Michael Church

Great color!

That original Type 35 photo is incredible. If you zoom in you can really see how much the louvers vary, the waviness of the cut where the frame emerges, and other details that show just how handmade these cars were.

@nick, I received your Alfa bolts and wire wheels just a couple days ago (they look great!) and the kit is coming any day. Should I hold off on cleaning mold lines off those plastic leaf springs? I'm pretty sure I can find another chunk of the kit to focus on for a few months....

Really fabulous work, and thank you for posting so many detail photos. They really convey what a special kit this is and the quality of your work. Now, any chance I can blame you when my wife looks over the bank statement and asks me, "who is this model named Hiro and why are you paying her hundreds of dollars?"

I built most of these Monogram 1920s to 1940s car kits when I was a kid in the 1970s. I'm sure they turned out very badly, but it's great to see the parts and instructions again. Thanks for posting your build!

Beautiful work on a beautiful car. My dad owned one, briefly. He sold it because the lack of Citroen specialists near where he lived made it hard to keep running, but he did let me drive it once. I mostly remember the incredibly sensitive brakes and my dad yelling at me to keep the revs up. Also, thanks for posting a build of a Ukraine Scale Cars kit--it's great to see how they're designed, where the issues might be, etc.

Very nice work on the rear wing. I've been avoiding 1/43 F1 cars with multilevel wings because I'm genuinely uncertain how to line up all the parts while gluing them together.

Sorry about the confusion! I was being silly. Lego calls the little bumps on the bricks "studs," and it made me think of "rivet counters" and the gentle teasing on this forum of builders too concerned about realism.

I just counted the number of studs on the frame of the 1967 Mustang parked down the street from where I live. The frame should be seven studs across, not six. I'm shocked to see such poor research by the kit designers at Lego! But honestly, I love how clever these Lego kits are and I'm looking forward to your photos.

My dad had two Corvairs in the early 70s, one first-generation Monza convertible and one second-generation 2-door. More recently, I lived for a few years near one of the former Corvair factories, so lots of people brought them to car shows. What amazes me is how different the back end of the second-generation looks depending on the angle. Your side view above really drives that home, especially with the spoiler making that long back deck look even longer. I can't wait to see how your build turns out!

I seriously considered buying a Fusion Sport in 2010. I liked the car's lines and how it drove quite a bit. My wife vetoed it because she detested the noise the turn signal made. The things we do for a good marriage....

I am not a butcher, but it looks like Porsche changed from pork chops to pork tenderloin in late 1970

The wire and bolt detail is definitely worth the time, I think. It helps capture the age of the car and a very different era, technologically. Really nice work.

The cutouts representing things like chrome tank trim are great--very nice use of negative space.

I'm genuinely curious how much improvement to speed and/or handling removing the bumpers would have made. On one hand, I imagine any 1950s Mercedes bumper is overbuilt and overengineered, but on the other this was a lightweight performance car. I've wondered the same about other cars. If I remember correctly, Ferrari 250 GT SWBs were raced in all kinds of bumper/partial bumper/no bumper configurations. If only you could find a good 1/24 figure, you could build two versions. One with suit and bumpers and dirty paint, one with racing gear and no bumpers and clean paint. Yes, I know this is a terrible idea!