Spiny

Very decent of them I'd say - I can only guess that they are referring to the solid axles, one-piece cabin glass and fairly basic chassis as the rest looks pretty good to me. I've certainly had kits which don't seem to be as good out of the box (Revell's '53 Corvete springs to mind), but then again I haven't started building it yet! The colour plan is pretty much the box car, black over silver. Hopefully it won't be too long to get it in paint but I will be spraying around trying to sell the house so who knows what will happen timescale wise with that!

Another one who has never owned a car they've hated - everyone has had something going for it, although I admit there may be some rose-tinted spectacles I've been sorry to see the back of all which went. Like @Windy37 I too think that my 2015 Fiesta Ecoboost is a brilliant all-rounder, while my 5-cylinder Focus ST always puts a smile on my face - I've had it since 2010 and have no intention of selling any time soon. But for the surprisingly good factor, I'd have to go for my '98 Nissan Almera - no it's not a car people lust after. Yes, it died from too much rust, but the engine was still a willing performer beyond 160,000 miles and felt like it had another 160,000 in it despite only being a 1.4 But the best bit was the handling - despite both current Fords having more grip, I'd have to say that the balance of the Almera was at least a match for them; after all it did come from the time when Nissan really built good handling cars. I can still remember leaving a (then quite new) 911 behind on a twisty road only to have him roar past me in an obvious fit of pique on the following straight section

Sounds like the car which my younger sister's arrival led to my parents selling... two doors was copeable with one child but not two apparently.

If I'd realised how rare they are (5 in the UK apparantly) I'd have grabbed a shot, but one of these was parked at the station today - 007 Land Rover Defender: https://media.landrover.com/en-gb/news/2021/09/new-land-rover-defender-v8-bond-edition-inspired-no-time-die Must admit to being more shocked at the price in the article than the car itself though!

I believe it's almost self matching - if you think about it the ground is acting as the link between the two sets of wheels rather than the more usual transaxle arrangement (as long as the ground is firm enough to stop the wheels spining). And if you do get bogged down and the wheels are spinning uselessly you're only losing the power from one engine/axle while the other engine can give you the power & grip to push on through.

Very nice build, although the brown looks lighter here than in your build thread. Excellent progress too, I can't believe that you got it built in only two weeks, and to such a high standard as well. I can't even foil a car in that time!

The best way I can think of if you have them to hand is to mark out where you want the windows. Then if you have a hold punch or drill to hand of the required radius, use these at each corner of the windows to make a hole. Then get a metal rule and cut a straight line between each window. You could then score another line just outside the new window hole to create a window rubber - if the black is runny enough the score will also help give a smooth edge. Hope that helps.

With the possibility that spraying time may be severely curtailed this year, I figured it was more important to use my very limited modelling time this weekend to make progress on getting another body ready for spraying. Step forward Aoshima's S12 '84 Nissan Silvia / Gazelle. First thing to note, one of the things you'd don't want to see written on a kit box is on this one: "The molds for this kit were designed and developed in the 1980s and may not be at the quality of replication in today's standards." 😬 Fortunately, on first impressions it doesn't look so bad (although I do question to provision of a clear bonnet in a kit with no engine!). This has always been a car I've thought looked good from way back when I was a child (I actually found some brochures while clearing out the house a month ago, but can't remember where they got filed), so when it was rereleased at a decent price I figured it was worth buying. So what do you get? This little lot: I'd say the parts count is likely to be about average for a curbside kit, although that may be boosted by some of the OTT modifying parts available with the kit. I think I'll be going down the standard route. This weekend, the focus was on getting the body ready for painting, namely sanding off the seam lines (not too bad actually) and rescribing the panel lines to make sure they will take a wash effectively. Unfortunately, there were a couple of slips with the scriber, but after a light coat of white primer I've put a little bit of filler in, rescribed and sanded those areas back. Still a couple of small corners to clean up which I can't get at with the sanding pads so a blade will be needed, but it's pretty much ready for priming proper. The most obvious issue with this kit though is the presence of two very narrow and long sunvisors The turned out to be in a really awkward place to get at, couldn't easily get at them with a saw of scalpel which raised the risk of damaging the pillars if either slipped. Nothing for it, take a large brave pill and dig out the Dremel. First off the lowest speed setting and circular cutting disk to take most of these back (down to about 2-3mm height). Then it was the pear-shaped grinding too, very little pressure and slowly took them back to almost level with a very slight recess. That was then filled with dissolved sprue before being sanded back with 120 grit sandpaper. It's not perfectly level, but I'll be very surprised if they're visible when I finally get this finished. So there we are, another kit started, at least in a very slow way. Expect sporadic updates over the coming months. Thanks for looking.

Got to sympathise with you ont he spraying front - it seems to have been six months of unsuitable weather we've had, maybe even more, and only just starting to get so that we can spray again. While I tend towards the shinier end of the spectrum, this is a good representation of something which doesn't have regular meets with wax and it looks like the sort of car which is enjoyed. It's been good seeing it come together and is a good end result.

THat's very nicely built. I can see what you mean about the proportions being a bit off (it looks a bit tall and stubby to me), but that's a fault of the kit and not really something you can correct on the bench. Ignore the kit issues and it's a lovely model you've made there.

Got to admit that the 309 would get more attention from me that the Ferrari next to it too. Seeing those Ford pics, it seems odd to see a sister of my car on display there. I know the situation will get more common as my car gets older, but I still find it odd to see Foci on display however nice they are.

Having done a google of both the 6600 and 7600 I have to say that you're both right. Can I use the excuse that it was replaced with a brand new 7710 when I was only 7 (with a very appropriate number plate ending OAT)?

Looks good to me. I wouldn't worry too much about the finish, I've never had a good gloss finish straight out of the can, it's always taken me far too much sanding/micromeshing and polishing to get anywhere near an acceptable finish.

That definitely looks like a Ford grille on it - given the age and 4WDness of it I'd say Windy was spot on with his County assessment. Must admit I'd forgotten all about one of Dad's tractors having the air filter sitting proud of the bonnet like that - being really young I always though it was a light and was disappointed never to see it lit up. I'd guess it was probably a 6600 but was too young to remember it that clearly.

Not only do I have too many kits, but also too many which I want to buy. I would like to see a 'standard' short nose version though so, will all the other good stuff coming out at the moment, I may well just wait for that.

That's an awful lot of buses. Appreciate you already have this one (and in the very first picture too), but hope you don't mind me adding one i got of the same bus. This was taken in 2005 so would be not long before they were withdrawn. Also it was taken on my first digital camera, all 2MP of it, so not up to today's picture quality.

I had a look, and the first one in this article looks like the one they had. The age would be about right too as I think it was a Y-reg from memory. https://www.agriland.co.uk/farming-news/county-tractors-prove-their-appeal-with-one-fetching-210000-at-sale/ Can't remember exactly though, but it certainly wasn't one of the long bonnet versions. And I certainly can't imagine them paying anywhere near £210,000 for it 😲

I'd never have thought of repurposing the badges like that (and to be honest probably wouldn't have dared try!). You're right to be pleased with how they've turned out though - it's going to be a good looking end result judging by how it looks in the mock up.

To be honest, when you talk about orange peel that looks fine to me for being straight out of the can/airbrush. My paints usually start off with much worse orange peel than that.

Sadly that sounds about right - my 1978 Pontiac GP only produced 150bhp from 5 litres of V8 power, so 158bhp from 5.8l is of a similar order. The scary thing is that that was the uprated version - the base version only made 135bhp from the same 5 litre lump!

When I was learning most people were looking at Fiestas for their own car, but almost every instructor had a Micra (which was confusing as the controls were on stalks on the opposite side). My instructor was the opposite way around as he was reluctant to get a Micra as the 'new' (i.e. Mk2) Micra had just been launched and he was reluctant to buy a brand new model as they were more likely to have reliability issues (oh, the benefit of hindsight!). So I ended up doing things the opposite way around to 80% of my generation - I owned the Micra but had lessons in a late '92 K-reg Fiesta which had less that 1500miles on the clock on my first lesson. First time I drove was on my 17th birthday, by 17 years and 10 weeks I'd passed my test in the aforementioned Fiesta 😁 Of course, as some others have mentioned, it helped that I learned and took my test in a small Yorkshire town with one set of traffic lights and which had only recently gained a mini-roundabout. The rumour was that the test routes avoided that roundabout after someone got rear-ended on their test by another driver who didn't expect them to stop as they were used to it being a T-junction. Another thing which allegedly helped (according to my instructor) was the genuine emergency stop I did in the practice just before my test when a black cat ran straight out in front of me - according to him that would bring me luck and I was sure to pass. So that's how I passed first time (with no minor faults either ). He was another old school instructor who didn't think a bit of snow was an excuse to cancel a lesson either!

Now I have to admit that I had no idea that County was a different manufacturer. A neighbouring farm had County's and I always thought they were a range of Ford tractors - in my memory they even had Ford text on them (I was going to say Ford badge until I remembered that Ford tractors text was usually black on white block capitals in theh '80s). Put that down as my thing learned for today

I'll also be keeping a keen eye on this build, for exactly the same reason - I too have the road-going version in my stash, although it may be a good couple of years before I get around to it. Does the rally car have a fuel filler in the C-pillar as it's the only reason I can think of for the hole in there on the body?

Are you sure about that?😉

The solution in MBdesignart's pickup looks good to me. But if you're determined to cut the kit parts, would it be better to cut vertically down from the leading edge of the top of the front window - that way you could make out it's a quarterlight so any line there wouldn't matter? You're braver than me trying all of that stuff, but it seems to be payng dividends judging by the photos.