Looks real good. I've been in & out of modeling all my life. I've picked up a few kits lately I'd like to do, one a model of my 70 RR and another one of my 73 Barracuda. Both are vinyl top cars, how did you do the finish on yours? I figured theres one or two tried & true methods, but yours looks really good, and correct for the scale, etc.
Later, Jim
To simulate my vinyl top, I first glued some thin Evergreen styrene plastic strips from the rear quarter windows around below the back window to replicate the stainless steel trim. Then I masked off the model to just expose the top. I masked off where the "seams" are on the vinyl top and sprayed it with Testors flat black. Then I peeled off that tape and fogged the top with the flat black to give it a rough finish. Next I gave it a few more coats of flat black, then finished off with a coat of Testors dullcoat.
The seam came out looking pretty good on the passenger side, you may be able to see it in my picture. The drivers side seam was OK, not as good as I wanted.
I used Bare Metal foil on the trim to give it the polished stainless steel look.
An interesting story on the Monogram T/A model. When I was 15 and just getting interested in Challengers, I saw a red with white vinyl top T/A drive down my street and park in front of my buddies house down the street. I hopped on my bike and rode down the street to check it out. It was the first T/A I ever got a close look at!
It belonged to a guy named Scott who was friends with my buddy's older brother.
Not long after Scott got his T/A, he took the white vinyl top off because he hated it.
Monogram Models was located in Morton Grove IL which was just south of my home town. In the early 80's, they borrowed Scott's T/A to use to develop their T/A model!
As thanks for that, on the original editions decal sheet, they included Scott's license plates Illinois SAS 392.
Apparently Scott's T/A is a standard dash car, I had to scratchbuild a rally dash for the interior of my model because my car has that option.
I still know Scott, and he still has that T/A. He has been restoring it for a while but recently told me it's almost done. Even though everyone tells him he should put a white vinyl top back on it, he won't because he still hates the way it looked with that!
No one I know has ever seen an FE5 T/A with a white vinyl top.
On a sad (I'd say tragic) note, I had a phone interview with Revell Monogram models in March for a product manager position. That sounded like a dream job for me, they were looking for someone passionate about cars and planes past and present, in other words, me!!
When talking to the president of Revell on the phone, I mentioned the big plant in Morton Grove and how I noticed that it got torn down 4 or 5 years ago and now condos have been built there.
He said that they had moved all the production over to China (like everyone else seems to be doing these days), he said at one point they had 650 people working here at the model company. Now they have 28. I didn't get the job, but I have to admit I wasn't all that interested any more after I talked to him. Another long time US company doing their part to destroy the US economy by moving all our jobs to China.
