Hello, from Music City, USA

[Lucky13]

Hello, and thanks for adding me to your forum. 

Quick intro is in order I guess.

My name is Michael, but most people call me Mozzi. I am originally from Bulgaria, but I live in Nashville, Tennessee. I started building models as a kid in Bulgaria, where before '89 the only models one could buy were those of russian commercial planes, as was the case with most things behind the Iron Curtain. Those were simple kits molded in white plastic that came with a tube of glue and a tube of pure bronze. Read the most toxic silver paint possible, which would probably shut a company down our days. My favorite thing was applying the decals.

 In 1990 my family and I immigrated in Lausanne, Switzerland, where the model kit situation was the exact opposite. In other words, if you could think of it it was available as the four or five hobby shops in town were very, very well stocked. Visiting the public beach at the lake, I was running into some of the latest and greatest cars, as there was the Grand Hotel, where all the jet setters were staying and on top of that there was a Ferrari service and dealer in the side street beside the hotel. As a teenager absolutely in love with sports cars, the staff usually didn't mind me sneaking in some events and I end up attending quite few interesting premiers and getting close and personal with some exotics. Visiting the Geneva Auto Salon a couple of times and meeting some crazy tuners like Willy Koeinig, Uwe Gemballa, Strossek, Luigi Colani, Franco Sbarro etc., sparked a love affair with tuned up vehicles. 

    So my modeling started with russian passenger planes, went all out with exotics and sports cars and then became an obsession with the rise of the tuning madness.

-------"""""(((((Here I am incapable of biting my tongue and I want to say that I am kinda sick and tired of youngsters explaining to me how drifting came from Japan and how revolutionary and innovative Japanese tuners are. Well, rally drivers across Europe were taking turns sideways with pedal to the metal after pulling the e-brake, long before someone thought of the term "drifting". And anything hat LWB, Libertywalk, Rocket Bunny etc are coming up with our days, European tuners were doing in the '80s. RANT OVER!)))))"""""------

Then I met my uncle Maik - my dad's half brother, who was Swiss and lived in Wohlen, outside Zürich. He wore cowboy boots and a Top Gun type leather jacket. And hung with a rough crowd, who were all into American cars. All of which was impressive to me back then. And I got introduced to American Musclecars and the almighty V8 motors. He gave me a whole stack of his old magazines - Chrom und Flamen they were called. And oh, boy! I discovered Hot Rods. Now the car from those iconic ZZ Top videos made whole lotta more sense. And so did the Monogram kit of it in the hobby shop by my school. 

  Some time later, when I went back to Bulgaria, I discovered airbrushing. My mom bought me an airbrush and a much older model builder hooked me up with a guy who made me a compressor for my airbrush from an old fridge compressor. Best part about airbrushing? Camouflage of course. And this was the mid nineties. The golden era of bad bottom Vietnam movies and all the cool Tamiya kits available in the first ever Hobby Shop in Bulgaria. 

With time, my model building gave way to collecting die cast models. And that was the way for quite some time after I moved to the USA. Until I got bored or dissatisfied with some of my models and started modifying them. Eventually this brought me back into the model building hobby. 

    So, fast forward to today. My airplane, ships and military machinery days are long gone and I am perfectly comfortable restricting my self to cars. However, I am one of very few hybrid collectors/builders that collect and modify die cast models and build plastic kits. The main theme for my diecast collection is Ferrari and some other exotics, while my plastic kit workbench is populated mainly by hotrods. However, quite few hotrods have found their way into my diecast collection and exotics are not absent from my work bench. 

   I hope I can make some friends on here and pick some new ideas and techniques, while perhaps offer some inspiration by showcasing my builds.

Cheers!

Mozzi

Edited July 26, 2022 by Lucky13

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

Hello Mozzi …  from the city by the lake Chicago USA. Im mostly military aircraft myself, used to build cars in the 1990’s but have long since moved on. I started building models in 1979 myself. 
 

Dennis

[Latakia]

Mozzi

[Steve86]

Hello and welcome along, I build mostly 1/72 aircraft and 1/24 cars.

[xebec]

Welcome Mozzi- that is an interesting life you've led my friend. I only build cars in 1:1 scale, but I'm interested in seeing you post your work here. 

[noelh]

Welcome,

Believe it or not those Russian kits made it this far west. They were fairly terrible but exotic subjects. 

 

I  built a few cars in my time. Particularly  F1.

 

So welcome again.

 

 

Edited July 30, 2022 by noelh

[Bandsaw Steve]

Welcome aboard Mozzi. 

[IGKOR]

Welcome Mozzi!

 

We are neighbours I may say  I am from Greece.

My immigration was actually a homecoming, since I was born in Germany, moved back to Greece to study, relocated in Germany and Austria for work and finally returned to Greece but working in Albania.

So we 're somehow international guys!

 

Be Well!

Igkor