The Wraith

[wraithcar]

Hey all, i'm new here, so forgive me if i'm posting in the wrong area. I might put this info in a couple of places.

I work on a project to restore an original movie prop car. I noticed a few threads have been started on these forums about different cars from the film. I'm here to pass word along that the star vehicle of The Wraith is now released in a 1:25 scale model.

See here.

Quantities are limited, only 100 for now. The model maker did everything by guess work and used photos from our website as inspiration. The model is a resin kit, with fewer pieces, but it is very detailed. He did an outstanding job! As far as i know, Comet Miniatures is the only store that sells this kit. Our crew ordered a model a couple of days after it's release and it took about a week to get it from the UK. It was delivered today, so i havent' seen it yet. A fellow fan ordered a copy shortly before we did and he posted photos of the kit on our discussion forums.

Wraith forums / Model photos

As i mentioned before, i help restore one of the original prop cars from the movie. You can see our work at the following links. We have several galleries on our main site, and a seperate site that links up with fellow car enthusiasts.

The Wraith Car

Car Domain / Restoration details

I will dig around the forums a little more, but if anyone here has built up the other models (Corvette and Daytona) could you link me to your work, or post photos here?

If anyone has any questions, please let me know.

Wes

Edited June 11, 2010 by wraithcar

[Car Crazy 81]

Wes- Welcome to the club im into "The Wraith" movie myself. In fact im building three of the cars from that movie such as: Packard Walsh's Corvette, Maggot's Firebird & Auggie Fisher's Daytona all three of those builds are in the On The Workbench section. And again welcome im looking foward to seeing youre work.

[wraithcar]

Wes- Welcome to the club im into "The Wraith" movie myself. In fact im building three of the cars from that movie such as: Packard Walsh's Corvette, Maggot's Firebird & Auggie Fisher's Daytona all three of those builds are in the On The Workbench section. And again welcome im looking foward to seeing youre work.

Thanks man! I believe it was one of your threads that i saw while searching the site. I wanted to see if there were some old topics i could feed from, but i didn't want to resurect anything. I thought it would be better suited to start something new. I'll be sure to check out those threads and keep an eye on them.

I'll be taking photos of the kit this weekend, I'll start a new thread in the Workbench area when i get started. If i play my card right, i MIGHT be able to get some of the original paint that went on the prop car. Still working on that though.

Thanks, again, for the welcome!

[Scalper]

Cool I love that movie. woudl be cool to see the real car in action again.

[MonoPed]

The movie was recently re-released to DVD in true 1.85:1 widescreen, not letterboxed to fit 4:3 or 4:3 pan & scan. Cheesy 80's flicks rock!

[wraithcar]

The movie was recently re-released to DVD in true 1.85:1 widescreen, not letterboxed to fit 4:3 or 4:3 pan & scan. Cheesy 80's flicks rock!

We were supposed to have a DVD extra spot on that to talk about the restoration of the car, but we couldn't make it work out with the production company's schedule. They did a good job on the new release though!

[wraithcar]

I'm not sure how many people around here are interested in the model, but i know there are a lot of folks looking for other things. Our restoration crew got together and ordered a few more models. The owner of the car has been talking about the paint job on the model being exact to the prop car. We have plenty of custom paint left over from the restoration, and the owner is willing to part with it.

Mind you, this is the CURRENT paint, not as close to the movie car paint.

We will soon be getting 2 ounce bottles and preparing for any orders. The cost will be $20 an ounce, plus shipping. It's expensive, but this paint is a custom mix, specifically for the Wraith car.

This was being extended to those fans on our website looking to build their own model. I figure that i would post details on here, as well, for anyone interested in a special paint. It would be a sharp color for any build. I've attached a photo for comparison...

For any questions, or requests for orders, please e-mail me and i can give you the details personally.

allfornot@gmail.com

Thanks!

Wes

[wraithcar]

I finally took a couple of days off work and had some time to sit down with the kit and take a few photos. The resin body is quite solid, and there are a few pop-up spots that need to be sanded down to make the surface even. As i mentioned in the original post, there are few pieces. Six individual slats to make up the vent in the nose of the car, and one large fin for the back spoiler, are the hardest pieces that i'll have to detail. I tried to fit the spoiler to the car, just to get a better idea of how it looks, and the piece is just a touch too wide. The under carriage area is a simple piece that i will try to detail more with different paints.

The wheels have a great bit of detail to them. The original wheels, on the props, were Pontiac GTA rims. The metal rims for the model are amazingly close. Might be a challenge to paint those.

The model maker tried to carve in the Dodge emblem in the hood, as you occasionally get a glimpse of in the film. For as small as it is, he did well. I might take some tools and make it a bit more detailed.

On the prop car, there was a section below the back window with a series of holes in the hood. This was to allow cooler air into the engine bay while the car was driven, and to vent heat as the car sat and cooled down. The model maker had been researching the details of the car from photos on our site, mostly when the car was in primer and going through restoration. There is detail on the model to show where those holes were on the body, but you don't see them in the movie. I'll likely grind this section down, just a bit, and add a small metal strip (proped up) to replicate the vent covering as seen in the film.

The tail lights are accurate to the body style. There is a strip of clear plastic to make the one piece lense for this feature. The photos weren't showing well, so i left the headlight covers and tail light cover out.

I haven't built a model in about 20 years (suddenly feeling old) and i've never offically painted one even when i was building them up as a kid. I invested in an air-brush kit. I managed to find one on Craigslist with a compressor, used once, for $20. It came with a few half ounce bottles of standard paint. I need to read up a little more before starting, but the body is taped off and ready for the first coat of black. I'll post more when that's done.

[Steve Keck]

$104.82 at today's exchange rate PLUS undisclosed postage and packaging costs (I chose not to login to get this info) for a slammer? Not for me.

[wraithcar]

I must admit, the solid "resin brick" greenhouse is a disappointment. No matter what, you either end up with something more "sculpture" than model, or you are in for as much scratchbuilding/modifying/kitbashing/something as if you started from scratch.

I'm glad this is out there for other people that may want it, but it's a swing-and-miss for me.

No, i totally agree with you about the solid body. I'd like to have something a little more complex. Working doors, glass for the windows and shields, etc. However, considering that it's the first of it's kind, we had to have it for our memorabilia collection. And he did it all from guess work and inspecting our photos, so i have to give him credit where it's due. He did very well for going off so little.

[Joe Handley]

Are you selling the 1/1 car or is there another one up for sale?

[wraithcar]

Are you selling the 1/1 car or is there another one up for sale?

Actually, the original prop is now up for sale. I don't know what the owner is expecting for a price. He's taking offers from collectors and other enthusiasts.

We're also in the process of starting up a body kit for the kit car fans. Talks with Dodge have been promising, and we're going to have to make some adjustments, but i'm hoping we'll have that off the ground later this year.

Edited July 1, 2010 by wraithcar

[Joe Handley]

I was just curious, I'm still a member of the Shelby Dodge Mailing List and recently joined TurboDodge.com and got an e-mail about the car being for sale with this link in it.

http://www.thewraithcar.com/index.html

I am bummed though that it has a Buick V6 (better than a junkyard truck SB Chevy most street rods sem to get, I guess ) instead of some variant of the 2.2/2.5 motor....or even the newer 2.4 Turbo/SRT turbo motor

Edited July 2, 2010 by Joe Handley

[wraithcar]

I was just curious, I'm still a member of the Shelby Dodge Mailing List and recently joined TurboDodge.com and got an e-mail about the car being for sale with this link in it.

http://www.thewraithcar.com/index.html

Yep, that's us! I've got some more details about the prop at the Turbo Dodge site. If you find a moderator there named 1983Rampage, he met up with us at the Starbird show this last January. He has some photos posted there too. Actually, now that i look, it was probably you who posted last in that thread. lol

I am bummed though that it has a Buick V6 (better than a junkyard truck SB Chevy most street rods sem to get, I guess ) instead of some variant of the 2.2/2.5 motor....or even the newer 2.4 Turbo/SRT turbo motor

Lyle (the owner) went to Detroit a few weeks ago to talk to Dodge about options for a kit. While he was there he picked up one of the original 2.2 engines that was to be dropped into an M4S, had it been produced. The engine was never even fired. I'm not sure what he's wanting to do with it yet, but it's a rather impressive piece. The prop cars didn't even have a mopar motor in them. I would love to drop the 2.2 in there, but we'll never build the car up to be street legal.

[Joe Handley]

Yep, that's us! I've got some more details about the prop at the Turbo Dodge site. If you find a moderator there named 1983Rampage, he met up with us at the Starbird show this last January. He has some photos posted there too. Actually, now that i look, it was probably you who posted last in that thread. lol

Looks like it's a pretty good site, wish I had a way of using it if it was around when I still had my cars. Been thinking lately that a factory turbo PT Cruiser set up to run E-85 would make a pretty fun little suppliment to the Jeep Cherokee I'm driving right now.......... BTW, yes that last post was mine too

Lyle (the owner) went to Detroit a few weeks ago to talk to Dodge about options for a kit. While he was there he picked up one of the original 2.2 engines that was to be dropped into an M4S, had it been produced. The engine was never even fired. I'm not sure what he's wanting to do with it yet, but it's a rather impressive piece. The prop cars didn't even have a mopar motor in them. I would love to drop the 2.2 in there, but we'll never build the car up to be street legal.

OK, now that sounds pretty friggin' cool right there

[wraithcar]

Looks like it's a pretty good site, wish I had a way of using it if it was around when I still had my cars. Been thinking lately that a factory turbo PT Cruiser set up to run E-85 would make a pretty fun little suppliment to the Jeep Cherokee I'm driving right now..........

It is a pretty handy site. I bought an 08 Liberty Sport last June and i've met some cool people on there to talk about Jeep stuff.

Btw. Lyle is on his way to a Chryslers of Carlisle event this week. He'll be stopping by my place today. If the rain holds out, i might have more photos of the M4S to show off later on. We're going to have lunch together and talk about the kit program, as well as the details of the 2.2 i mentioned earlier. I'm hoping he'll drop it into the car.