Table of contents for June 2020 in Scale Auto

The most challenging part of the XP-87’s bodywork for me was the fairing behind the driver. It’s a classic teardrop shape, but the recessed side vents make it difficult to reproduce. I considered carving it from solid putty, but how would I sand those smooth semi-circular vents? In the end, I decided to define the teardrop-shaped fairing with several sections of sheet styrene and make the vents from styrene tube cut at an angle. All I had to do was fill the shape with putty, leaving the vents unfilled, and sand it to the final shape. I found the method worked well. On the body, plastic doll eyes from a craft store served as the fore and aft vent trumpets. I cut the hemispherical lens in half, and voila! Vent…

After 15 seasons, the TV show and popculture touchstone Supernatural is coming to an end. And sad as it may be that we can’t ride along anymore with Sam and Dean Winchester on their monster-hunting adventures, the ’67 Impala four-door they inherited from their dad has finally appeared as a 1/25 scale kit from AMT. As you would expect, the Impala in the TV show is not one car, but several vehicles used for various shots. In the show, the Impala is the trusty steed to the knights errant, as much a character as the Winchesters, presented as a stock survivor, lovingly cared for and preserved over the years. But the hero Impala, the main automobile, is a modern beast powered by a modern 550-horsepower 502 cid power plant, an…

A Pontiac fan and who owned a vintage 1967 Pontiac LeMans, I was happy to see the re-release of MPC’s 1967 Pontiac GTO Weekend Warrior kit. In 1964, Pontiac’s GTO was born and is credited as the first muscle car: a big motor in a mid-sized package. From 1964-1966, GTOs were powered by a 389 V8 with optional Tri-Power carburetion. Pontiac refined the 1967 GTO with a 400 V8 equipped with a single 2- or 4-barrel carburetor and either a Muncie four-speed transmission or a Turbo-Hydramatic three-speed automatic with a Hurst dual-gate shifter. The majority of the model is molded in white including the body and interior. There are also chrome sprues, a baggy of clear and clear red parts, four unbranded redline tires, and a pair of Firestone-branded drag…

Everyone knows Tamiya kits feature near-perfect engineering, and they practically fall together with no seams or gaps. And while Tamiya has long been a leader in fit and assembly, what is state-of-the-art has changed over the years. Tamiya’s 1/12 scale Porsche 934 RSR harkens back to 1976: It’s big, it’s orange, and it has 500 parts. But it’s not quite what you expect from a modernday Tamiya kit. The molds still produce clean parts with little flash. My sample’s body had minimal seams, but I was surprised to find some of the engine parts left gaps I had to fill. There were also some locator pins that provided vague connection. In other words, you’ll have to do a little modeling. I could see vestiges of a former life for this…

Wynn’s Jammer has seen numerous releases over the years, but the molding remains crisp, with just a little flash to clean up. In this re-issue, the two-piece body comes molded in clear smoke plastic that provides a cool see-through effect in a color that mimics the real dragster. The kit includes a display base molded in black. Even though the instructions may appear simple, don’t be fooled: The build is a challenging one, so pay attention to the assembly notes. As an aside, the real Wynn’s Jammer didn’t have much chrome, so if you want a visually accurate appearance, you’ll have to remove most of the chrome plating. The blown Hemi engine includes molded pistons, impellers in the blower, clutch pack, and a crankshaft that is visible through the clear…

Months ago, when Tim Kidwell, Scale Auto editor, started talking about this issue, there was no question I wanted to build the ’69 Ford Mustang Boss 429 from the movie John Wick. What can I say? I’m a muscle-car fanatic! As with all my builds, I did some homework before starting this project, and it had some surprises in store. Right off the bat, let’s get something straight: Although it is said in the film’s dialogue that the car is a rare and highly collectible Boss 429, the truth is that none of the five cars used in the film actually were. While no one has specifically come out and said what the cars used in the movie left the factory as, there are several clues in the film that…

Ask anyone what is the most iconic James Bond car of all time and undoubtedly it would be the Aston Martin DB5. First seen in 1964’s Goldfinger, several of the silver birch DB5s have been featured in a succession of James Bond films including Thunderball, GoldenEye, Tomorrow Never Dies, Casino Royale, Skyfall, Spectre, and it’s upcoming appearance in No Time to Die. Two DB5s were built to promote Goldfinger at the 1964 World’s Fair, generating so much international interest that the DB5 was coined “the most famous car in the world.” In 1981, Roger Moore made a cameo appearance in the Burt Reynolds comedy Cannonball Run and drove, what else, a DB5. Instantly iconic, several licensed toys and models appeared to satisfy collectors, builders, and enthusiasts. In the U.S., Aurora…

Initially released in 2010, this re-release of Revell’s ‘66 Impala SS 396 includes some familiar lowrider parts seen in other Revell kits to make it a 2’n 1. Because this kit shares much of its tooling with the ’65 Impala SS 396, there are some extra parts that aren’t used during assembly. I incorporated most of the lowrider parts into my model but applied factory colors. An inspection of the body found a dimple in the center of the roof that I fixed with automotive putty. On the passenger side of the body, the stainless-steel trim that lines the wheel wells is only faintly engraved and makes application of Bare-Metal Foil more difficult. The interior is my favorite part of this kit. The door cards have excellently engraved detail and…

In 1999, Yamaha introduced the RoadStar XV1600 and redefined the large cruiser motorcycle market. Its powerful 1602cc OHV V-Twin engine pushed out over 63 hp and made the XV1600 one of the most powerful motorcycles in its day. Inside the kit, I found several frets bagged by color, along with a pouch containing screws, rubber tubing, and a metal spring for the rear suspension. The parts did not disappoint with most of them free of ejector pin marks and flash. The Yamaha’s 33-piece engine practically fell together, and I barely had to clean up any seams. Parts on the V-Twin are installed throughout the build as it is fitted to the frame and you add more details. The four-part frame built up just as well as the engine with minimal…

The revolutionary Chaparral series of 1960s road-race cars was immortalized in two 1/25 scale full-detail kits. One was IMC’s well-known replica of the Chaparral 2E with the elevated rear spoiler attached directly to the rear suspension hub carriers. The other kit? Aurora’s Chaparral 2A, which replicated the No. 3 car driven by Jim Hall and Hal Sharp. This Chaparral dominated the 1965 12 Hours of Sebring by winning the pole, the fastest lap time, and the overall race. Aurora in the 1960s billed itself as the world’s largest model kit manufacturer, but its 1/25 scale lineup was minimal. Most of the catalog comprised Aurora’s Sports Car Series that included a Jaguar XK-E coupe and roadster, a Porsche 904, a Ferrari 250 GTO, a Maserati 3500 GT, an Aston Martin DB4,…

This past January, I traveled to Jacksonville, FL, for Jaxcon 2020, and, once again, ran into expert modeler Hubert Dumas, who provided another great tip worthy of our Tip of the Month. This time Hubert devised a simple way to create his own weathering powders by grinding artist pastels, like Prismacolor NuPastels, available online or at art supply stores. Hubert took a small, clear, plastic container and drilled a hole in the side large enough to accommodate the shaft of a rotary tool sanding drum. He then pushed the shaft through the hole and chucked it into his rotary tool. He put the lid on the container and cut a small, square hole the size of the pastel stick directly above the drum. Next, he secured the container and the…

Many consider Ridley Scott’s 1982 feature film Blade Runner one of the best science-fiction movies ever produced. Loosely based on P.K. Dick’s 1968 novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, Scott’s Blade Runner is set in a dystopian Los Angeles in the year 2019, which was, at the time, 37 years in the future. Much of the film’s look was conceptualized by artist and futurist Syd Mead. One of the vehicle ideas he conjured was a flying police cruiser called the Spinner because of the way it took off and landed. The Spinner and 24 other cars based on Mead’s designs were built for the movie by the legendary car customizer Gene Winfield. Mead conceived of the Spinner as an “aerodyne” capable of traveling on the surface or in the…

Who you gonna call? Ghostbusters! Venkman, Stantz, Spengler, and Zedmore set up shop in downtown Manhattan 36 years ago. When Stantz brought a 1959 Cadillac Miller-Meteora Futura Duplex ambulance back to the firehouse, bought for the low sum of $4,800 dollars, even he knew it wasn’t the steal he’d hoped, needing work on the suspension, shocks, brakes, and brake pads, interior lining, steering box, transmission, rear end, mufflers, wiring … basically, everything. Eventually, from the old hulk emerged Ecto-1 — sometimes called the Ectomobile. The team converted the old ambulance gurney to transport proton packs and crammed in a ton of high-tech supernatural detection equipment into the back end and piled more of the same onto the roof. Previously, the only model available of Ecto-1 has been the 1/24 scale…

The Buick Grand National terrorized U.S. streets with its unmatched performance and good looks from 1982 to 1987. The pinnacle of the GN’s production was the 1987 GNX (Grand National Experimental) juiced by engineers at McLaren Performance Technologies. The ’87 GNX was the fastest production car produced in the U.S. at the time, all done with an intercooled, turbocharged Buick 231 V6 with 300 horsepower. This was the last year for Grand National production before General Motors eliminated the rear-wheel-drive G-body in favor of a more economical front-wheel platform. Upon opening the box, I was pleasantly surprised to see that the Monogram molds have held up well with little flash and few mold lines. Going through the contents, I was greeted with one chrome-plated, four white, and clear and clear…

The decals make the MPC Coca-Cola ’69 Charger R/T snap-together kit a singular, curbside build. The body has few seams and only a tiny bit of flash, but the surface finish is dull with a slight brushed texture with visible sink marks on the hood, deck lid, and fenders. Yes, it’s a snap kit, but plastic cement can be helpful. The one-piece chassis has molded detail and metal axles. The simple bucket-style interior has separate front seats, dash, shifter, and steering wheel. The tires are Goodyear Polyglas G70/15s with raised sidewall lettering. The large decal sheet is nicely printed, and the instructions are easy to follow. I sanded the body and cleaned up the mold lines, re-scribed panels lines where necessary, and filled the sink marks in the deck lid.…

This is a re-issue of the Vega wagon funny car first offered in 1971, later updated to a 1974/75-style nose, and again, finally, as a 1976 model. Since it is a funny car, the overall body proportions are little off: uniformly shortened front to rear compared to a stock vehicle. There are no provisions to make a factory-stock car from this kit, but there is an option to make it a panel wagon. It has a Logghe frame with a blown and injected Chevy 454 big-block engine. You can build it with chrome headlights or block-off covers. The rear tires are beautiful pad-printed M&H slicks. They can be used right out of the box, although they fit a little loose on the rims. The mold lines and ejector-pin marks are…

With both a heavy heart and good cheer, we say farewell and happy retirement to Mark Savage, Scale Auto and FineScale Modeler executive editor. Mark spent 19 years variously as an editor, executive editor, and publisher at Kalmbach Media managing many different magazines. I had the pleasure of meeting Mark in 2006 and worked with him on many titles since. Mark is a mentor and friend, and his presence during the day-to-day hack-and-slash will be sorely missed. But he’s a Scale Auto enthusiast, like the rest of us, so keep your eyes open, because I’m sure you’ll see him around. Meanwhile, you can check out his 1/1 scale car reviews at savageonwheels.com.…