Post by mykturk on Jun 1, 2008 23:01:39 GMT -6
Greetings Earthlings! As I'd said in another post (My very first) I've been haunting this site for some time (The perfect place for TD kit research!) but I hadn't bothered to register until recently when my search for an old kit had netted zero results. Thanks to several good people here, I now know the kits name and manufacturer. (AMT Va Va Vette, would have NEVER guessed AMT) So anyway, now that I have registered and will surely be commenting from time to time (Or more) maybe it'd be a good idea to give a little background on myself...
I, like many of you are very very near half a century old, if you count back to inception, I've crossed that milestone already... (Sigh) Back in the early sixties I watched with complete fascination as my older brother built a "Gangbusters" kit. He showed me the hidden machine guns and how it could be built with bullet ridden glass if he'd wanted it to. I couldn't say what one it was, but I do remember he painted it deep metallic green with a tan interior. That was it, at age 4, I went to my mom and said, I wanted to build a model. She said I was too little and I'd have to wait a few years. That wasn't going to cut it, nope. I asked and asked and asked and at last. They said yes, but I'd have to start with airplanes, they were 'easier', and if I did okay with them, then I could move up to cars. I hated building planes, they were too easy, but in no time I had proved I really wanted to build models.
Armed with a .50 a week allowance and a hobby shop right across the street from the grocery store, I was in plastic heaven!
I built 100's of car kits (Destroyed 100's of them too) from 1964-1972... In 1972, several of my peers in the neighborhood gave me a ton of grief over still having all my "Baby toys". So, in a moment of very foolish weakness, I gave all, ALL, my models and toys to the younger kids in my neighborhood. I'm pretty sure I'd built EVERY one of Tom Daniel's designs at least once, some several times. In 1974 I met my friend Jay Carter. Jay was a frantic model builder too and in short order, I was messing with plastic again. Jay and I would get together on a Saturday or Sunday afternoon and we'd do some serious B.S.ing and kit bashing. Between the two of us our building skills improved in every way. This lasted a few years until we discovered girls and real cars. I again put the glue down for a while. In 1979 I had a job working evenings at a gas station that wasn't very busy. I started killing time putting a model together now and then. Not long after that, I had a job offer in California. Being young and adventurous, I took it. California was a disaster for me, no matter what happened, I could not get ahead there, again, models kept me sane by giving me an inexpensive hobby in my idol time. After two years, I'd had enough of California kicking me around, and I returned to the Midwest. In 1986 Hot Rod magazine announced a model contest. I once again had a reason to put glue to plastic. I had a ball building an entry that didn't even place. It didn't matter all that much, I enjoyed it. Not long after that, I met my first wife, Sandy. She had a bowling night that she and her sister had done for years. One bowling night, her sisters husband came over with a model he'd picked up and wanted me to paint. This was the beginning of our bowling/building night. About this same time, Jay and I had gotten back in touch with each other, so I called him up and asked him if he'd care to join in the B.S.ing and building again.
Sandy and I were only together for a year. When we split up, I moved to Jay's house for a while. This turned into the creation station. Again, working off each others ideas our skills again increased many fold. It was about this time we discovered a nicely stocked hobby shop just across the river. While there, we saw a flyer for a hobby show and model contest. Now we had a goal, a place to see what other builders were doing and see how we measured up. So, we show up at the contest area, complete unknowns in a clearly established community, and we blew them away! We made several new friends (And a few enemy's) that day, saw what was available and just what else was going on in the hobby. This was a great time to be a builder, there were lots of new kits and advances in detail products. This was also the hey day of Pro Street and most of my models reflected that trend. like this GTO... (All the pictures of models are scans of old photos, I need to clean and reshoot my models...)
These were fun to build but were not a huge challenge, I wanted something, over the top. What I really wanted to build was just to expensive to do, a Nash Metropolitan. The Metro was only made for one or two years by Hubly and the kits commanded a very high price. I just couldn't bring myself to spend a couple of hundred dollars for a body that I was going to cut up. One evening Jay and I were bench racing and building fantasy cars out loud. I had picked up a cheap Johan Cadillac Eldorodo kit just for the Latham Supercharger advertised on the side of the box. I also bought the snot out of Monogram Sprint Cars for the giant treaded back tires, so I had a mess of injected small block Chevy engines and the smaller of the two rear sprint car tires. On a whim, I picked up the Eldorodo body, 4 small fat sprint car tires and 4 small block Chevies, jammed them all together and said, I'm going to build this! Jay say's, "Can't be done!"...
Nine months later, this was finished...
The crazy monoshock rear suspension works. The whole chassis is scratch built, the doors open suicide, the trunk opens and the body tilts funny car style.
A year or so later, I was approched by a collector/dealer/gear head who asked if I was still looking for a Metro. I said yes, but that I didn't want to have to pay a bunch of money for it. He said he'd GIVE it to me if I'd build a model for him, and he'd supply most everything I'd need to do it. Deal! I built him a nice 64 Falcon panel delivery and he gave me an original 1959 Hubly Nash Metropolitan promo in a dark mint green. A year later, this insane little project was finished...
As this was an 'expensive' and rare piece, I felt it deserved my very best effort. So, it's list of working features is long. The completely sctratch built chassis has working front and rear suspension with the rear being a condenced version of the monoshock Cadillac chain drive system (Beerwagon chains). The front end also has a working rack and pinion to steer the front wheels when the steering wheel is turned. The body tilts with working 'hydrolic' rams. The doors open when the latches are tripped. The hood opens reverse and the trunk sideways. The roof is removable and has a "Baby I'm Bored" yellow diamond sign hanging in the back window. There is complete linkage from the twin carberators to the gas pedal, the brake system is complete as is the wiring. It won every event it has been entered in since it was completed and was on the cover of Car Modeler. I haven't done much building over the past 15 years or so, unless you count the real cars I've built. My most recent creation isn't a model in the classic sence, but it is clearly inspired by a very rare Tom Daniel design...
I call it "rrrrRumbleBird" but it could just as easily be called "Draggin' Fly II"... It started as these three Hot Wheels...
And here's what it ended up as...
The pilot is made from Sculpty and it's about 1/40th scale...
More to come!
I, like many of you are very very near half a century old, if you count back to inception, I've crossed that milestone already... (Sigh) Back in the early sixties I watched with complete fascination as my older brother built a "Gangbusters" kit. He showed me the hidden machine guns and how it could be built with bullet ridden glass if he'd wanted it to. I couldn't say what one it was, but I do remember he painted it deep metallic green with a tan interior. That was it, at age 4, I went to my mom and said, I wanted to build a model. She said I was too little and I'd have to wait a few years. That wasn't going to cut it, nope. I asked and asked and asked and at last. They said yes, but I'd have to start with airplanes, they were 'easier', and if I did okay with them, then I could move up to cars. I hated building planes, they were too easy, but in no time I had proved I really wanted to build models.
Armed with a .50 a week allowance and a hobby shop right across the street from the grocery store, I was in plastic heaven!
I built 100's of car kits (Destroyed 100's of them too) from 1964-1972... In 1972, several of my peers in the neighborhood gave me a ton of grief over still having all my "Baby toys". So, in a moment of very foolish weakness, I gave all, ALL, my models and toys to the younger kids in my neighborhood. I'm pretty sure I'd built EVERY one of Tom Daniel's designs at least once, some several times. In 1974 I met my friend Jay Carter. Jay was a frantic model builder too and in short order, I was messing with plastic again. Jay and I would get together on a Saturday or Sunday afternoon and we'd do some serious B.S.ing and kit bashing. Between the two of us our building skills improved in every way. This lasted a few years until we discovered girls and real cars. I again put the glue down for a while. In 1979 I had a job working evenings at a gas station that wasn't very busy. I started killing time putting a model together now and then. Not long after that, I had a job offer in California. Being young and adventurous, I took it. California was a disaster for me, no matter what happened, I could not get ahead there, again, models kept me sane by giving me an inexpensive hobby in my idol time. After two years, I'd had enough of California kicking me around, and I returned to the Midwest. In 1986 Hot Rod magazine announced a model contest. I once again had a reason to put glue to plastic. I had a ball building an entry that didn't even place. It didn't matter all that much, I enjoyed it. Not long after that, I met my first wife, Sandy. She had a bowling night that she and her sister had done for years. One bowling night, her sisters husband came over with a model he'd picked up and wanted me to paint. This was the beginning of our bowling/building night. About this same time, Jay and I had gotten back in touch with each other, so I called him up and asked him if he'd care to join in the B.S.ing and building again.
Sandy and I were only together for a year. When we split up, I moved to Jay's house for a while. This turned into the creation station. Again, working off each others ideas our skills again increased many fold. It was about this time we discovered a nicely stocked hobby shop just across the river. While there, we saw a flyer for a hobby show and model contest. Now we had a goal, a place to see what other builders were doing and see how we measured up. So, we show up at the contest area, complete unknowns in a clearly established community, and we blew them away! We made several new friends (And a few enemy's) that day, saw what was available and just what else was going on in the hobby. This was a great time to be a builder, there were lots of new kits and advances in detail products. This was also the hey day of Pro Street and most of my models reflected that trend. like this GTO... (All the pictures of models are scans of old photos, I need to clean and reshoot my models...)
These were fun to build but were not a huge challenge, I wanted something, over the top. What I really wanted to build was just to expensive to do, a Nash Metropolitan. The Metro was only made for one or two years by Hubly and the kits commanded a very high price. I just couldn't bring myself to spend a couple of hundred dollars for a body that I was going to cut up. One evening Jay and I were bench racing and building fantasy cars out loud. I had picked up a cheap Johan Cadillac Eldorodo kit just for the Latham Supercharger advertised on the side of the box. I also bought the snot out of Monogram Sprint Cars for the giant treaded back tires, so I had a mess of injected small block Chevy engines and the smaller of the two rear sprint car tires. On a whim, I picked up the Eldorodo body, 4 small fat sprint car tires and 4 small block Chevies, jammed them all together and said, I'm going to build this! Jay say's, "Can't be done!"...
Nine months later, this was finished...
The crazy monoshock rear suspension works. The whole chassis is scratch built, the doors open suicide, the trunk opens and the body tilts funny car style.
A year or so later, I was approched by a collector/dealer/gear head who asked if I was still looking for a Metro. I said yes, but that I didn't want to have to pay a bunch of money for it. He said he'd GIVE it to me if I'd build a model for him, and he'd supply most everything I'd need to do it. Deal! I built him a nice 64 Falcon panel delivery and he gave me an original 1959 Hubly Nash Metropolitan promo in a dark mint green. A year later, this insane little project was finished...
As this was an 'expensive' and rare piece, I felt it deserved my very best effort. So, it's list of working features is long. The completely sctratch built chassis has working front and rear suspension with the rear being a condenced version of the monoshock Cadillac chain drive system (Beerwagon chains). The front end also has a working rack and pinion to steer the front wheels when the steering wheel is turned. The body tilts with working 'hydrolic' rams. The doors open when the latches are tripped. The hood opens reverse and the trunk sideways. The roof is removable and has a "Baby I'm Bored" yellow diamond sign hanging in the back window. There is complete linkage from the twin carberators to the gas pedal, the brake system is complete as is the wiring. It won every event it has been entered in since it was completed and was on the cover of Car Modeler. I haven't done much building over the past 15 years or so, unless you count the real cars I've built. My most recent creation isn't a model in the classic sence, but it is clearly inspired by a very rare Tom Daniel design...
I call it "rrrrRumbleBird" but it could just as easily be called "Draggin' Fly II"... It started as these three Hot Wheels...
And here's what it ended up as...
The pilot is made from Sculpty and it's about 1/40th scale...
More to come!
