Well I finally got my restoration finished on my orig. AMT '66 Skylark GS kit. It was given to me by a fellow model building enthuiast from the west coast (CA) for some model work I did for him and now is across the border up here on the east coast of Canada.The car was built many years ago and was cleanly stripped when I got it from him. The body had the incorrect body side mldgs removed from the beltline, the doorlock cyls were molded in the wrong spot and the quarters had the small bird Skylark emblem on it which needed to go to be a GS. The 401 nailhead got upgraded with a better detailed version from the '66 Riviera kit's 425 dual quad, so it's a tough Wildcat 2x4 optioned torquer under the hood. Basic wiring and plumbing for added detail and since it was a Cali based car some mix and match of AC parts made sure the cool would keep it's cool for thehot summer nights. The chassis got pulled from the '66 Olds 442 conv. kit along with the exhaust and susp componants for better details over the ol' screwmount chassis with the molded in pipes and susp. parts. The interior got carpet flocking and I deleted the console from between the buckets for the 4 spd. shifter. The paint is Canadian Tire/Duplicolor touch-up aqua lacquer without any clear coat, just polished out with Mother's plastic polish and some Bare Metal Foil trimmings. The tires from the parts box were handpainted with the redlines and the Modified Stocker issue Skylark kit still has a nice fresh set of the road wheels on the trees. The finned alum brake drums got pulled from the AMT '66 Wildcat kit. I had a blast givin' the ol' GS a new look and did these shots with a vintage Gran Sport jacket patch in the background for that GM factory promo shot feel. Hope you like how it turned out!
Oh yeah..... Looks great!!!! Wish i could get motivated enough to start doing models again. I only have about 300 in inventory to work on. Life is so short, then all these projects..... John
Dude, i'm gonna take some pictures of a 66 Wildcat model i built and post them. Sweet car you built there ! Peace WildBill
Excellent job Jeff. Did you swap the dash or modify it? The kit has a '65 dash according to all the pics I could find of it. I started mine a couple of years ago but never finished it.
you wouldnt happen to know where i could get one of those do you? even though mine is a 67, i would like to build one of them.:3gears:
Hobby Heaven has a resin repop of the '66 available, it's probably the least expensive route to go as older unbuilts and even some builts of the '66's go quite high on ebay. With a few mods you could have a close match to your 1967. Check out www.modelcarkits.com for more info on the resin '66's.
Yep. I paid over $200 for a mint unbuilt `66 Skylark GS kit (AMT 6566) and over $80 for a mint unbuilt "Mexically Mudlark" kit. If you like resin kits, Modelhaus has resin kits for the `66 Skylark hardtop and convertible. Note, however, that the hoods are molded in, promo-style. http://www.modelhaus.com/kits_shopwindow.cfm Joe Wheat builds and paints the Modelhaus kits and sells them as part of his Memory Lane series. http://www.wheatsnostalgia.com/index.php
Jeff, AWSOME work on the kit. You answered my questions about taking it from promo to show! I got a good friend that located me an original one that I will be building to resemble mine. If you have or can find me a good box for this kit let me know. :TU: Thanks
cool job i love the color.....the body side molding is not molding it was a pin stripe for the gran sport that was molded into the car....but looks cool anyway.... I collect the 1966 skylark promos which are hard to find..
Outstanding build :TU: The ref. about the dash should be about the Wildcat. the 66 Wildcat kit had the 65 Cat dash board. Why AMT didn't tool up the correct dash for 66 is anybodys guess. Our Buicks didn't get much respect from the kit manufactures, for 65 & 66 there has been a kit of every chevy model.
Here's a few blurry shots of an original AMT kit that i built to look like TOPCAT......... check out the wood wheel hand painted trim TOPCAT was originally burgundy ....but ended up being BLUEp Peace WildBill
Nice job.I cannot believe they have never made a model of the first year GS,65 of course.That just seems really stupid to me that no one would make the Mother car of all GSs........Wierd.
Actually Jeff, a few GS cars rolled off the line with the bird on the rear quarters. Some say this was done in the baltimore plant. The 66 sea side sail boat (green car ad) has the bird, skylark script and GS marks. Not many made this way. Excellent model work!:gp:
