O Scale Motor Vehicle Chronicle Feb.14

I really enjoy your posts each week. Very informative & great photos.

I am with Spence....I really enjoy this thread and even more when there are scale examples on member's layouts...

Alan

I also look forward to your weekly posts. Just out of interest, of all the cars, which is your favorite in what color scheme?

Thanks for a great thread!

Second the motions in the above comments.  As a car nut and train nut, and one who

is gathering era specific  "traffic" for a layout, I am quick to open one of these new postings, whether it addresses protoypes or models. Went through a Corgi list found on an earlier posting and found nothing current for the U.S. market.  Model market is

transient......

I agree and look forward to your pictures and comments every week.

Art

I very much look forward to your post every week.

Thank you!

Mike

I was very happy to find a Motor City model of this car at York last Oct. Mine is medium metallic brown/dark brown. It is a hard model to find.

May contribution for the week.

This Franklin Mint Chrysler Town and Country is very nice. There are plenty of them on eBay for between $12. and $20.

That is a beautiful car!  I have always liked woody station wagons, but had forgotten about these.

Art

I go to hot rod car shows and the great bulk there is Fords and Chevy's. Its great to see at least a few of these now unusual examples of all makes and models and years are still around.

Mr. Rempel, and others unfamiliar with it, should pick up a copy of Hemmings and

go to a vintage car show.....while there will be a plethora of Fords, early Chevies

and cars many have never heard of might be there.  Like trains shows, there are

more of them in the northeast, as major ones have been impacted as have train

shows.  Of course, if in eastern PA., go to Hershey on Saturday.

I read somewhere that this first postwar Fords were designed by Studebaker stylists moonlighting for Ford.  Upon study it surely looks that way.  But regardless they were good looking, modern cars for the period.  I have a '50 Ford sedan taxi and a Highway patrol coupe I have converted to 'Streets. I run them nearly all the time.

But my favorite 'Streets car is this '56 IXO Fairlane.  It is just a lovely little car.  I added dual exhausts since it has Thunderbird emblems on the front fenders.  This would have been a very desirable car to own in the mid '50s.

Lee, I agree the nicest of your Super Streets cars is the Ford Fairlane pictured above. Great looking car. You can't beat the fifties!!!!

The styling and appearance of a '56 Ford Fairlane is so head and shoulders above the generic looking cars that Bachman is producing!  Lee, you have elevated Super Streets to a whole new level.  And the fact that they run so slow and smooth is the frosting on the cake.  Super job!

Art

Fred:

It would be hard to pick a favorite classic, there are just to many to chose from. One of my favorites is the '55 Imperial, I had a '56 that is nearly identical, I wish I still had it. The '53 Studebaker and the '61 Lincoln Continental are also at the top of my list.

1955 Imperial.

 Thank you. Talk about a small world, my father had a 55 Chrysler 300 in  red (the photo is off the net . When I was in high school I would disconnect the speed cable behind the dashboard and drive it for hours. I thought I was pretty smart but my father checked the threaded attachment and found it was only finger tight. That ended my wonderful Saturday night cruises with the hemi.    

Photo from the net http://www.google.com/url?sa=i&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&docid=2VYS7WfUE32-EM&tbnid=XRzt4ukS3oSGaM:&ved=0CAcQjB04BA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.hotrodscustomstuff.com%2FOLD_SITE%2Fchrysler300-01.html&ei=OhsAU_vgKefI0AHt1YAQ&psig=AFQjCNHD6w1cThV21Jw8QafHRhUmhTBd1g&ust=1392602298740351

Here is a '55 Chrysler 300 by Motor Max...

Tom B

Richard, that 55 Imperial is awesome!

Phil

I'm posting this here because I think it likely the people who follow this thread might have an answer to a question I doubt many know. The picture below shows a Brooklin '49 Buick Roadmaster.  A nice car and a nice model.  I'm curious about the tires.  They are exactly.7 inches in diameter which means a scale 33.6 inches or so tall - rather monsterous for a car, even a big one in the '40s.  Is this correct - or close to it?  It looks good with them - in fact they look right for the car, but that seems like a big, big tire . . . 

I went to convert this to 'Streets but I have only two choices of tire diameter in 'Streets wheels, one just less than a scale 26 inches, which looks much smaller than the tires that came on the Brooklin, or close to 40+ inches in size, which looks too big and won't fit well anyway.   

If you look through a Brooklin catalog you will see a number of their older models with wheels that are too large (and "greenhouse" areas that are too low). Brooklin fanatics describe these faults as "personality". Yes, your Buick DID have large wheels and fat whitewalls...but these wheels are too large. Based on photos of the actual car, the whitewalls on the front tires should not be so near the top of the wheel opening.

Thanks.  I just could not believe the tires were that big.  Not sure what I cam going to do with this model - I've sort of lost my enthusiasm for it due to its "personality."

Since I foolishly owned one of these '49 Buicks, as a (first) used car, I can state that

it took 15" tires.  While a make of car with the same name as mine came with 42"

wheels (and double running boards to climb up into), maybe a piece of construction

equipment would take 34" tires, so I would go with the smaller wheels, and get

a more realistic model without the "personality" that confirms my belief that Brooklins

aren't worth the price.

Many early Brooklins were not that well done, That Buick is a good example The venture ports are not in a straight line and the rear fenders are to fat. That being said, they were much less expensive then and were models unavailable anywhere else. Many early Brooklins are available on the secondary market at reasonable prices.
The best value for high quality 1/43 are from American Excellance  / NEO. Although not cheap, their detail rivals models costing 3 times as much.

They still have models unavailable elsewhere, which is the frustration.  Thanks to someone above for the NEO/Excellence site , but, as usual, it was saturated with

rare classics and exotics not seen parked at the A&P.  Found one Ford model identified as 1937 (which I always considered the ugliest Ford, followed by 1938), but the car, if

of an American version, is a 1936 Ford...now, Ford produced some later English

models that looked like downsized versions of prior year U.S. models, so that spooked me.  I would buy a model of a 1937 as my childhood neighbor was still driving one,

as well as a 1936 sedan as this one LOOKS to be.  Forties cars on the site  looked like more choices and fifties, with more the more recent the model.  I could not figure

out how to search by years...such as "<1941". The good thing is that most years ARE

identified in listings.  You can search by "American".  There were some interesting

models such as a 1950 Nash for the transition era.

Rextoys made some ’35 Fords Coupes, Sedans Station Wagons and sedan deliveries, also ’40 Packard sedans.  They are out of production but are not hard to find.
AMT made a 1/43 ’36 and a ’48 Ford coupe kit. They show up on e-bay from time to time.
IXO made a ’36 and a ’47 Ford sedan as well as a ’48 wagon.
Elligor made a variety  of early ‘30s Fords, although they are hard to find

I've taken a good look at my Brooklin Buick and then went on line and compared it to pictures of the real thing.  I am nowt disgusted with it.  It is really just a caricature of a '59 Buick: exaggerated lines and swoops, narrowed windows, a way, way too big grill.  It looks like something Disney would have drawn in the early '50s or a Boyd Coddington nightmare.

Some of the best looking models are resin, and so far I have not converted those.  I've taken two apart to see about it but they are solid inside, at least where the interior, etc., is not placed.  Don't want to have to cut that much away.  

I still have a case of Rextoy Packards from when I was selling them in trains shows.

The NEO/Excellence site I just waded through, after I figured out I could speed it

up by citing "American", has many varieties/colors of those Packards (of the four door sedan) for sale, for less than I paid wholesale.  I have, for years, had most of the Rextoys made that are pertinent to my era, but after a variety of 1935 (only) Fords with different bodies, and the 1940 Packard, with only one body, nothing more was

forthcoming.  Rextoy had put out a small but enticing brochure showing some planned

marques of interest to me that never materialized.  As for the price of Brooklins, I

was on another car site yesterday, and there were six or eight vintage models I

would have liked, BUT they are more than twice the price of a Brooklin!  I just don't

want a layout with a '35 Ford sitting at a station, and 20 miles (3 feet) down the

track there is a '35 Ford at that station, and all the parking lots have the same few makes and models.  With Packards, that is even less likely in the real world. 

I have one of those Buicks on my layout and it is in the back. Brooklin's 48 Cadillac Sedanet is much better.

In my lifetime I have owned every almost all the fords you talk about, except the woody. When I was 17 you could buy these for 25 to 50 dollars and run them to the ground. Left many 49 or 50 beside the road and never looked back. Had a few  54, 55 56s to. Ford had a lot of over heating problems and as a young teenager my foot was to heavy. Live and learn!

The 1955 Imperial is my all time favorite car.

Jeff C

Colorado hirailer could email me...it's in my profile.

Bob

I agree that Brooklin produces cars that others neglected, like my '54 Plymouth and Chevy wagons...but my main complaint with Brooklin is lack of silver trim, especially around the windows. If I get this trim on a "cheap" model, I certainly expect it on one costing $100.+. On some Brooklins, the side panel trim is very "heavy", with a "laid-on" look.

I have 8 Brooklins, but most of them I paid to have "detailed". On the 1:43 Forum I belong to, heaven help the person who finds fault with Brooklin...the die-hards will be out for blood (sort of like being critical of St. Mike here).

"St. Mike"?  There is a church thread running.  Maybe I could get on that 43:Forum

and yank some chains.  Wonder how many of those fanatic fans are familiar with the real cars and qualified to recognize errors? Brooklin has some some interesting ideas...which I am not sure were carried to fruition, such as their Buick series, which, so far, I have not seen all the body styles expected, and they ignored 1940, which was an important year (First year of sealed beam headlights, first year, for some makes without running boards, or last year with them for others)  There seems to be a Pontiac and Oldsmobile series started along the same line, but it has really produced few years or body styles, but that may be due to the economic downturn.  I was hoping they would do that series for Chevrolets...but......nothing seen on that. I'd be happier if somebody picked up Rextoy and did all of this.  I had heard that Rextoy

was managed in Switzerland, made in France, and the guy died, and his widow shut

it all down....also heard other variations?

MTH did a series of fallen flag freight cars, as a set, and that was not carried to

fuition, either.  A few were done, and then......just when I was happily picking certain now defunct roadname freightcars out of break-ups.

Thanks for making me smile. I remember dropping a Merc engine into a 50 Ford.

Great chic car at the carhops. Err. So we thought  anyways. Continental rear bumper kit really made things cool.

It's my biggest gripe beyond the "caricature" nature of some of the older ones.  For that price you really expect more and on some of the newer ones they paint the trim which is something of an improvement, I guess.

On all of my older ones, I carefully scraped and/or filed the paint off the raised trim, exposing shiny metal: if you look carefully at the Buick Iposted above, I did the lower body trim piece but not around the windows that way.  Anyway, it looks good even as you have to be very careful: I cover the car except for those pieces in masking tape first so I don't mar the paint where I should not by mistake.  The shiny exposed metal oxidizes over time to a duller sheen but even so looks good and can be renewed with a brightboy eraser to a good shine.