Building the AMT Double Dragster Streamliner (again…)

[OldNYJim]

So, I built one of these last year, slightly modified, but my intention has been for a while to build a basically box-stock version of the gold car on the original box art:

So…here goes!

Started the Labor Day weekend with the morning sun streaming through the blinds and some newly cleaned-up frame-halves ready for assembly:

If anyone’s building one of these, it’s WAY easier to clean up the ejector pin marks on the inside of the frame before assembling it…and the front crossmember has indexed pins on the front, so don’t open up those holes with a drill-bit before you install it or you’ll have to figure out the angle of the suicide mount yourself…

The body of this kit is two pieces, and designed to be installed around the frame after painting, and it’d be a trick to get the big seam hidden along the roof, so I’m tweaking mine…

I did consider cutting out the floor so the body can drop over the frame, but much easier is removing that little cowl piece and making it removable:

If this were a real car (and as best I can tell it’s not a replica of ANY actual 1:1, just in-the-style-of some dragsters in this era…) you’d probably need to actually assemble and disassemble the thing, so this seemded a feasible solution (although it would still suck if you were the crew working on it…)

Got the axles in the frame and the engine mocked up with white glue…the front axle is molded ‘open’ to allow for the standard AMT metal axle, so I made it whole with some half-round styrene:

The kit’s seat is the first part I really needed to put any major effort into - I wanted to remove the molded-in belts but it was pretty tough to do that without ruining the tuck ‘n’ roll pattern.  Cleaned up the back the best I could, and replaced the lower cushion with some styrene sheet with scribed grooves…and then, because I don’t want to have to do that again on the Fiat kit when I build it (same design seat) I made a quick mold so I can cast them.  Original on left, modified in center and molded copy on right:

And a quick mock-up to round out the long weekend…plenty more to come on this one (but I love how fast it is to get almost ANY AMT project on it’s wheels for a sneak peek):

Thanks for looking - more soon, soon as I’ve done more!

[Dennis Lacy]

I think this is the best approach I’ve seen to the streamliner body. Good thinking!

Ya know, as an original Trophy Series kit, this definitely qualifies for the KISS group build and nobody has entered a Double Dragster yet…

[stavanzer]

Wonderful Start.

I'll try to keep that tip about the body, when I build mine.

Thank You!

[TECHMAN]

Probably the "most built kit" for me over the lifetime.....  Have built a basket-load of the different variations since the early 60's, but honestly, don't remember ever doing the "box-art" version that you are.... hummmm......  Got two more of those kits on the shelf, guess one will have to go the direction you are.

Like your idea on the body mods, may have to copy your idea (GREAT idea at that!!!!).  Look forward to your updates.

DJ

[OldNYJim]

On 9/2/2025 at 12:13 AM, Dennis Lacy said:

Ya know, as an original Trophy Series kit, this definitely qualifies for the KISS group build and nobody has entered a Double Dragster yet…

I did consider that - but I don’t know if I’ll actually be able to keep it simple, ha!  I have two builds sitting here waiting for that group build though…

@stavanzer, @TECHMAN - thank you!!!  

A little progress this week so far…

Handling some boring-but-necessary tasks first.  Cleaned up the tires, and tried a new (to me) technique of scrubbing them with a paste made of water and some Comet cleaning powder.  It was actually surprisingly effective…

The Comet left a little white residue, but this dollar-store goopy cleaning putty does a nice job of removing that (and dried polish from door gaps in bodies also):

Painted the seat in an artist’s acrylic that matched the seat on the box art:

Then added some washes and brush-painted highlights and lowlights to give it some life…I’m still REALLY green at this technique, which is something figure painters do on leather stuff a lot, but it’s more interesting than not doing it at all, at least:

Painted the frame and motor - again, matched the color close as I could to the box art:

And while all that was going on, I was prepping the bodywork for paint.  Found a couple of colors that, again, match the illustration on the box in Createx’s range (which is good, because I love their paint):

As I normally do, I’m going to massively over-complicate the process to hit the look I want…and the primer was no exception…everything shot gray besides the top surfaces which got some white to add a little extra depth:

Paint process, step two is the main color:

Now, I could probably just call that good and clearcoat it, but if you look back to my first post up above you’ll see the art shows a bunch of tone changes and color shifts - particularly on the lower rear portion of the body, and the lower edges.  Obviously, that’s meant to just represent depth and shadow and light changes in the limitations of a 2D illustration, but those color fades are too tempting not to try and match, so next step this evening was fading on some copper tones to the undersides to try and mimic that:

Shot the whole body with some intercoat at this stage and tomorrow it’ll be time to flip it over and add some extra shading to the top side also…

Thanks for looking - more soon, soon as I’ve done more!

Edited September 7 by OldNYJim

[stavanzer]

Wow!

That paint is great!

[meechum68]

The paint is beautiful! And I am really enjoying the work and prep you have done so far on this little guy!

 

[OldNYJim]

Thanks fellas!  A little more bench time today…

Hit the frame (and a somewhat related side-project) with some clear:

And while I had clear in the gun, I mixed in some white Pearl Ex flake and shot the upper surfaces of all the body panels to give a nice flip from gold to white when the light hits the edges:

Next up, a mist of intercoat to get the body panels ready for decals.  The tin-box edition of this kit comes with an awesome decal sheet, and I would NORMALLY mask and paint a flamejob but thought it would actually be fun to do it the way that I wouldn’t usually.

The kit decals:

And the first decal, the second it hit the water:

Good thing I have multiples of this kit…try again with the decals from the latest issue…AMT was pretty optimistic with thinking their design would wrap nicely over the edges of the nose and ‘hood’, but I laid them down with PLENTY of water and a mild setting solution and we’ll see if this horribleness fixes itself overnight as they dry:

The setting solution actually lifted the center of the decal on the hood piece in the middle there, but I daren’t touch it…gotta let it try and do it’s thing I guess.

I have some stronger solution to try also if they don’t snuggle down, and I’m fully expecting that I’ll have to put some slices in the decals to get them to fold over and fit correctly, but we’ll see…

Luckily, the graphics and numbers on the rear part of the body are all laid down on relatively flat surfaces but I gave them just a little setting solution too:

In other news, made some seatbelts and added some PE buckles to the seat I’ve been working on:

I kept the arrangement of the belts pretty close to how they were molded-in to the kit seat - just with more dimension.  I’ll probably give the belts a little shading like I did on the seat also to get them to match, but I’m happy with the extra detail they add anyway.

And that’s it for another exciting weekend at the bench - thanks for looking…more soon, soon as I’ve done more!

Edited September 8 by OldNYJim

[meechum68]

Ohh fantastic!!! Nice save on the decals! 

[OldNYJim]

 

On 9/8/2025 at 8:29 AM, meechum68 said:

Ohh fantastic!!! Nice save on the decals! 

Thank you!!  I’m not out of the woods yet tho…

Spent the week giving the decals a couple of doses of Microsol a day, and gradually working them down over the curves of the body panels…I don’t think they’re GREAT, but they’re better than they were at least…

At a certain point they just stopped getting any better…but the final airbrushing step was going to be adding some little white highlights to the leading edges of some of these panels anyway, so I’m hoping I can still improve the look of them a little more.

In other news, painted about every component of this thing in the last week - got a BIG stack of parts ready to be made into assemblies - I’m trying to use Vallejo paints mainly and get my technique better with those.  They have a good range and I like working with acrylics - just got to master them…here’s the engine parts:

I’m keeping the chrome fairly minimal on this build, but the wheels DID get stripped and cleaned up and refinished with Molotow today:

And I started some very light assembly work on the frame…didn’t get far though 🤪

Excited to try and get the body wrapped up and to start getting it into clear, but I can assemble everything else whilst I’m working on that…thanks for looking - more soon, soon as I’ve done more!

Edited September 15 by OldNYJim

[stavanzer]

Outstanding Workmanship, Jim!

[OldNYJim]

Thank you sir!

Just a little progress this week - a little assembly on the engine:

Turns out, a Bicycle brand dice is the perfect size to hold those headers in place while the glue dries 🤪

And I did a little more work on the body - added some fades to the flames with a little Vallejo white:

Only thing left on these pieces will be adding one more decal and then clear…because of the way these kits assemble I really want to get the body completely cleared and polished before I can do much more…next post will hopefully be shiny tinwork and then a bunch of assembly!