Chopped Survivor '30 Ford

[Tom Geiger]

Those of you who follow my silliness, you know I love to fiddle with old survivors. I found this in a bag of junk models I bought at a show a few years ago. Some kid never finished his chop. I got this engine and body, but no chassis.

Someone mentioned that this was indeed the 1962 original issue (green plastic) of this iconic Monogram kit. It has the dual side mount fenders that seem to be missing in kits after 1970 or so. I don't know why I didn't do a build thread on this one. I thought I did, but couldn't find it. Oh well.

I dug into an early phaeton parts kit and found a few of these wheel covers that I really liked for this project. Through the kindness of a board lurker from Cape Cod and Dave Dale, I wound up with enough wheels and wheel covers... note that I needed six, to make that vision come true... thanks guys! I cracked open a couple of later date versions of this kit series as parts cars. The Phaeton will be rolling off my assembly line next. Seeing that it survived all of some 55 years, I figured it was cool enough to finish! And here's it's debut today!

So here she is! As with a lot of my restos I kept the original color and the original builder's intent. I found that Testors still made that blue in a brush bottle, as a flat color. That came in handy with all the body work. I had always planned it as a traditional (don't say rat) rod.

This is the original engine, all rebuilt and painted Chevy orange. I wired it up and soon figured out that the headers on it wouldn't work with the side mounts. So I made an exhaust system for her.

I fitted a hood, this one actually was part of the Model A pickup you'll see in a few photos. It didn't work on the pickup because the air cleaners sat high. So I stripped it and painted it to match this project. I'm still deciding if I like the hood patina or if I'm going to tone it down a bit.

Rear view. The left tail light did come with the original body, so I left the 1930 license plate since it was original. I added a second tail light from the open parts kits. The rear bumper came out of the 1962 Phaeton kit that I had received as an incomplete parts kit. I mounted it upside down to fill the void between the two fenders. The body was cracked, so I left it. The door and trunk handle are delicate little parts that were missing on my body. I didn't want to steal them from another kit I plan to build, so I made some from wire. And with all the fiddling to get this together, I broke the mounts on the rumble seat so it's glued shut.

I'd call this the "dirty side" but that doesn't apply with this model! The Monogram suspension pieces were all semi-flat and out of scale so I replaced it all with different sizes of rod and wire. 
I made the exhaust system from my big box of exhaust parts. I cut it up and assemble pieces with bits of straight pin. I can adjust the angles etc, just like you would on a 1:1. Once I like it I glue the pieces together. Those are the tires that came with the Phaeton in all their misshaped glory!

And a couple of relatives with a lot in common! I built the pickup from a junker too, and both come from the same family of Monogram Model A kits. I had a lot of fun and have found it rewarding to finally bring a model that sat for 55 years to completion. During this process I acquired a bunch more of these Model A kits, so watch for the Phaeton and maybe a few more!  These kits are addicting!  

[slusher]

Great little Hotrod Tom!!

Edited October 28, 2018 by slusher

[Snake45]

Very cool! Like you, I love survivor/glue bomb rescue/resto/rehab jobs, and you did a fine job with this one! Ain't it great to take some random old junk and make it live again? Well done and model on! 

[slusher]

Tom really neat wheel covers/wheels what are they called?

[Russell C]

Great fun save!  (that rust'll buff out)

[Tom Geiger]

8 hours ago, slusher said:

Tom really neat wheel covers/wheels what are they called?

Those are the original Monogram wheel covers that came in this series of kits.  I found the first few in the original 1962 Phaeton kit, supplemented by donations from the community.  I don't know if there is a term for them.

The wheels on the pickup are from a diecast '32 hotrod.  I've seen them on a bunch of different diecast cars.  I think they'd be worth casting since a lot of folks have asked about them.

[Tom Geiger]

5 hours ago, Russell C said:

Great fun save!  (that rust'll buff out)

Prolly would!   Especially since it's a mixture of Testors Dullcote and chalks.  Wipes right off with lacquer thinner.

[Dave Darby]

1 hour ago, Tom Geiger said:

Prolly would!   Especially since it's a mixture of Testors Dullcote and chalks.  Wipes right off with lacquer 

Rubbing alcohol will cut that too. Hope you'll share that on the Scale Survivors Facebook page - it's way cool!

Edited October 28, 2018 by Dave Darby