Custom Diecast Cars 1 18
Heather Mitchell
Back in summer of 2000 we bought one of the first PT Cruisers in our area. It was all-black and I wanted to do something custom without getting too wild (I'm a conservative guy anyway). I suggested 2-tone to the wife, but she could not envision it. So....I took apart a Maisto 1/18 model and the transition began.
First was the 2-tone red over black paint followed by lowering the suspension and adding taller tires on the back. Lake pipes were added (borrowed from a Mercury custom), as was a custom-made brass receiver hitch and scratchbuilt cat-back "dual" exhaust.
When the model was complete, I showed it to the wife and she was then onboard to do the paint work on the 1:1 PT. All of the other mods (lowered suspension, tires, exhaust, lake pipes, etc.) had already been done.
We also had a 1:1 custom trailer that was painted to match the PT. I built a replica of that in 1/18 scale by carving the main body from a solid block of basswood which was then sealed and painted. The rear axle and wheels came from another PT diecast while the fenders were cut off a diecast '34 Ford.
Here are the victims:Anson 1/18 scale Chevy club cab duallyACME 1/18 scale Ford ramp back haulerStarted taking pictures mid-stream, so I apologize for starting this right in the middle.Here's the bottom of the Anson, the chassis is plastic, the body is diecast.Six screws hold on the bed, and it's pretty easy to remove.20190829_191529 by Jim Forte, on FlickrAnd here's the chassis of the ACME with the cab removed. It is such an advantage for the ACME to have a diecast ladder frame, will make marrying the two models a lot easier. Screws are easy to access on this model. The cab is diecast, the ramp bed is plastic.Essentially, I am going to cut the back off the Anson chassis, and blend the ACME ladder frame into the remaining front of the Anson.Started out by cutting a portion of the ACME ladder frame off, so that the existing crossmember will, more or less, match up with the similar feature on the Anson plastic chassis.Then I removed the rear of the Anson chassis.Initial dry fit looks promising.Next is to determine how much of the plastic detail to remove from the bottom of the Anson chassis in order for the ACME chassis to match up cleanly.
Wrapped it up this weekend, and apologize for not having a detailed picture, but to ensure the integrity of the connection I had to work quickly.Essentially what I did was Dremel out the plastic the interfered with allowing the ACME diecast chassis from to blend into the Anson plastic chassis. What I did then was placed the diecast chassis into the plastic chassis, and filled the void with JB Weld. I let it cure until it was really close, and then assembled the model so that I could get it to set in a level condition.In this first picture, you can see some of the JB Weld that leaked through, but it worked, once the JB Weld cured completely, it is solid.And here it sits, and then I just had to pose a color appropriate model with it.I've got another white ACME heading my way, and a white Anson dually on the donor shelf. This one went so well, might have to start a fleet.
Nice collection Jim! I clicked on the photo and checked out your Flickr pages, wow. When I saw your posted picture above I almost responded that it was a good thing you did not have cats, but then I saw the Junkins Suspension Test photo, you do have cats.
The good news is that the cats (Pumpkin - "Junkins" and Bistro, and our rescue Chiweenie, Lady Finger) don't usually go in there unless they follow me in, so under pretty good control. Running out of room, clearly.
Collection is now close to 25 years old, started out with 1/18 scale only, and stayed that way. Lots of Ertl, Racing Champions, Revell, and Action Nascar, then branched out to road racers and winged sprinters, and of course, anything else I liked.
When it comes to diecast model car, I believe that many friends are not unfamiliar with them, because nowadays many young people like to pursue some high class life, and custom diecast model car can also reflect the taste of the owner. The most important thing is that the model car can be collected as a kind of hobby goods, with the passage of time and the scarcity of circulating products, it will have a great value of collection. So, how much does a custom model car cost in general? I will briefly introduce it for you.
In many occasions, we can see some custom-made diecast model car. In fact, custom-made model car are mainly customized according to the needs of enterprises. Enterprises can request materials, parts, shapes, colors, etc. of the model car according to their requirements, and the manufacturer will design and mass produce according to the requirements.
There are many people may ask the question, since the price of the mold is said to be so expensive, can I not do it? Actually, the answer is no. It is very difficult to make a model car if there is no mold. Especially for some car parts, because different car parts, their shape and proportion are different. If the same parts are difficult to assemble into another model, so you have to make a separate set of molds to do so.
Since the price of custom diecast model car is much higher than ordinary diecast model car (toys), why are custom diecast model car so expensive? In fact, the main reason is that the cost of the mold is more expensive. Generally speaking, the mold is composed of a mold base and a mold core. The cost of the mold base is relatively rough, and the most important thing is the mold core. The structure of the mold core is relatively precise and complex, and the processing is very difficult. It requires a high cost to complete. If you want to make a complete set of Mold core needs to invest a lot of labor cost and time cost, these costs far exceed the cost of the material itself.
How much does a custom model car cost in general? After reading the above, I believe you have an understanding of the price of custom diecast model car. Generally speaking, custom diecast model car are much higher than ordinary toy models, but custom diecast model car can meet the actual needs of enterprises, especially during the promotion of new cars on the market, which can help enterprises to implant the image of new products into the hearts of potential customers. Compared with millions of dollars in advertising costs, the value of diecast model car is obviously the best choice for the best value. In addition to the role of promoting new products in the early stage, after several years, these customized diecast model car also gradually become part of the car culture of the car company itself, which can be displayed and collected, so it is a multi-benefit.
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The speakers were meant to evoke the import tuner style of the TEKU from Acceleracers, while the little screen is actually movie-accurate (as far as I can remember) to the World Race where the interior of the Deora II was shown on-screen quite often.
TK Diecast specializes in 1/18 modeling, and they have their own custom decal printing service you can make use of, whether you design the decals to be printable yourself (as I did) or give them the generic idea of what you want and pay them for the design time. All of these decal assets are publicly available online (many on the r/Acceleracers subreddit). All I had to do was vector them into larger, printable designs, color them the way I wanted for the model, and size them for TK Diecast to print.
Thankfully most of the damage was localized to the rear quarter panel, which is coincidentally where the big TEKU logo decal will be going, so I decided not to stress too much and just touch up certain areas and hope the decal would hide the rest.
Diecast cars are valuable collectables regardless of size, but collectors with a certain scale in mind can start here. 1/18 scale model cars are the largest models available from most manufacturers, making them the most eye-catching and, in most cases, the diecast cars with the highest amounts of detail.
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