Camaro Pics!

I guess I am about to find out how weirdly the blog will post these pics, usually I pic a spot and post them and then it moves them anywhere it pleases....

The Camaro is nearly finished finally! As you can see the engine compartment is not done, but I ran out of ignition wire....

Also one of the front bumpers ran off, so unless I find it , or a replacement the car may not get finished completely.

I dropped the hood and chipped the paint in the back corner as you can see... bummer!

The car actually doesn't look to bad for all the hacking and problems I had on it. So until I get some wire or a few other parts this one is done at least temporarily.

Until next time when we see what else I am up to... keep building.

The Camaro is Coming Along

I extended the axle housing slightly. (I cut it to short...) and attached the rear end to the frame. I have also glued in the front tires and wheels.

The mold lines are removed from the headers, and the headlights, grille, and tail lights are in place. The rear spoiler is glued in place and the broken hood support has been repaired. I like the new stance of the car much better than the way it was before.

The hood scoop will be donated to the Dodge Demon model (I think) as I find I rather like the looks of the model without it.

Maybe I will get far enough in the next several days to get some pics that show the difference. I would like to post some before and after pics as well once it is all finished up.

Camaro Pics!

It still is not finished, but it is closer... The body is waxed, I tried Carnubba wax, but it has left a few streaks. I will try something else next time. I think the paint might not have cured enough yet.

I am considering not using the scoop, but the wing will go on the model. There is still quite a bit of work to be done even though the model looks nearly done.

I narrowed the rear end and opened up the rear fender wells to fit the slicks under the car. The engine is still needing some work before it is set in place, and I want to lower the front a bit.

The Camaro Continues

I did manage to cut out the rear fender wells today to get the rear tires under the fenders and lower the rear of the model. I am also in the process of polishing out the paint.

The paint has been wet sanded with 1500 grit wet or dry paper, and all the little defects are gone. All that is left is to polish the paint back to a shine and wax it.

The rear axle was cut down again to fit the new narrower theme. I probably will not tub it since I am wanting it to look more like a bracket racer.

I still need to make a set of leaf springs to support the rear end, but that is pretty easy.

I am hoping to get the time to work on it this weekend and finish it or at least get it some what closer.

It is starting to come together now and I am looking forward to finishing it up.

Polishing Clear Plastic

I had the need to polish some scratches out of the windows of a couple of the old models I am rebuilding.

I thought this would be a good tip to pass on to newer builders out there.

You need to sand out the scratches with 600 to 800 grit wet or dry paper to start. This should be done under running warm water to carry away the sanded off particles. once a uniform surface is attained move on to 1500 grit paper and repeat the process.

There are several products that I was told about: Novus polish and cleaner, Kit clear plastic polish and a few others as well. What I found at the local Walmart was Meguiar's PlastX, clear plastic cleaner and polish so I decided to try it instead of driving all over town....

Rub it in with a soft cloth (like an old cotton t-shirt) and buff the part. Switch to a dry soft cloth and buff it dry. You may have to repeat this process a few times to get the whole part clear again, but it does work!

New Projects

I received a box full of models and parts from a Friend of mine that her sons no longer had a use for. I finally got the chance to go through them and separate the usable items out and thinned the herd....

I ended up with a model box 3/4 full of parts and about ten usable bodies for future projects! There was also an incomplete kit of a USS Enterprise aircraft carrier as well.

The nicest part about the bodies is all of them are models that I don't have.

There were a lot of broken parts and parts of things I had no use for, but it was a great gift bag and a lot of fun to dig through!

One word of caution, do not store glue or paint in your parts boxes! It can really make a mess of some decent pieces and ruin them for future use. There were several items like that in the box, including what could have been some very nice pro street tires.

I ended up with wheels and tires, engine parts, frames, bodies, seats, and many other usable items.

Thank you Cyndee!

I got a Gift in the Mail!

The camaro is in the stripe mode, and as you can see it is still wet. I will try and get some pics of it without all the masking and run another post later today.

A friend of mine sent me some of her sons old models, and a bunch of loose parts.

It looks like I'll have projects for quite a while now. They will take a lot of TLC to clean up enough to be usable, but they will work.

There is only one model that is nearly all there so I think some imagination is in order....

This is just a few of what I received in the mail and I am still going through the box and sorting things out. Most of the parts were loose in shopping bags so it is going to take awhile.

Well I am going to get on with the camaro and see what I can accomplish with it today!

Camaro Progress!

The interior tub is almost done now, lacking a bit of detail painting and touch up. I had to decant (spray some paint into a jar) some of the tan paint for touch up, and fixed the yellow paint that managed to get on the seats and door panels.

The seats, dash and shifter are now glued into place, as is the steering wheel. I wound up cutting the top rim of the steering wheel away as it had a some warp to it.

The hood is repainted so with a bit of luck the striping can begin in a couple of days! Now I need to decide if I want a single wide stripe or two narrower stripes from the nose to the back of the trunk.

I even found time to test fit a few parts to the engine while I was at it. So he water pump and starter need painted and holes need drilled into the fan and pulley assembly, and the engine will be a little farther along.

The demon has some putty in it now and soon I can begin to shape and smooth it up as well.

I had originally hoped to keep this blog up every day, but it has come to my attention that that is a lot harder than it would seem. My days are pretty full already for now and building time is getting precious. So, I am going to blog every other day unless I happen to luck out and find some extra time somewhere.

Hopefully that will work, and I will try to post at least every other day as much as possible.

The Camaro

I finally did manage to get a little bit done on that poor neglected ol' camaro tonight. Not a lot though. I went over the two tone on the seats by hand with a brush since the spray paint was not behaving.

I have come to the conclusion that that yellow spray paint has been the problem all along. I had not moved the hood since the last coat I gave it and it had some bubbling in it too.

Now I don't mind painting at all, but doing the same car over, and over is getting old....
I'll try sanding out the bubbles and re-spraying the hood one more time.

I started some of the detail on the dash while I was at it, and the console too. I will try and get them far enough along to get some pics up today sometime (since it is after midnight here.)

I was going to shoot the black stripe, but the hood is going to stop that progress in it's tracks for now. I can always work on the chassis and motor now I guess while the hood is getting ready for new paint.

There is also the rear end and tire clearance to work out as well. I need to drop the rear of the car a bit to get the stance right. There is also the headers to be built from solder still.

I want to finish the camaro and the 54 Chevy before I try getting to involved with another project.

GTO Review Continued

Sorry for the delay in getting the blog out today! Things got a lil' hectic today.

Continuing on with the kit reviews, we are looking at the difference between a 66 Revell GTO and a 67 AMT GTO.

Though the AMT had the better tires, I think that Revell won out in the wheel department. The Revell wheels are a much cleaner casting and as an added plus they threw in a set of stock wheels to boot! The AMT wheels are a rough cast with excess flashing and the wheels are not cut completely out, leaving a backing that will need cut out if you are into detailing and realism.

The AMT grille/front bumper has the headlights and turn signals cast into it. The AMT also a solid piece, where the Revell has an open slot in the bumper like the real cars.

The AMT kit has a few extra parts like headers and two sets of side pipes on the chrome tree, which is nice. The Revell kit has a chromed steering wheel, and windshield wipers for a nice touch.

AMT has quite a few extra parts in colored plastic and they are not as nice a molding as the Revell kit, because of all the extra mold flashing. There were extra inner wheels, an extra dash board (although it may not even be for this car...), racing bucket seats with head rests, and a roll bar.

The AMT kit will make a nice model with work, but the Revell is the winner in molding and detail.

I can't tell you about fit yet, but I will get around to it eventually.

Keep on building!

GTO Kit Review

Here it is! The AMT 67 Goat VS the Revell 66 Goat.

Both boxes are quite heavy for a model and possibly a good sign of things to come.

AMT's instruction sheet is rather simplistic and lacks detail. The decals that are supplied in the kit are a set of custom graphics and two license plates.

Revell offers a more complex set of instructions, though easy to read, with a short BIO on the car thrown in. The decal sheet includes floor mats, gauge cluster,six license plates, emblems, pin striping decals, and what looks to be red line decals for the tires.

AMT does an excellent job of packaging the kit with the body in a separate bag and the glass packed inside of it to avoid scratching. All of the chrome parts are bagged separately as are the tires, a very nice touch.

The revell kit loses a few points here as the body is in with all the other white plastic parts, and the glass is bagged separately but loose to get knocked around inside the box. The decals are nestled inside the instructions to avoid scratches and laid in the bottom of the box.

One obvious difference I can see is the tires. AMT did a really nice job on theirs with crisp casting while Revell's are not a bad casting they are attached to a tree and have blow off on the opposite side, requiring some very careful trimming. Also the Revell tires have that wonderful mold line down the center of the tread although very small.

Tomorrow I will take these two kits for a review spin and see what turns up. Until then, keep building!

Painting problems

This weekend was a lost cause from the start. Sometimes painting is simply a matter of stripping it all off and starting over...

The body is done, except polishing, but the hood is not cooperating and needs more work. The interior was masked for a two tone look and it went south quickly. I applied the same paint as what I used on the body, but it bubbled and got under the masking in places even though the tape was burnished down with a dental pick.

The colors used for the two tone were not bad, but I really was not thrilled by them either. Good thing the yellow came out badly, because it needs stripped again. It is beginning to feel like this camaro is fighting me every step of the way!

There are days like that, which is why I usually work on more than one model at a time. If one is giving you problems, switch to another until you can think the first through and work with a clear head.

I will eventually get the hood finished and then I can add the stripes to the top of the car (gloss black), the hood, the trunk, and the nose. I want to be able to tape the hood to the body for that, so the hood has to be done first. That way all the paint lines match up as well as the color of the stripes by painting it all at once.

I need to order a few things to finish the car, gauge decals and carpet flocking are still needed.

The engine still needs work and a few parts to finish it, like the starter, and water pump, belts and pulleys, and a fan.

Then I will move on to wiring and plumbing.

Pictures from the 54 Chevy.

This picture was taken quite a while ago, but it shows the pieces I had to add to fill in the holes that are left when making a tilt front end.

I had to fill in the front across the firewall as well as the sides of the firewall so you could not see inside the passengers compartment with the front end lifted.

You can also see, in the top picture, the hinge for the tilt at the very front of the frame.

Since these pictures were taken, the frame has been channeled, or recessed into the floor pan to lower the car more, and the front end has been radically lowered to improve the stance of the model.

There are some pictures I posted on an earlier post showing the difference between then and now. The frame is about a couple of sheets of paper's thickness off the ground now. I also had to narrow the front end to get it under the fenders by taking a slice out of the k frame and the tie rod ends as well.

Reviews to Come- GTO's

My son received two models for his birthday, and sooner or later they will be reviewed here. A 1966 GTO by Revell, and a 1967 GTO by AMT. I started looking them over and there is a difference.

The cars look nearly the same body wise (shape and style), but the two kits are a long way apart. I will dig into these in more detail in the future and give a more detailed review.

I was unable to post yesterday, and for that I apologise. I intend to post as often as possible and keep this blog up to date.

It is a beautiful day here today, and the temperature is supposed to get into the 70's. Maybe today will be the magic day that some paint descends on that poor neglected camaro....

I not only failed to post yesterday, but I never found time to work on the models either. A bad day all around. Today will be a better day!

If you have any questions or if you just want to speak your mind, please leave a comment!

Keep on building.

A Short Post

I didn't get much done last night on the camaro. I did manage to work on the engine a while and do some detail painting on it.

It is still pretty cold here, so painting the body may not be an option yet, but there are other things I can work on until the weather cooperates.

The challenger has the hood, front valance panel, headlights and grille missing as well as the rear valance and tail light panel... I'll have to think about that one.

Here is a link to an article I wrote for a beginner. A how to article to help them improve. http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1453738/building_a_model_car_a_guide_to_get.html

And another article: http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1444500/model_car_building_a_scale_model_of.html


The Dodge Demon is still in the stripping bucket and will hopefully be done soon. As soon as it is cleaned up I'll take a picture of it and post it.

That is all for today, keep building!

Another Picture

I found two more, neither is finished, but at least they are both pretty much in the same condition that I last saw them in.

The figure in the half track is actually a tank commander. I wish I had found the figures when I took the picture of the tanks to give an idea of how huge they are by comparison.

I try to keep my modeling to the same scales as much as possible, using 1/35th for armor and 1/24 and 1/25 for automotive. That way they are all scaled to each other if I want to build a diorama. It also helps when displaying them if they appear to be in the same scale.

I spent some time cleaning up the Challenger yesterday, but it is going to take a while. There are pieces to the model that are missing which I have not found yet... maybe it will get rebuilt, we will have to see.

I put a 71 Dodge Demon body in the paint stripper yesterday. It is a model I have been playing with for years and will be a drag car with a tilt front end when done. I have been hoarding parts for this one for some time and may actually have enough to finish it.

I hope to finish the paint on the camaro today, the body is sanded and waiting for a calm day still. The camaro is first on the list to complete so I will be doing something to it today if all else fails.

Old Builds

I dug through my

"collection", only to find that these four are the only ones fit to show here.

A long move from Colorado to Florida, caused some pretty serious damage to all of the others.

The Tiger tanks shown are unfinished as you can see (Porshe Tiger on the left and Sturm Tiger on the right.) But are in the best shape of other (once) more complete models.

A 1969 and a 1970 Barracuda are shown in the other photo. You can click either one to enlarge it like any other picture on the blog. All four models are damaged, but it is hard to see in the picture.

The rest of the models that I brought with me are going to need some serious TLC or a complete overhaul... lots of parts for future builds and rebuilds.

Oh well, it will keep me busy for a year or ten.

Also, it doesn't hurt to get enclosed cases to show off your models in, if you can afford it. Inserting a finished model into one of the small clear display cases widely available is far better than seeing a build you worked so hard on covered in nearly impossible to remove dust! Of course a display case is better still, but far more expensive.

The Nomad

You can see the camaro in the background, patiently waiting for more paint. It has been windy and cooler here the last couple of days and that is not conductive to outdoor painting.

Someday maybe I will get around to building an indoor paint booth, but until then, mother nature picks my painting schedule.

The nomad got its first coat of primer and surprised me, looking much better than I had expected it to considering the number of scratches that it had. Wet sanding, gotta love it...

The first primer coat is very important, especially on a model you are trying to restore. It will make defects show up that are very hard to see before you primer, and make some disappear as well. There are some defects where the side molding used to be on the nomad that I could not see until after I had primed it.

The first coat of primer is a starting point, one from which you can find small defects and perfect your body work on. Once you get the body close to how you want it switch to a lighter colored primer and re-wet sand it. High spots will show up when you sand through to the darker colored primer below, and you can find the low spots to fill and repair when most of the body has returned to the darker color, but light spots remain.

The use of foam sanding blocks is recommended to keep from creating low spots while sanding. Foam blocks can be trimmed to nearly any shape and conform to contours that a flat block will not. Foam sanding blocks can be found at nearly any hardware store.

All these tips take practice, so if you don't get the results you really want you can try again by either applying them to your next model, or stripping the one you are working on down and starting over. One nice thing about stripping paint, the newer it is , the easier it comes off.

Good luck, and keep building!

Wet Sanding

Any model can be improved with a little effort. Wet sanding the body takes some time, but it is one area that will improve your paint quality and make the model shine.

The trick is to sand with a good quality wet or dry paper of film. Your local hardware store will have it, and most will sell it by the sheet so that you don't have to buy a huge amount to get you started.

Get a variety of grits, from 220 all the way to 1,000 or more if you can find it. Be sure it is the black wet or dry variety as wood sand paper is water soluble and will fall apart on you.

On a new model start with 600 grit and under running water (just enough to wet the paper and wash off the residue)lightly sand the entire body. Be very careful around emblems and small raised detail you want to keep, because they will sand off.

You can hear and feel the sanding working, it will make less noise as it smooths out and the surface will be far slicker than when you started.

Rinse the model thoroughly after each sanding to remove and debris.

Spray each coat and re sand it once dry.the paint needs to be very dry or it will stick to the paper or your fingers and cause you to pull out your hair and start over.

Stick with 600 grit until you near the last few coats and then switch to finer and finer grit as you progress until the last coat you apply. The only reason to go back to courser paper is if you get a defect the finer grit will not remove.

After the last coat of paint STOP! What type of paint are you using? If it is enamel do not re sand it. If it is Lacquer paint you may want to hit it again with the finest grit you have, or, You can let it dry completely and polish it.

Any paint can be polished to shine it up, but it has to be completely dry first. We will talk more about polishing another day!

Remember, every time you sand it paint will be removed, so don't get carried away. Try to avoid over sanding high spots or you can sand right through the paint and ruin your progress. Only sand enough to smooth the paint out.

I began sanding the nomad last night,and it is ready for the first primer coat so I can begin the body work.

The camaro got some serious sanding to remove the defects in the last coat of paint, and is nearly ready for another coat.

Practice wet sanding and painting! It will be worth it.

Build updates

The camaro: I am letting the paint dry on the body before proceeding any farther. There is some bubbling near the bottom of the door on one side. The rear end is cut and the wheel wells opened up for tire clearance. The interior needs flocking, gauge decals and detail painted.

The nomad: The paint is now stripped as far as I can get it, and body work can commence. The frame needs repairing as it broke in dis-assembly, but it is ready to start anytime.

The 54 Cevy street racer: needs some interior work, flocking for carpet (maybe), body work and paint. The frame is nearly done, and the engine needs a little detail work. I also have to figure out how to install the radiator.

The Doge Challenger: is still soaking to remove the paint, and the frame and interior is still in the freezer.

I have a new article out for beginners that can be seen:here

I wasn't able to get much done last night, but I do hope for progress tonight.