Monogram Fred Flypogger kits!

[Hepcat]

Here's another great Super Fuzz build by UMA's own Mark McGovern:







Mark built this one for model kit collector Mike Blanchard who owns The Core comic shop in Cedar Falls, Iowa.

 

[Hepcat]

Here are three really good shots of the rad Speed Shift model that Mark McGovern built for Mike Blanchard:







 

[Tim Nolan]

I restored this badly damaged kit last year.  It was a gift from a good friend and I also have the Speed Shift kit in need of restoration as well.  These old kits are getting hard and harder to find and the prices are just going thru the roof.  I really wish we would see some reissues of these things.

[Hepcat]

Oh man! That translucent blue pearl paint you used was fabulous.

 

[Tim Nolan]

Oh man! That translucent blue pearl paint you used was fabulous.

 

I use a lot of automotive urethane from House of Kolors on many of my builds.  The last coat is generally Kosmic Kleer with some flake in it!

[Hepcat]

Here are some terrific shots of the wild Flip Out! model that Mark McGovern built for Mike Blanchard:















Dig how Mark kit bashed the little Mouse into a surfing rodent complete with swim trunks!

 

[Hepcat]

The Revell model kits based on "Big Daddy" Roth's show cars were selling so well in the early 1960's that other model kit companies began scouting the show car circuit for custom rods on which they could base competing kits of their own. One of the very earliest of these was Monogram's Li'l Coffin.

The Li'l Coffin had been built by Dave Stuckey of Wichita, Kansas. The body was based on a 1932 Ford two door sedan and it was powered by a 1954 331 cubic inch De Soto hemi with six carbonators. In 1963 the Li'l Coffin won the Top Custom Car award at the Oakland Roadster Show, the premier rod show in the nation.   

So impressed were Monogram executives by the Li'l Coffin that they bought the car and exhibited it at the 1964 New York World's Fair! The Li'l Coffin kit that Monogram put out in 1964 remains an all-time classic.

The bigger kids down the street, Fred and Mike, had one when I was a kid so I bought one too. I had real problems trying to assemble the thing though because some of the parts didn't fit together very well. Here's a closeup shot of the unbuilt one I have today:



 

[Mord]

 Nice, Hep, I wish I still had mine. I know this may sound weird, but I really like the smell of cardboard and styrophene when you first open a kit.

[Hepcat]

...I really like the smell of cardboard and styrophene when you first open a kit.

Not at all surprising. I think most of us who built model kits as kids still love the old smell of styrene plastic and cardboard. Plus modelling cement and enamel paint of course!

 

[Mord]

Plus modelling cement and enamel paint of course!

Oh, yeah. I always wondered why I felt so happily dazed as a kid.

[Tom_Hering]

The Revell model kits based on "Big Daddy" Roth's show cars were selling so well in the early 1960's that other model kit companies began scouting the show car circuit for custom rods on which they could base competing kits of their own. One of the very earliest of these was Monogram's Li'l Coffin.

The Li'l Coffin had been built by Dave Stuckey of Wichita, Kansas. The body was based on a 1932 Ford two door sedan and it was powered by a 1954 331 cubic inch De Soto hemi with six carbonators. In 1963 the Li'l Coffin won the Top Custom Car award at the Oakland Roadster Show, the premier rod show in the nation.   

So impressed were Monogram executives by the Li'l Coffin that they bought the car and exhibited it at the 1964 New York World's Fair! The Li'l Coffin kit that Monogram put out in 1964 remains an all-time classic.

The bigger kids down the street, Fred and Mike, had one when I was a kid so I bought one too. I had real problems trying to assemble the thing though because some of the parts didn't fit together very well. Here's a closeup shot of the unbuilt one I have today:



 

Ah, the model car craze of the 1960s. Car Model Magazine was our internet. Those were exciting times, because the kit manufacturers released a lot of show, concept, and kustom cars. My favorite was Jo-Han's Chrysler Turbine. Here's the 1965 first release of the kit that I own today. Check out the exclusive "Frame-Pak" packaging. The Turbine may have been the finest car kit of the '60s. The tooling cost a whopping $250,000 (or 1/4 million, which is 2 million in today's dollars), and was completely underwritten by Chrysler Corporation.

[Hepcat]

Wow! Now there's a kit that would require hours of careful work to assemble.

 

[Tom_Hering]

Wow! Now there's a kit that would require hours of careful work to assemble.

 

Yes. The front wheels steer. The hood, trunk, and doors all open. The front seats fold forward. The original vinyl tires in my kit have deteriorated badly over time, so I've added a new set to the box, made by Moebius. The second issue of this kit (in a blue box) included a sheet of self-adhesive chrome foil, years before Bare-Metal Foil came on the market.

[Hepcat]

The Revell model kits based on "Big Daddy" Roth's show cars were selling so well in the early 1960's that other model kit companies began scouting the show car circuit for custom rods on which they could base competing kits of their own.

Ah, the model car craze of the 1960s. Car Model Magazine was our internet.

It wasn't until 1968 that Monogram found its own answer to Revell's wild show rods that "Big Daddy" Roth had designed. That's when Monogram released its first Tom Daniel design, the Beer Wagon:



The second was the Red Baron:



All in all, Monogram released 77 model kits based on concepts by Tom Daniel between 1968 and 1975. One of these was the Ghost of the Red Baron from 1969:



Granted it was a cheap snap-together "kit" but the concept was good. Here are some really nice pictures of rkoenn's buildup:







 

[rkoenn]

I saw the Lil' Coffin picture in this thread and I did one of those not too long ago.  I think I built one when I was a kid too in the '60s as I thought it was so cool.  It was an actual show car that made the rounds.  Here's my build, again if my link works.