W.I.P. Dale Earnhardt Nova

[Truck parts]

I like what you have done so far

[MarkJ]

[MarkJ]

I'll take the powerglide transmission you hacked off the Impala engine, to bad you couldn't find one of the AMT NASCAR engines, they would have been perfect, dry sump system and all.

please post the link for that amt nascar small block sportsman chevy engine with the dry sump system. I might want to build another one and don't want to go to all this trouble.

[horsepower]

You can get that engine from any of the AMT NASCAR kits, but I prefer the earlier ones but it's just my preference. You can also get a nice one from the Revell ASA kits that have V-8 powerplants, but the headers from those kits won't work but the ones from the Nova SS with the small block engine will work, and the Z-28 headers should work too. The only resin engine I've seen that is nice is the Ross Gibson one but it's getting hard to find and expensive since his passing, and the end of production.  The other good side of using the NASCAR kits is you can get a couple of them for less than one resin engine, and you get a lot of other parts and pieces to use in building a Sportsman car.

Edited January 6, 2016 by horsepower

[MarkJ]

[Stuntman Mike]

Really nice job so far and a cool subject. As the AMT Nascar Smallblock was mentioned, here´s a 358ci Pontiac engine from this kit:

 

 

 

The following pic shows the intake manifold and carburator from the engine above. This is currently in progress of becoming the powerplant for my current ´70 Yenko Deuce Nova build. Not factory stock, but I think it´s a realistic upgrade for a 350 LT/1.

 

The AMT Nascars are great as parts donors. A lot of crisp detailed parts and other useful stuff. The headers with the simulated heat wrap are pretty cool.

However, hope this was useful for future projects. I´m looking forward to see this evolve. I really like Novas.

[MarkJ]

Really nice job so far and a cool subject. As the AMT Nascar Smallblock was mentioned, here´s a 358ci Pontiac engine from this kit:

 

 

 

The following pic shows the intake manifold and carburator from the engine above. This is currently in progress of becoming the powerplant for my current ´70 Yenko Deuce Nova build. Not factory stock, but I think it´s a realistic upgrade for a 350 LT/1.

 

The AMT Nascars are great as parts donors. A lot of crisp detailed parts and other useful stuff. The headers with the simulated heat wrap are pretty cool.

However, hope this was useful for future projects. I´m looking forward to see this evolve. I really like Novas.

The only problem is the car I am doing was run in 1978 and that kit is a 1989 Pontiac cup car. I would hate to waste a whole nascar kit, especially that vintage, just to use the engine out of it. I actually used that kit a short time back to build this car.

 

[MarkJ]

I found this picture during my research for the build. It is a 1:1 representation of the car I'm building. Its not the actual car. It was scrapped a long time ago. I'm hoping the builder had a good idea what the actual car had under the hood so that's what I have been using for reference. You can only see the top portion of the engine so the rest is just a guess.

[MarkJ]

On to the chassis.

[MarkJ]

[MarkJ]

it was pointed out to me that the real car had a Banjo chassis. Well this is going to be a highly modified version of  a Banjo chassis.  I'm not going to try to find an amt 1/25 scale nascar ford kit from that time and rob the chassis out of it and then try to squeeze It under this body and get everything to line up properly. Its way too much trouble. So when the model is finished you don't have to let me know that the real car had a banjo chassis. I already know. Or I guess I could just scrap the whole project and move on to my next build.

[Belugawrx]

Keep her going Mark, doing great..

Cheers

[MarkJ]

 

 

 

[MarkJ]

 

 

[MarkJ]

I'm going to have to redo the roll cage. The front bars need to be closer to the a pillars.

[horsepower]

 

The AMT Nascars are great as parts donors. A lot of crisp detailed parts and other useful stuff. The headers with the simulated heat wrap are pretty cool.

However, hope this was useful for future projects. I´m looking forward to see this evolve. I really like Novas.

Those earlier releases were especially good for drive train and chassis parts, their nine inch Ford rear end's were perfect for swapping into almost anything since they didn't even have any spring perches molded in the housing, or big locating notches you had to fill. A if you really wanted to widen one or make a special housing it was as simple as sawing the housings off where the center section strengthening ended and drilling a hole through the entire remaining part, then just insert the aluminum or brass tube of the appropriate size and go from there, you could use plastic tube also, and insert styrene round rod into the ends for mounting brakes, wheels etc.

[MarkJ]

Those earlier releases were especially good for drive train and chassis parts, their nine inch Ford rear end's were perfect for swapping into almost anything since they didn't even have any spring perches molded in the housing, or big locating notches you had to fill. A if you really wanted to widen one or make a special housing it was as simple as sawing the housings off where the center section strengthening ended and drilling a hole through the entire remaining part, then just insert the aluminum or brass tube of the appropriate size and go from there, you could use plastic tube also, and insert styrene round rod into the ends for mounting brakes, wheels etc.

Like I said, if I was able to get one of those old kits I would not want to canabalize it just to get some parts. This is just going to be a shelfer so it does not have to be an exact duplicate of the real car which was scrapped a long time ago and nobody

knows what it really looked like inside and underneath  anyway. You just have to make educated guesses.

[Erik548]

I would hate to waste a whole nascar kit, especially that vintage, just to use the engine out of it.

Like I said, if I was able to get one of those old kits I would not want to canabalize it just to get some parts.

yes it is a "vintage" kit but, atleast around me, you cant give them away, ive never spent more then $5 on a complete kit, (including a couple for free by going to a train swap meet) and its not like your pulling them out of the nascar modelers hands, during those years the market was flooded with NASCAR kits the manufacturers trying to make every car. and since except for the decals it was the same build (yes i know slightly different body and motor, but the BUILD was the same) they sold well but weren't built often.

fast forward to today, the NASCAR modelers build them, but dont look for a specific kit because the decals are wrong they just look for say a 1989-93 thunderbird kit, toss the decals (because they are old and incorrect) and get the decals for the specific thunderbird they want to model from a site like mikesdecals.

what im trying to say is yes it was made 20 some years ago but the market is still flooded with them. just a quick look on model roundup (because he stocks vintage kits) turned up 13 first gen mustang kits, now something like that is collectible because the different manufacturers and the different runs make the kits all slightly different on the inside and different builds. where a quick look turned up 18 different 89-93 thunderbirds that, excepts for the decals, are the same (and the nascar builders most of the time dont use anyway).

so dont feel bad about cutting one up because that kit probably still more copies available then any other kit on the second hand market 

[Erik548]

The only problem is the car I am doing was run in 1978 and that kit is a 1989 Pontiac cup car. I would hate to waste a whole nascar kit, especially that vintage, just to use the engine out of it. I actually used that kit a short time back to build this car.

 

one more thing, mikesdecals sells that kit without decals for $6 and keep in mind its his job, not like a swap meet, so he has some markup in it to make a profit. even at $6 its cheaper then a set of resin valve covers, or tranny
http://www.mikesdecals.com/product_info.php?cPath=1_25&products_id=265

[horsepower]

When my daughter and her husband had their hobby shop, we had one supplier who was blowing out the pre 98 AMT NASCAR kits for $1.99 each, and Toy Liquidators was retailing the same kits for $4.00, so needless to say I have a few of them, also a pretty good stash of the Quaker State Steve Kinser Sprints, and the Testors Boyds kits, of the Aluma Coupe, and Chezoom, for some reason (I think a new worker didn't change the settings on the price gun) we went in one Tuesday when their kits came in, and they had ALL of those new stock kits marked at $1.99 each, we bought every one of every kit they had on the shelves.

[MarkJ]

one more thing, mikesdecals sells that kit without decals for $6 and keep in mind its his job, not like a swap meet, so he has some markup in it to make a profit. even at $6 its cheaper then a set of resin valve covers, or tranny
http://www.mikesdecals.com/product_info.php?cPath=1_25&products_id=265

That kit would not do me any good because this car is a rear steer car and those are front steer. I would need the 1983 monogram thunderbird kit and he has 0 of those. I'm just going to keep modifying this chassis to look some what like a banjo rear steer because even if I used the 83 thunderbird rear steer kit it would not look anything like the real car I'm building any way. And stretching this nova body over it would not turn out very well either.

[MarkJ]

 

 

 

 

[MarkJ]

 

 

 

 

 

[vintagercr]

You are making good progress

[MarkJ]