41 Plymouth mild custom with a twist

[Spex84]

Loving this build! I once had a '41 Plymouth on the bench and reached the same conclusions regarding its proportions. I swear a real '41 Plymouth is better looking than the AMT body somehow. The biggest issue in trying to section the Plymouth is that with the front fenders curving up to meet the hood sides, there's no way to easily section it through the beltline as with a Ford. The solution you've arrived at is quite effective! I like that you're rodding the inline 6 too, instead of V8 swapping it...it has that late 40s full custom look!

I'm looking forward to seeing the V'd grille in place. I've passed over that grille many times in the past because it's too flat and frog-mouthy, so I'm curious to see how it looks now that you've tweaked it.

 

 

[alan barton]

Hi Chris,  I should have some photos up soon of how it looks with the V'd Chevy grille.  I like it a lot!  Problem is, and you can see it in the photos above, when I was cutting from the back, as the saw teeth broke through it cracked off a section of the grille bars on the opposite side of the cut.  I patched it best I could but it is not great.  Somewhere in my stash I have another grile so I hope to dig it out and try again.  I might use an Xacto to scribe through the grille bars gently from the front before starting the sawing from the back this time, hopefully will get a cleaner result.

Glad you are enjoying the build.  This was definitely a model that I picked up and put back many times before I took this approach and I am very happy with the results.

Meanwhile I have got most of the fab finished for the interior.  To start with, I put a piece of tape on my desk to mark the length of the Evergreen half round I wanted to use for tuck and roll. Even for a small interior like this is takes a lot of strips!  I then glued them to the tub with Revell Professional liquid cement.  I left a gap between each strip to allow the white paint to flow into the gap and give the impression of a deep tuck - next time I might close the gaps up a bit.

When that was dry I used a steel rule and a sharp knife to trim the top surface straight and then glued another strip of half round along the top and bottom of the pleats.

I think the seat is from an AMT 53  Studebaker.  I had to file the front corners back to fit in the tight confines of the interior tub and then replace the original piping with thin Evergreen half round.  I made some very simple seat supports from flat styrene to lift the seat to a believable height - these supports are invisible on the finished interior.

The dash needed to be converted to right hand drive so I cut out the glovebox door and the instrument panel.  I then cut a piece of styrene and sanded it to form the replacement door on the left hand side.  The instrument cluster was not particularly well engraved so I fabricated a small rectangular housing on the right hand side and used a decal instead.  It is not the greatest gauge cluster ever but when you peak inside the window it looks fine. 

Finally I drilled a bunch of small holes and fitted them with tiny dressmaking pins to replace the dash switch knobs.

Cheers

Alan

[thatz4u]

1 hour ago, alan barton said:

Hi Chris,  I should have some photos up soon of how it looks with the V'd Chevy grille.  I like it a lot!  Problem is, and you can see it in the photos above, when I was cutting from the back, as the saw teeth broke through it cracked off a section of the grille bars on the opposite side of the cut.  I patched it best I could but it is not great.  Somewhere in my stash I have another grile so I hope to dig it out and try again.  I might use an Xacto to scribe through the grille bars gently from the front before starting the sawing from the back this time, hopefully will get a cleaner result.

Glad you are enjoying the build.  This was definitely a model that I picked up and put back many times before I took this approach and I am very happy with the results.

Meanwhile I have got most of the fab finished for the interior.  To start with, I put a piece of tape on my desk to mark the length of the Evergreen half round I wanted to use for tuck and roll. Even for a small interior like this is takes a lot of strips!  I then glued them to the tub with Revell Professional liquid cement.  I left a gap between each strip to allow the white paint to flow into the gap and give the impression of a deep tuck - next time I might close the gaps up a bit.

When that was dry I used a steel rule and a sharp knife to trim the top surface straight and then glued another strip of half round along the top and bottom of the pleats.

I think the seat is from an AMT 53  Studebaker.  I had to file the front corners back to fit in the tight confines of the interior tub and then replace the original piping with thin Evergreen half round.  I made some very simple seat supports from flat styrene to lift the seat to a believable height - these supports are invisible on the finished interior.

The dash needed to be converted to right hand drive so I cut out the glovebox door and the instrument panel.  I then cut a piece of styrene and sanded it to form the replacement door on the left hand side.  The instrument cluster was not particularly well engraved so I fabricated a small rectangular housing on the right hand side and used a decal instead.  It is not the greatest gauge cluster ever but when you peak inside the window it looks fine. 

Finally I drilled a bunch of small holes and fitted them with tiny dressmaking pins to replace the dash switch knobs.

Cheers

Alan

nice work on the dash, well done....

[espo]

Great looking interior. 

[bill-e-boy]

Hi Alan

Cool build of that old kit. Love the front end treatment and interior mods

Should drop a 241 hemi from an AlaKart into it. You are way past the original banger modified theme and the 241 would fit in with a junkyard raid engine. You could always pass it off as a 315 as this was the largest of the Dodge hemi's I believe

[Tom Geiger]

On 6/15/2021 at 5:22 PM, alan barton said:

Hi Chris,  I should have some photos up soon of how it looks with the V'd Chevy grille.  I like it a lot!  Problem is, and you can see it in the photos above, when I was cutting from the back, as the saw teeth broke through it cracked off a section of the grille bars on the opposite side of the cut.  I patched it best I could but it is not great.  Somewhere in my stash I have another grile so I hope to dig it out and try again.  I might use an Xacto to scribe through the grille bars gently from the front before starting the sawing from the back this time, hopefully will get a cleaner result.

Glad you are enjoying the build.  This was definitely a model that I picked up and put back many times before I took this approach and I am very happy with the results.

Meanwhile I have got most of the fab finished for the interior.  To start with, I put a piece of tape on my desk to mark the length of the Evergreen half round I wanted to use for tuck and roll. Even for a small interior like this is takes a lot of strips!  I then glued them to the tub with Revell Professional liquid cement.  I left a gap between each strip to allow the white paint to flow into the gap and give the impression of a deep tuck - next time I might close the gaps up a bit.

When that was dry I used a steel rule and a sharp knife to trim the top surface straight and then glued another strip of half round along the top and bottom of the pleats.

I think the seat is from an AMT 53  Studebaker.  I had to file the front corners back to fit in the tight confines of the interior tub and then replace the original piping with thin Evergreen half round.  I made some very simple seat supports from flat styrene to lift the seat to a believable height - these supports are invisible on the finished interior.

The dash needed to be converted to right hand drive so I cut out the glovebox door and the instrument panel.  I then cut a piece of styrene and sanded it to form the replacement door on the left hand side.  The instrument cluster was not particularly well engraved so I fabricated a small rectangular housing on the right hand side and used a decal instead.  It is not the greatest gauge cluster ever but when you peak inside the window it looks fine. 

Finally I drilled a bunch of small holes and fitted them with tiny dressmaking pins to replace the dash switch knobs.

Cheers

Alan

I love the work on the dashboard!  Especially the pins. 

[Zippi]

I love the old fat fender cars/trucks.  Yours is looking great.  

[NOBLNG]

Excellent work all around. It looks much sleeker than original. Those pins for dash knobs is a terrific idea…consider it stolen!?