Lesney #16c Scammell Slowplow Restoration

I got this one from a friend on one of the diecast forums for free, promising him I'd restore it! So here it is. It was a pretty straightforward restoration. He gave me a second snowplow to use for parts. It was in much worse shape but had a blade that was in better shape. This one looked good on the surface, but was pretty broken up behind the blade. Here's how it looked when I got it:

And after I got finished with it:

I used metallic silver automotive touch up paint for the cab, chassis, and blade. Definitely not original, but I like the look. The Krylon orange paint matches the original pretty well. Decals came from Rick's Toybox. 

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British Classic: Aston Martin DB5

What to do with this lovely casting? No doubt in my mind, this is the best Hot Wheels release in years.. But in just two releases, they've already made it in its best colors.. British Racing Green and silver.

I bought several of these when they first came out to use for customs, but the more I thought about it.. There's not a whole lot you can do to such a perfect car. But after a quick search on google images, I came up with what I think is an absolutely fantastic color for this classic machine.. What do you think?

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Hot Wheels Custom: BMW E30 M3

This is post #1 for this evening. I've been in a rare Hot Wheels mood today, and decided to tackle two of my favorite recent releases, one of them being the E30 M3. What a great car. The original M3 has never been beaten in my mind, up there with the 3.0 CSL and E28 M5 as one of the greatest BMWs of all time. Though I might be a tad bit biased... I much prefer older BMWs to new ones, as is the case with most cars for me. BMW as I know and love it ceased to exist after the E46, E39 and E38 went out of production. When the E65 7 Series was ushered in in 2002, it was the beginning of the end for purists such as myself. But I digress...

I do rather like HWs version of the E92 M3, particularly in that nice metallic black with 10SP wheels. So I decided to recreate it in E30 form. I'm looking forward to doing the same thing with the upcoming Hot Wheels E36...

Unfortunately I didn't let the paint completely cure before setting it on its roof, so the paint there is a little messed up. It is noticeable but I had sealed the car back up with JB Weld before I noticed it! Oops.

Here it is with its older brother. All I need now is an E46 M3 casting, but I don't know of any in 1/64 scale.

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Lesney #44a-Rolls Royce Silver Cloud Restoration

Tonight's project came from my trip to England recently. I got it i a big lot of cars that had had horrible repaints at some point in the past. This one had been painted white, and looked pretty horrible. It was a nightmare to get off, I wonder what sort of paint it was? But luckily the wheels were metal so I could use the same paint stripper on the wheels as on the body. Here's how it looked when I got started:

After a great deal of scrubbing old paint off and scraping rusty axles, I decided to go with something like the original light blue this car came in. I was surprised how well my paint matched the original. Unfortunately, the left rear corner of the bumper was missing from the car, so that's really the only flaw with it. Here's how the old Brit ended up:

Junkyard Find: Opel Diplomat

I am changing it up a little today! I'm straying away from my usual concours-quality restorations, and going in quite the opposite direction... I want to build a junkyard diorama at some point, and while I don't have all the plans laid out quite yet, I figured I could start working on some cars to go in it. Now I have plenty of cars that I destroyed as a kid to put in the back of the "lot" when it is finished, but I need some really convincing junkers to go out front, marked for sale as restoration projects for potential buyers!

So here is junker #1, a Lesney Opel Diplomat. This is the parts car that donated its hood, interior and windows to the silver Opel Diplomat Transitional project I did a while back. I have a big box full of Lesneys that I've already harvested for parts, so hopefully this junker collection will grow! I have already figured out some ways to make them look a little more realistic, but for now, here's what I've got...

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Matchbox 1968 Ford Mustang GT/CS California Special

I picked up some new Matchbox releases tonight, and every time I see a new model with chrome interior, it frustrates me to no end!!! Why do they bother making such nice models, in lovely colors and with accurate tampos, just to let it down with a chrome interior??

So I decided to change that, and this one came out so well, I might try it with some others.
I'm no Mustang collector, but I'm a sucker for brown/bronze cars, and I couldn't pass this one up!! I think I've improved it quite a bit, though I am working on gaining a steadier hand with the silver sharpie haha. What do you think?

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Lesney #18e-Field Car Superfast Transitional

The paint has finally dried on this one.. I think it came out pretty well. I've always liked this casting for some reason, and I certainly love transitionals, so I kept it stock. Here's what I started with:

Certainly not a bad starting point. The wheels were in reasonable shape, the roof was good, and it had its spare wheel. The only real problems were the bent windshield frame, and the missing trailer hitch, a problem that plagues so many models from this era.

But not to worry! I had a spare Field Car laying around with a good interior/hitch. I think I might try to fit some modern wheels to this one and completely lose the roof, at some point. 

This was another pretty straightforward resto. After some straightening of the windshield frame, a lick of paint, and some touch-up on the wheels, here's what I ended up with:

Heading off to it's home on the display shelf:

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