Five-year anniversary

I started this blog on February 27, 2014. Looking back to that first post, I see that the links to older builds are no longer working as I have since rearranged my Dropbox files and accidentally deleted the files. So for the record here are some of my pre-2014 builds. The interesting thing is the extent to which my skill level has increased through continued practice. So if you are feeling beat by the challenges, all I have to say is keep at it! Practice, practice, practice.



Tamiya's Lotus 7. A very nice build and I will build it again.



Scratch-built 4WD and a stake bed from the parts bin. This was an opportunity to put all the various tools in a single spot, and to use the lovely Sinclair Oil decals with the dinosaur.



Vicky body shortened to a two-seater and moved rearwards to make room for the Revell Parts Packs version of the 283 with Potvin blower. An early rat rod.



Another Tamiya Lotus. I had a hard time with the decals of the gold stripes on the JPS black paint, so I simply didn't bother with them.



Honda 1.5 V12. Transverse engine. Fat lot of good it did them too. The level of detail in this Hasegawa kit is only fair.



Nissan Group C. Not Le Mans but the rules are close. Twin-turbo V8 and Tamiya's usual level of detail. This is unpainted and dusty.



Jag XJR-9R with the 7-litre V12. Chassis a lot like the Nissan. I decided to skip the eye-popping purple paint on the racer and go for a traditional BRG and yellow scheme.



Success on the decals on this one! Compared to the Nissan and Jag, the chassis has less aggressive undertrays due to rules, not aerodynamics.



Monte Carlo: Mini and Peugeot 205. The starting point may be the same (FWD, transverse engine econobox) but the end-result is quite different.



El Caprice and El Nomad. The Caprice is the Alternomad kit, with the rear roof hacked off and the top chopped; mechanically the chassis and pickup bed came from the Chevy 454 SS pickup truck underneath. The Nomad was a similarly crude approach with a blown V8 of some description taken from the parts bin.



Ford F150 6X4 transport and a '32 coupe with a Dodge Stealth engine transplanted to the rear.



The '32 body features an aggressive top chop and a sloped section. I probably cut up four or five of the Stealth kits for the drive train.



Another, cleaner, '32 with the Stealth drivetrain. No top chop on this one.



Cruisers: box-stock '59 Impala and my Project Starliner. Take her to warp, Mr. Sulu! The 390 Tripower fits nicely under the rear deck of the Starliner, and one hopes the Nissan Skyline rear axle can take the torque. I love the long deck and clean lines of the Starliner, in contrast to the clumsy fins of the Impala, and wanted to accentuate the line from the top of the front fender clear back to the tail lights.



So some straight rally and Le Mans builds, and a bunch of cut-and-paste scratchbuilt what-ifs. Shortly after I started this blog, I discovered resin and multi-media kits of obscure little racers that only true gearheads know of, at which point the hobby bug bit pretty hard.




Stay tuned, there are 190 more kits in the stash!