long overdue project

"parkrndl is enjoying his midlife crisis" (parkrndl) 03/14/2015 at 19:29 • Filed to: None

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So, I'm a slot car nerd. I had them as a kid in the '70s and '80s and rediscovered them about 15 years ago. I have a 4-lane track and several hundred cars in the basement, but life gets busy and sometimes the stuff collects dust for a while. Here's a project that's been kicking around for way too long. But first, a little history. This is what I drove senior year of high school:

'73 Nova. It had been my dad's, and he traded it to me for the '77 Cougar that I shouldn't have bought. It was originally silver with a black roof, but a few years before I got it, he had had it painted by Earl Scheib (oh yes he did) and they put a new vinyl roof on it too. You can't really tell from the pictures, but the roof is a few shades lighter than the paint. Sadly, these are the only pics I can find.

It had a 250 c.i. six/PG in it when i got it, but soon after that, a girl in the neighborhood wrecked her '73 4-door with a 307/TH350, and after it sat in her driveway for a couple months, I bought it from her dad for 50 bucks. Did the swap in the street in front of the house. From there, it got all the ugly cheap stuff that all my friends put on their cars back then: Gabriel HiJackers, used Quadrajet and 4-barrel intake, cheap headers, B&M shift kit, factory steel rally wheels from a swap meet, hacked-in bucket seats out of the wrong car (mine were from a Cougar and mounted on two-by-fours). I even put a console and shifter in from an early '70s Camaro. And the reason the doors don't seem to match is that I put doors on it off a '71 Ventura that my uncle was parting out. Hey, I liked the wing windows and they were free. The first pic was before the door swap, the second was after.

It was really ugly in lots of ways (far too many stories to tell here), but man, did I love that car.

Then I went to college and met a girl and had to get something sensible. And so i got on with my life.

Years later, after I had forgotten about and then rediscovered slot cars, Auto World released a '68-'72 Nova for Tjet chassis. Yeah, it's the wrong year, but I had always intended to paint one up like my old Nova. I've had an extra sitting in my project box forever now. And over that time, I picked up two different Dupli-Color metallic grays and set them aside, but I never got around to finishing up... till now.

I was considering adding the primer patches and blue doors, but I think I like it better this way, the way I wanted it to look if I ever got around to painting it. I tellya, the paint colors are a dead match to what I remember, right down to the Earl Scheib patented orange peel.

So after everyone goes to bed tonight, I think I'm gonna put on my Spotify '80s playlist in the dungeon and just go run laps...

Coty > parkrndl is enjoying his midlife crisis 03/14/2015 at 19:37

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This is gorgeous/ perfect.

Funktheduck > parkrndl is enjoying his midlife crisis 03/14/2015 at 20:44

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Very neat. Woot.com has A Mario Kart slot car set on sale under the kids section today.