Salvino Jr VS Polar Lights Charger?

[Furiousgeorge]

I’ve been eyeing up the Salvinos and Charger kit for a little while now, and I’m wondering how it stacks up against the old Polar Lights Chargers? I have a few of the PL’s in my stash (both Petty and Baker), but the few PL kits I’ve done we’re sub-par. Are the Salvinos much better?

[CapSat 6]

6 hours ago, Furiousgeorge said:

I’ve been eyeing up the Salvinos and Charger kit for a little while now, and I’m wondering how it stacks up against the old Polar Lights Chargers? I have a few of the PL’s in my stash (both Petty and Baker), but the few PL kits I’ve done we’re sub-par. Are the Salvinos much better?

The Salvinos kit is much stronger than the Polar Lights kits mostly in the body. The PL bodies are almost cartoonish. 
 

Elements of the PL Chassis are better than the Salvinos, as the Salvino’s kits use more of a generic chassis. Both chassis have unusually large transmission tunnels. 
 

I’d give the Salvino’s kit the nod in the engine department. It’s a generic block for which you use either Hemi or wedge heads, depending on the year you’re building, but I think overall it presents a bit better than the Polar Lights kit. 
 

If I were to buy just one of these to build, it would be a Salvino’s, hands down. 

Myself, I’m trying to bash a Salvino’s body with a PL chassis and a AMT ‘68 Road Runner engine block, heads and transmission, but then again, I had all of these parts to start with. I’m still stuck on fixing that transmission tunnel. The Salvino’s body is much better to my eyes. I do like the PL chassis a little better than the Salvino’s, as it looks more “Mopar” under there. 

[64Comet404]

The Salvino's has the better body dimensions, and 'looks' like a Charger; not quite sure what PL used for their rendition. The Salvino's chassis is similar in concept to the old MPC stock cars, but the torsion bar front and leaf-spring rear represent what a Charger would have ran. The PL is more of a purpose-built chassis, but the designers didn't do a great job. As Bill S. states, the tranny tunnel on both is huge. The roll cage on the Salvino's looks good, though. I have thought about using the Salvino's roll cage and related parts with the chassis from a Revell '69 Charger, just to get the more accurate floorpan stampings for the interior. If you are just building it out of the box, however, the Salvino's kit is the winner, hands-down.

[kurth]

How do the wheels in the two kits compare? The Salvino 9 hole wheels are very strange looking, and the 5 slot wheels also look weird to me.  Instead of having a concave profile, like a bowl, they are flat on the inner face, and look like a cake pan. 

Edited September 6, 2021 by kurth

[CapSat 6]

2 hours ago, kurth said:

How do the wheels in the two kits compare? The Salvino 9 hole wheels are very strange looking, and the 5 slot wheels also look weird to me.  Instead of having a concave profile, like a bowl, they are flat on the inner face, and look like a cake pan. 

The slot wheels in the Salvino’s kits are much nicer than the ones in the Polar Lights kits. The Salvino’s kits come with 3 sets of wheels each- chromed slots, unchromed slots and unchromed steel Holman Moody wheels, so- lots of extra parts in those Salvino’s kits!!!

[Mark]

If you are going to change chassis, why not start with the same piece Petty started with...stock '71 Charger?  Between the stock kit, and the Salvino (or Polar Lights if you prefer) roll cage, engine parts, and everything else, you ought to be able to piece together a much better chassis than the cribbed/two-piece/generic stuff...

[Dave Van]

To make a really good contest model....take the PL Charger, Salvinos and AMT 71 kit. Salcinos chassis is not that good. HUGE transmission tunnel and wrong transmission. Mix and match the best parts from the rest. The Slvinos BODY is much better than PL....it almost looks like they cloned the old MPC body.

[Furiousgeorge]

Thanks for all the info! I’ll order one, and see what I can mash together!

[Dan Rosenello]

I recently built both Charger kits. I pretty much agree with the other’s assessment of both kits. 
 The funny thing about the PL Charger is that I built an old Earnhardt ride with mine. And all the pictures I found if the real car look just as wonky as the kit.

[Bob Ellis]

They both look good to me