ScottsGT

Yea, I think I built half that car with him from all the phone calls I got. “Hey Pops, what about this, or that? Should I ….” One of the best was the LT4 corvette style exhaust tips. He bought a bunch of stainless U shaped tubes, stated cutting them, got angles all off and called me for advise. I simply did a Google search and found dual tips on line and sent him the link. Why make it when you can buy premade if you’re under a time crunch? He was literally still bolting parts on the car in the Mecum tent where cars are displayed before the auction. He did get to meet Bruno Massel from Garage Squad at Mecum. It was kind of funny because Bruno is the spitting image of my wife’s brother. I’ve always told my son he’s his Uncles son because he favors that side of the family. He told Bruno I’m always telling him he’s his Dad he never met. The guy he works for is a very wealthy dealership broker that is living vicariously through my sons skills. But now he’s branching out with putting my son to work (and paying him very well too) and sending him all over the place doing work on restructuring dealerships, transporting cars across country, etc. I keep reminding him he also needs to focus on the builds because his boss is in his upper ‘70’s and won’t be around forever. Focus on that resume building. Funny thing is, he got his start working the parts counter at Advance Auto while taking an auto tech class at Trident Tech in Charleston. His boss came in and asked if he and his coworker could help him run some brake lines on a Factory 5 kit car. They got there and realized they needed to blow the project all apart and start over since half the stuff was done wrong. A few months later he got fired from Advance for doing a brake job on a friends car in the parking lot off duty. I told him that was the best thing that ever happened to him. He went to work for the guy full time.

I did my one and only SEA scheme in my display case using the silly putty method many years ago. It’s the old Hobby Craft/Trumpeter F-105. Only reason I’ve hesitated doing another was because I was shooting enamels and hated dealing with the dry time between colors. I welcome my new lacquer overlords to start another SEA one day soon. I’m predicting it will be my Fisher fat face or a Vietnam era Phantom.

My youngest drives a manual 2002 Mustang he built from two cars. He said I’m to blame for his career of building really nice custom cars. He’s got a hell of a career going already at 27. I think I posted a pic from Mecum here last year with an LT4 powered ‘62 Corvette he built. Aww, screw it. Here it is again I keep teasing him that it would have pulled another $50k if they didn’t black out all the chrome 😁 Just yesterday I was trying to drive my 1990 F-250 to town to help a friend out. Barely made it out of the neighborhood with zero acceleration and it got worse as I added throttle. Truck only has 57,000 miles on it. Put a new fuel filter on it today and it made a great improvement. Now my catalytic converter sounds like it has a hundred marbles bouncing around inside it. Trucks so old and we have no inspections here, so I was throwing around the idea of just putting in a bypass pipe, but man, I really hate the smell of a car now without a cat.

Thanks Peter! Did a little sanding, putty and priming on the sub. No real progress to show model wise. But I did quit the procrastination that I love to do so much and jumped back on the base woodwork. Man, procrastination really is my first hobby! I got the first layer of trim around the edges with a lip to build up the sea bed. But before the clay slinging starts, I need to prep the wood and stain and clear it first.

Chris, why the 3/4 cam? Couldn’t afford to buy the whole cam? Man, that’s some real old terminology back to the Ford flathead days! I always thought that was some street slang until I looked into the history of “1/4 race cam” or “1/2 race cam”. I was an old hotrodder from the ‘80’s. We cut our teeth on things like the Duntov 30/30, Competition Cams 280H if you had an auto trans and couldn’t afford a stall torque converter or a 292H if you were rolling in the dough! When I built the 5.0 in my ‘66 I was hit with questions like “Are you running the stock ECM or will it be tuned?” How about no ECM? I wound up using the Trick Flow Stage 1 cam that is their mildest cam that matches their heads. But I am running aftermarket EFI that has turned into a major PITA. I’m going to play with it a little more this spring and if it doesn’t straighten out, I’m yanking all that crap and slapping on a Holly 600 cfm carb.

Hey Rob, similar life learning experience with me as well. I was in high school taking a printing and photography course at the trade center. I was running an AB Dick 360 printing press and I was in the process of cleaning the rollers. We were warned about getting over zealous cleaning the top roller and getting too close to the roller below it as it was running. Me being the hard headed kid I was got my finger in the wrong place at the wrong time. Lucky for me there was a built in safety feature that ejected the top roller straight up into the air with a loud banging noise as it smacked the ceiling tile. Instructor came over and in his very calm demeanor, “Well, I guess you learned just how close to not get?” I still have all my digits! I just pulled the table saw out Friday evening to cut down the edge molding for the base. It was about 3/16 too wide. First one went through and using my push stick something wasn’t right. Wood kept lifting. Closer inspection showed my push stick has too deep of a notch for thin wood and it was hitting the table top. Taped a piece of scrap wood to the push stick and all was good!

Just shot more primer. More primer = more bad spots I’m seeing. Ugh…..

I’ll add a little tip that might come in handy for y’all. I wanted to make damned sure I didn’t get dust up inside the model through the open bay on the bottom. Each time I do some sanding of filler or primer I’ve been using my small Milwaukee M18 portable vacuum to get the dust off and not simply wiping it or blowing it off. It has kept my work area surprisingly cleaner as well. I think I found a new home for the vac.

Oh man…. If any of y’all ever decide to take on a huge model like this or say that big B-36 Ernie is working on, make sure your meds are in check and your liquor cabinet is stocked. Just taping up the sub bay and the bottom flood lights is an exercise in swinging this thing around from one side of the bench to the other. Look out work light! Here it comes again! Im now at that fiddly stage of checking every seam and making sure it’s filled all the way, block sanding all the hull seams to make sure they’re flat and straight and finding minor errors. I need a nap! I’m getting grumpy.

Got the email last night. Use code PaintApex as per the email. Sale ends on 2/12. Prices a bottle of Mr. Color lacquer right at $2.25 I’m going to unnecessarily stock up! My past experience with my one order was good other than a little slow to ship. That being said, it was right after the last hurricane went through Florida. They are in Daytona. EDIT: just placed an order. Saved about $10 on a good size order.

I was looking at the 1/72 kit thinking it was a bit too large……

I just stumbled across this website on Cybermodeler. https://www.cybermodeler.com/resource6.shtml C026, Duck Egg seems to be a Pre-WWII color. According to the charts, C368 is supposed to be it. I have noticed that sometimes Mr. Colors caps are a few shades off of the actual color. I’m in no big hurry, so I’ll probably throw a bottle in my cart on my next Sprue order just to see how it looks.

Ok, wife’s mouse pad arrived!

Those big bottles are hard to find around here. Seller had it listed for $80. I paid her $60 for it and had to drive almost an hour one way. I’ve got a friend that works for the local beer, wine and liquor distributor. She said she thinks they have one in the back, but still cannot find it.

And she brings this home. I kid..I kid. I actually found it locally on eBay and it didn’t sell. Contacted the seller, met her yesterday and bought it cash in hand. I had no idea it was still full of wine. But the cork leaks, so it’s 6 liters of vinegar I’m sure. Going to make an “Art Deco” light fixture with it. I have a high wall separating the kitchen from the family room that does not go to the ceiling. well, here. Here’s a pic. I’m going to build a bottle holder with it tilted down and hanging over the ledge. I’ll have to drill a hole in the bottom of the bottle, run a wire through it and let it hang down about 3’-4’ and put a hanging light socket on it. I bought one of those huge Edison bulbs with the twisty LED filaments inside it I’ll use. I was shocked when the wife was on board with my crazy artistic plan. And when I told her I was going to replace the wall sconce in the stairwell with a similar bulb and using an old glass power line insulator, she didn’t blink an eye. See guys, this is the trick. Start with “art” she likes. By the time I’m done, I’ll have that 116” wingspan Stearman hanging upside down in the family room up here! It’s 19’ to the peak.

If you look at my wet build progress pics you can see it still sitting on the top shelf of my bench. One day…

Just an update…wetting the wood did the trick. It would take a chisel to get that stuff off the wood now. I did get some drying cracks, but I can go back and fill those in.

Nope, not a kit. My shipping email for the Spitfire deal. Got a tracking number last week for delivery today. When I click the tracking link it takes me to a shipment from Tamiya that is getting delivered to KY. Currently preparing for delivery, will be there today. Ok, I’m hundreds of miles from Bowling Green, KY. If I log into my UPS account and look up my deliveries coming, there’s the correct tracking number and it’s in town preparing for delivery. Now I just hope I’m getting the right kit. My luck I’ll wind up with some wrong scale 1/48 crap. Or maybe an RC car? 😁

Wouldn’t that be ironic! Just maybe the balloon was sent up to get close up pics of the F-22 for R&D? Think it will come with a balloon kill decal? How about a balloon in the kit as well? DISCLAIMER: No, I’m not this stupid. Post was made in jest. Please recalibrate your joke and sarcasm meter if y’all think I’m being serious.

Just got my TBM-3W decals from them last week. Shipped out same day. Sat in customs in Warsaw a couple days and then NY Customs a couple days. Pay close attention to the shipping options. My order first popped up with the highest cost option, but lowest cost for a sheet of decals (with tracking) was still $15.

Gotta love owning velociraptors.

Those ideas are probably from recent MBA graduates they hired. They just don’t get how cheap us old farts are! Especially when it’s online a click away.

Thought you got “Red pilled” by somebody or you were collecting red M&M’s. Those would be tough to swallow.

Couldn’t have said it better myself. For the life of me, cannot figure out why not a few holes punched in it from the mini-gun and let it slowly descend where it could have been recovered intact.