Lesney #56b-Fiat 1500 Restoration

I got inspiration for this project from the show Parenthood. I saw a clip on TV the other night of one of the characters driving this old Fiat, and I was thinking how good it looked in orange. Those old Fiats and Ladas were pretty neat old cars, and I think I did this one justice. What do you think?

Before:

Here it is now:

Not sure why I added the surfboards, but I think they look cool!

Matchbox Custom: Mercedes W124 300E

Here's a W124, one of my all time favorite Matchbox castings, and probably the best Mercedes ever made! I think it came out pretty well.

Before:

And here it is now:

Lesney #59c-Ford Galaxie Fire Chief

Good evening folks! Here's tonight's restoration, an old Galaxie fire chief. The final piece took parts from 4 different cars! I'd gathered them over time, all in far too bad of a condition to display. I'd hoped to restore all of them eventually, but 3 of the 4 had missing pillars and bent roofs. Repairing that is beyond the scope of my ability. But they all had at least 1 good part to donate, so here is the finished product. Sorry, no before pics, I forgot to take them. But the other 3 cars should be appearing in my upcoming junkyard diorama!

Lesney #28c-Jaguar Mark 10 Restoration

As you've probably noticed on this blog, I'm a big fan of Jaguars. Not just the sexy E-Types and such, but the regular sedans are quite lovely as well. I bought this beat Mark 10 on my trip to England this summer and have finally gotten around to restoring it. Here's how it started:

 

Pretty rough, but I like giving a new life to the most beat cars I can find! While scrolling through google images, I came across this photo, and thought the color suited the car extremely well!

And here is what my old Jag looks like now. 

A group photo with a nice original Mark 10 from my collection

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Matchbox Custom: Citroen DS

This is a favorite car of mine. The DS was so futuristic and ahead of its time, it still is really. It is such a cool car, and naturally one of my favorite Matchbox castings. So I decided to give a custom on a go. Here's what I came up with. 

A little family group photo. 

LA's Real Life Car in Scale: Volvo C70 Coupe

Well, I think this has turned out to be my favorite project to date. I made a 1:43 scale replica of my much-beloved 1:1 scale Volvo. This car and I have been together for quite a while, a little over seven years in fact. It was my first car, bought about a month before my 16th birthday. We've made a lot of memories together. I learned to drive in it, took my date to prom in it, drove off to college in Florida in it, and my girlfriend and I had our first date almost 5 years ago in it! Needless to say, it's a part of the family, and will stay with me for the rest of my life.

It appeals to me for so many reasons. One, it is pretty rare. There's only about 25k of the coupes in the world, and I believe only about 6k ever made it to North America. So I very seldom see another one, which is nice. Two, it's comfortable. It has the absolute best seats I've ever come across. They are supportive in all the right places, cushioned just so, and upholstered in wonderfully soft leather. Three, it's fast enough, and handles well enough. A 240hp turbocharged engine gives it plenty of get up and go, but not enough to get into any serious trouble. It handled well too. Being heavy and front wheel drive, it's no Lotus through the twisty back roads, but it does pretty darn well for what it is. I looked at several other cars in its class when I made my purchase back in 2007, and for me, it is absolutely the best all-around car in its class. Sure, the 3 Series handles better, but the seats feel like they are made out of wood, and to quote Jeremy Clarkson, "I would rather fall down a flight of stairs then go over bumps with this suspension." The Mercedes CLK is also a very nice car, but has nowhere near as well put together interior as my Volvo. It's fast, it's comfortable, it's well made, and in my (maybe slightly biased) opinion, one of the best looking cars ever made. I absolutely love the shape of the coupe, and have been taken with it ever since the C70 debuted in 1998.

Here's a recent photo of my C70

After doing daily duty for 7 years, it's resting in my parents garage back home now, waiting for its poor college owner to come home and rescue it and give it some love. I get home once every month or two and drive it, but it needs some love. Long term plans involve a complete strip-down and restoration (whether it really needs it or not). I want to sink some money into the car so it will be nice and reliable for the rest of my life. I am not planning too many mods, other than a manual gearbox swap, and a few basic upgrades, like a nice throathy (non-ricer) exhaust, slightly bigger turbo, and suspension. It will be completely re-upholstered in the highest quality leather I can get my hands on, and given a high-quality paint job. Not sure of colors yet, but it will be a one-off, and very unique for sure. I want to keep with the GT car feel, maybe something like a modern day P1800. Stay tuned for that...

Anyways, here is the model. It's a Minichamps, so it didn't come cheap. But it was worth every penny to have a high-quality model of my car sitting on my desk to look at every day. It was black originally, but after a nice respray, it's looking pretty authentic. And I know, these aren't my wheels, but they are actually the ones I want for the car someday, so I like it! Any comments would be appreciated!

Lesney #60a - Morris J2 Pickup Restoration

This is a really interesting little truck. Being in the States, I certainly have never seen one of these things in real life, but I can't imagine they're that common in the UK either. I'm not a big fan of it to be honest, nor am I a fan of the Matchbox model, but I can't stand seeing a toy in need and not doing something about it! So here we go..

Before:

After:

Two reasons for changing the color. One, it looks nice, and two, I didn't feel like going out and buying paint that matched the original blue. Like I said, not a big fan of this car so I didn't want to spend extra money on it. But I'm happy with it, it looks nice and will sit proudly on my shelf. 

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Lesney #46c-Mercedes 300SE Coupe Restoration

Good evening folks! I had a little break in tests today and thought I'd try and throw some paint on something. I have a few beat up examples of this casting laying around, and it's about time I did something about that.

I'm a big vintage Mercedes fan, and the W111 ranks up there as one of the classiest cars of all times. (in my opinion) I never really cared for the colors the Lesney versions came in, especially that bright green. These cars look so good in nice subdued colors, pale golds, silvers, browns, colors like that.

Such a lovely car. Modern Mercedes cars just look so plain in comparison

So here's the car I started with. It's the first restoration I've ever done where I needed NO paint stripper to start with. Nearly all the paint was gone, and a quick brush up from the Dremel took care of what little paint remained. The hood ornament is gone, but the windows are nearly flawless, which is strange considering the hard life that this car has no doubt led! 

Using the first picture as inspiration, here's what I came up with:

I might go back and do some detailing later, but this was just a quick respray in between studying! I know the suspension is sagging in the back, but that's just the way it is haha. 

Here's a little family photo with the other two I have on display. 

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