HO scale Bluesmobile

The only model building project I worked on in December was this re-decoration of Busch's HO-scale '70s Dodge Monaco into Jake and Elwood's Blues-mobile. It was easy and could be worked on a few minutes at a time. It isn't an exact replica, but it seems to capture the spirit of the original.

The car is easy to pry apart. Not shown in the above photo is the clear plastic insert for the windows, and a sprue of side-mirrors that is packed with the car. The chromed parts were soaked in SuperClean to strip them back to the unfinished plastic. The body was washed in soap and water before painting.

The car was brush painted with thin flat black and white acrylics using photos found on the internet for reference.  Grills, bumpers and trim were painted with a loose mixture of flat aluminum and black paint. Before re-assembling the parts after painting, everything was washed with loose mixes of gray, brown and black to dirty things up. I was lucky and found a pair of small star decals in my stash for the doors. Also, some thin strips of styrene were cut and fitted to the front bumper to represent push bars.