AMT 59 El Camino--COMPLETED-11/21

Pulling up a chair, popcorn's on...I always enjoy following your builds, and this kit has been reaching out to me at Hobby Lobby. Looking forward to seeing what you do with it!

Mike

mrmike

Pulling up a chair, popcorn's on...

Ha! Me too!

I was just thinking of you yesterday, Joe, and wondering if you'd start a WIP. This will be fun. Neat subject.

Maybe you'll spark some interest in building re your son's friend.

Hi ;

 Hmmm , Gotchya ! That's a okay kit ! T.B.

Thanks guys.

Been meanin' to post this one here for a while but time got away from me.

I talked with Jonathan about this build and he asked if I could put white wall tires on it. Soooo I figured I could go with some baby moon wheels. Initially he wanted to paint the car white. After explaining to him that I could paint it white but that the chrome would stand out more if I painted it a more contrasting color such as blue or maroon, he decided to go with maroon.

This is a good thing because after doing a little research on the internet I found this photo from Cal Car Cover. I showed the photo to him and he fell in love with it. So ............we'll be going with this theme.

That should be kewl, Joe.

Hoo, another memory flashback!

This was the first car model kit I ever had. When my brother and I were kids living in Detroit in the ‘50’s we had been building airplane and ship kits. In 1959 an uncle in the auto industry had some of the original AMT 3n1 kits given to him and he handed them out to kids he knew including my brother and I. This was the first auto kit we ever saw and we were blown away by all the parts and options, and put it together without even painting it.

I suspect that the current release won’t have as many options as the original but I should pick one up just for the nostalgia. (No way I’m paying for an original one!)

Thanks Greg and Liegghio. I can't imagine what an original kit would go for right off the top of my head.

So.....I cleaned up the flash, ejector pin marks and seams from all the parts and bagged them all up in an organized fashion in the box i.e. chassis parts, engine parts, interior and so on.



There was A LOT of clean up on this kit too.

The rear differential/ axle assy was probably the worst of it (aside from the plastic molded exhaust system which is always a pain in the butt to clean up and make look right  )

Here's after assembling the two halves together. Terrible over bite resulting in a seam on both sides of the assembly:



After the initial cleaning up I put a line of super glue across the diff cover seam:



After painting...……..



Yeah I know...…………...why is my hand in the picture? Let's look a little closer at that diff cover and zero in on the reflection of my fingers in the dried paint.



Last shot of the painted and semi glossed chassis before there are any parts installed on it...

Got some chassis work done this morning …………...errr should I say...………..ALOT of chassis work done:

Chassis is looking good, Joe.

And the differential is very red and shiny. :)

I've yet to try the superglue on the seam trick. Looks like it works pretty ok.

mustang1989

 

Yeah I know...…………...why is my hand in the picture? Let's look a little closer at that diff cover and zero in on the reflection of my fingers in the dried paint.

This is gonna be really nice. Jonathan owes you big.

Greg: Thanks bud. The super glue trick works on all of the modeling paints that I've covered it with. It does NOT play well with automotive style paints however unless a good coat of primer is used and really light initial coats go on first and THEN applying the heavier gloss/ finishing coats. But then again....depending on how hot the paint is, there's not a whole lot of automotive paints that play well with plastic.

Bill: LOL! I appreciate the good word man. I hear you on the Round 2 gig. However bad they are, they still don't hold a candle to how bad the classic Revell automotive line up is. I've built SEVERAL of the older Revell kits and they are alot of work to turn a decent build out of.

I'm pretty much just being a nice guy and just building this for Jonathan at this point. I've tried to get him into it throughout the build and he's shown VERY little interest in learning. Don't get me wrong, I'm not half stepping this build by any means but he's just into the modeling gig. Hopefully he'll look at the finished product and something'll fire off in him to want to learn how to do this kind of stuff.

I did things a little backwards on this build. I'm still waiting on some parts and trying to figure out how I'm going to do the interior so I decided to lay down the initial color coat after ALOT of body work. I used Testors One Coat Lacquer "Mythical Maroon" , decanted and shot through a Badger 350 airbrush.

  I found a set of PE "El Camino" emblems from the Model Car Garage so I got rid of the molded El Camino emblems on the side of the body.

Here goes:

Cool!  Great subject

This is a very cool subject and project Joe. The work you have done so far is superb. The color you've chosen sure is sharp looking. I hope you have some success in perking Johnathan's interest and that he a last gives building a try. It's certainly a noble effort on your part nonetheless.

Per your request here is a pic of the latest auto kits I've acquired.

Thanks guys.

Joe: Good lookin' scores man. Both look like da bomb to build. When are we gettin' started on these?

I chose to go with the Revell 348 for this bad boy because the AMT 348 was just that *** poor. Someone off of another forum donated one to me for the cause.

N E wayz.....I got it finished.

Looking good!

PUFF-puff-puff...pant, pant, pant Hi,  pant, pant I got here as fast as I could [BIG Inhale-Exhale]  whooo-eee  Glad I made it to the show. 

What did I  mi….oh, OK jus’ read it.

So, 59 El Co-mean-no, lookin’ good to date.   Great choice  for body color,.

And the work looks like this will be a thing of beauty soon.

Ding !   Ah, mi-cron- wave says,  the  popcorn is done.  

So On with the Show, Joe.    [geesh I crack me up]

Hi,

Your engine looks great.

Pat

Thanks John, Steve (you crack me up dude ) and Pat.

OK guys. Interior is finished. There were several things that I didn't like about this kit in regards to the interior. First off, the ejector pin marks were at the worst possible places. One on each side of the seat bottom???? What tha heck? I managed to cover one of them with the magazine and the other I sanded as far as I dared and still not sacrifice the texture on the seat. Then there were two ugly marks on the flooring which got covered up by the floor mats. Secondly, AMT produced the interior in the boring base model interior. Had to get a little creative with the seat to jog things up a bit color wise. Lastly, the shifter looked like something from a school bus so that QUICKLY got changed out for something a little more sporty by way of scratchbuildinig. The goodies used were more of a distractive measure to make up for and enhance the mediocre interior. All in all I'm fairly pleased with the outcome. Although not my best interior, I think I made more out of what I had to work with.

GMorrison

If it was my WIP it'd be "look at my fingers in the dried paint".

Ha!

JOE RIX

This is a very cool subject and project Joe. The work you have done so far is superb. The color you've chosen sure is sharp looking. I hope you have some success in perking Johnathan's interest and that he a last gives building a try. It's certainly a noble effort on your part nonetheless.

Per your request here is a pic of the latest auto kits I've acquired.

 

 

Holy Cow, JR, does that Ford GT40 bring back memories.

I had one in regular slot car size, and a couple in HO slot car size. I probably build a model of one but don't remember.

Wishing you great fun with both kits.

Engine and interior looking good, Joe.

Tremendous work on the engine and on the interior. You've got it going on there compadre.

Looks good Joe!  I'll be watching from here and there and over yonder...

It looks great.  How did you make the exhaust manifolds look like cast iron, with the rough surface?  Thanks

Nice save on the seat's. I had to look "Extra hard" to see the pin mark. If you had not told us where it was .... we never would have known it was there. ( BTW, you shouldnt leave the key's on the seat like that ..... I may take it for a joyride !)

Excellent choice on the color's too.

Thanks guys.

Steve: The manifolds were cast in kind of a rough look but I start by shooting a coat of black onto the manifolds. In this case I used Testors Flat Black Lacquer. After that I use a super light coat of Model Master "Steel" over the black to allow for shadowing effects and a true to life steel finish.

Thanks for the tip.

No problem bud.

Regardless of my lack of posting in the last couple of weeks, I have been able to hit the bench. With my son in football and in agriculture in school (he's raising a pig) we've all got some really busy nights. We don't plan anything right now outside of the pig and football. I would post more during the week at night but I'd be a babbling idiot due to being so tired.

In regards to the bench, I have spent the better part of a friggin' WEEK applying bare metal foil to all the chrome trim that is on this car. I never in a million years EVER realized there was so much dang chrome on these things. Boy did I ever get a rude awakening! I've still got more chrome to install on this car in the way of bumpers, headlights/ bezels, turn signal bezels, tail lights and the like.
I had to sand about 3/16" off the bottom of the window/ glass assy because the interior tub wasn't fitting into the interior cavity fully causing a large gap between the top of the door opening and the interior door panels. Crazy.
After that I managed to get the body installed onto the rolling chassis and I'm VERY happy with that result. It was exactly the look I was hoping for.