though the grille shell looks too vertical to me. I have the kit but haven't built this issue yet, though I did so decades ago when it was a Pyro kit. The 2006 Lindbergh reissue, unlike Pyro, has plated chrome parts. Nits based on my observations: Most models seem to have problems with a decent hood fit; the windshield frame is inaccurate; the chrome step plates on the running boards are too big; tires and wheels look too small; molded door panel seams stick out instead of being engraved in. Decals are so-so, using gray ink for parts that would be chrome.

Most of those issues can be overcome with some diligence. But my biggest pet peeve is box art that shows a real car and not the model (however, it's decent reference for what the 1:1 looks like).  But you can get that on Google.

 

You can see a nice build on this site by 70mach1 that he posted under glass in February 2014. 

Edited August 30, 2015 by sjordan2

[FordRodnKustom]

Here you go Elvin. Looks like with a little work you could build something cool out of it. I think the later releases have some chrome parts. This is my PYRO original.

[sjordan2]

As you can see in the excellent shots above, the original Pyro version has 2-part plastic wheel/tires and no chrome.

Lindbergh has vinyl tires and separate chrome wheels, plus a chrome sprue. 

[Junkman]

We need a newly tooled kit of this thing.

[unclescott58]

Thanks Ron for posting the pictures above. The quality and portions look simular to the Cord 812 by Pyro Kit I built back in the 1970's. Because of Mongram's great Cord 812 kit I'd never did built another Pyro version again. This is fine for the Cord. The problem is, in anything remotely 1/25th - 1/24th scale for the Auburn, the Pyro kit is the only thing available. Someday I may buy one. But I know it's going to take a lot of work to make it look okay.

As far as chrome parts go in the new Lindberg reissue of the Pyro Auburn. What parts are chrome plated? Wasn't everything that would be chrome on the real car, molded into other parts on the model, requiring paint or foil? The hub caps are molded into the wheels. The step plates to the rockers. I'm not seeing the grille or headlamps above. Were they seperate pieces that could be chrome plated? I assume the side pipes and bumpers could be offered in chrome. I would like to see a more modern Lindberg version, showing the chrome parts.

[stavanzer]

I remember building this kit when I was about 16. (1980 or so) It was a Turkey even to my then very new eyes. Worse even than Monogram. (!)

(remember how bad any Monogram kit that was NOT a Showrod was back in 1979-1980?)

Very Blocky, and detail ranged from decent to looking like the tool had been cut with a crayon.

The tires were very stiff, and I still recall how hard it was to get the wheels into the hard vinyl tires. I split at least one tire.

Both of these Pryo tools are worse than toys. Lindberg should really never issue them again.

The Nostalgia Market that these were targeted at, has mostly aged out of Model Building, (and doesn't want them anyway) and newer Modelers who may have built one of Lindbergs 1990's tools (the '53 Fords or the Dodge Minivan or Ford Crown Vic) will open this kit, Become Horrified by the Contents and never trust any Lindberg Box Art again. For Lindberg Kits, Round2 Needs to be VERY, VERY clear about what is in the box, going forward. Nostalgia BoxArt from Lindberg is all intended as deceptive advertising, to sell mediocre kits to an already discriminating market 30 years ago, when the tooling was already 25-30 years old and could not compete with Revell, AMT or Airfix even then. I'd go so far as to say from an Automotive Model standpoint that Round2 has gotten (at best) 20-25  Tools that should be issued. The rest are Junk. Every Last one of them. The best Round2 could do, is to publicly Promise never to inflict that DRECK on the Model buying public again.

Never Happen, but that is my Two Cents on it.

[charlie8575]

We need a newly tooled kit of this thing.

Agreed. Completely, unreservedly agreed.

Charlie Larkin

[sjordan2]

The Lindberg chrome trees include wire wheels (for separate vinyl tires, unlike the Pyro kit), engine block and all engine parts, headlights and other lights, dashboard and shift/brake levers, bumpers and hood exhaust pipes, windshield frame, side mirror, hood ornament. 

You'll probably have to make some repair to chrome parts when you remove them from the thick  sprue attachments.

None of the body parts are plated or replaced with chrome parts -- grille, rocker step plates, rear fender stone guard plates,  hood side vents -- or anything originally molded onto the body.

If you want whitewall tires, you'll have to paint them yourself or find replacements. The latter is a good idea since the kit tires are a tad small. 

I regret that I can't post images, because I can't copy and paste anything from my desktop anymore  since the forum was revamped, and don't have access to any reply boxes. My text posts like this one are from my iPad, and I don't know how to copy and paste that way.

Edited September 2, 2015 by sjordan2

[Junkman]

Agreed. Completely, unreservedly agreed.

Charlie Larkin

Yeah, but it can't be done. Because someone said so. If you'd be "inside", you'd understand, you know.

[sjordan2]

Yeah, but it can't be done. Because someone said so. If you'd be "inside", you'd understand, you know.

Even so, you can build a nice-looking model from this kit if you address the issues mentioned above. You're halfway home if you conquer the following for an acceptable curbside appearance:

The first and most important part is working on the hood fit. If this doesn't work, you've got a loser.

You'll need to refine the windshield frame.

You better be good with BMF.

If you don't care about the heavy engine work required, just glue the hood shut.

[jbwelda]

Unattributed quotations require a 10$ surcharge, Junkman.

But seriously what Alexis of Bakersfield is saying is pretty much my opinion of most of this era junk, there isn't a whole lot there that is worth reissuing, certainly not these Pyro kits, at least not without unretouched box art models in plain site and maybe a parental warning!

I have some later Lindberg kits that seem pretty nicely done, the Plymouths and Chevys and little red wagon, but man most of their earlier stuff promised so  much on the box top only to deliver so little inside.

I wouldn't say the same about the rest of R2's catalogue, they have been bringing out some solid, if somewhat unremarkable, kits lately, I wish though they would add more usable stuff inside instead of the novelties...or maybe along with the novelties

jb

 

[Harry P.]

I think it's absolutely hilarious that the door panel lines stick out from the surface!

Obviously somebody didn't understand that the mold was the negative, the molded part the positive.

[stavanzer]

Harry, they understood it just fine.

It's that raised panel lines were "state of the art" when this kit was first tooled.

Just about everything from everybody had raised panel lines then. In fact on most kits ALL details were raised.

That was the way things were back then.

 

Alan

[jbwelda]

I would assume its much easier in the tool making process too, to have raised panel lines. after all, all it takes is a trench in the tool to make a raised line, while a sunken panel lines requires a raised surface. much more difficult to make, I would guess.

but raised panel lines were and I think to some extent still are the norm with aircraft for example. I know I have a plane kit in my closet, that little messerschmidt jet aircraft, that I was considering building the other day. then I took it out and saw the raised panel lines, the two piece chassis split right down the middle with all those raised panel lines and thought, not in this lifetime its not happening.

and those Lindy kits held all kind of little surprises like that as I recall...though even as a kid I learned to avoid the Lindberg stuff pretty fast.

jb

 

[stavanzer]

Yep, JB you rae correct.

You just never knew what the kit in a Lindberg Box would look like.

I do not remember getting anything that was really great compared to the Airfix and Revell kits, that I built back in the 1980's.

Some were Smooth, with few panel lines, and great shapes, and little surface detailing, others were Rivet-Fests, and even at 15, I could tell they were Turkeys.

So What Me262 Kit did you pull off the shelf>

The 1/48 Lindberg is a POS, but the newer (1970's) Monogram kit is pretty nice, even with raised Panel lines. By the time Monogram switched over to engraved lines in the 1980's, their last few 'raised line' kits, had very fine, very discrete panel lines, Not bad at all.

[jbwelda]

it was the ME163 Komet ("...basically a high speed glider fitted with a rocket motor...") kit in that hobby shop only series from Testors, do not really know who originally did this kit.

 

actually as I look at it now, it does in fact have very fine engraved panel lines and rivets? oh man we got rivets. my problem as I now recall was more the fitting of the two fuselage halves and dealing with the panel lines over that seam. now that I look at it, I might just put this thing back out to consider again in the future. its a totally kool plane, "...perhaps the most unusual and dangerous warplane to ever see series production."

here are the fuselage halves and the rivet detail, not the best photos in the world and sorry for that:

 

sorry for no relation to Lindberg, nor the Auburn Speedster...

jb

 

[charlie8575]

it was the ME163 Komet ("...basically a high speed glider fitted with a rocket motor...") kit in that hobby shop only series from Testors, do not really know who originally did this kit.

"...perhaps the most unusual and dangerous warplane to ever see series production."

 

When my dad was working at AVCO-Lycoming in the 1960s, several of their test pilots were actually ex Komet pilots! 

Dad remembers one pilot in particular named Willie, who, learning from several of his friends literally going up in flames with Me-163 mishaps, that anytime Willie would take any of the AVCO planes up, whether one of the test mules or the company chopper, the one or two-hour long pre-flight check, as he became deathly afraid of even the slightest problem. 

Agreed, short of the purpose-built Kamikaze planes, the Komet was probably the most deadly-to-crew aircraft ever used by any military force.

Charlie Larkin