As I sat down to write this, I was in something of a quandary. The British ‘Festival of the Unexceptional’ is something of an homage to what used to be derided as ‘grey porridge’: Marinas, Allegros, Cortinas, Escorts, Victors, Vivas, and the like. The antithesis of high-end exotics. Everyday family cars that, against all odds, survived. And fell into the hands of someone who actually loved them.
What, mused I, would be the American equivalent?
A post full of Mustangs, Camaros and ’57 Chevys came to mind. That would be easy. But I remembered – my online friends, both here and elsewhere, often despair, having gone to a show with high hopes but finding it full of the usual suspects. The invariable comment, cleaned up (or sometimes not) for publication on the net, is some variation on a theme of ‘Boring!’
What to show, then?
Let’s trawl through the photo files, just confining ourselves to the postwar era. Too many! Okay, seventies on, incorporating the Malaise Era. No high-end cars, nothing sporting or otherwise especially appealing. I’ll limit us to American cars, and try and avoid cars I’ve shown before. Hmm; Cutlass, Pinto, Monte Carlo, what else…? Can he make this interesting? Let’s see!
I reckon we’ll start off with a Nova. AMT used to have a Pontiac Ventura kit spun off from the same tool, and made the front fenders separate from the rest of the body, with separate parts for the Chevy and Pontiac kits. Good idea in theory, but the separate fenders were always a bear to fit and line up, needing a lot of grinding and filing of the insides. I’ve built a few of these; this is probably the best. Yes, Revell makes a great ’69 Nova, but the AMT one is Unexceptional.
Okay, I’m kinda cheating here. This one is an SS, true, but I view it as in something of a ‘barn find’ state. An oldie I built back in the mid-seventies, the clearcoat has yellowed and dulled…. Unexceptional condition.
I see these Cougars as something of a ‘meh’ car. Especially once they gained that battering ram on the front. Beige is an appropriately unexceptional colour, the interior and roof colours were copied from a neighbour’s ’73 Fairlane. BTW, that vinyl roof texture was molded into the body. Nice touch.
What could be more Seventies than a Colonnade Cutlass? This one’s an old Johan curbside kit (no engine); basically an unassembled promotional model put into a box with instructions. It was molded in red, so I just cleared it and accented the trim. And added a pinstripe.
Okay, this one represents a work in progress. I built this back in ’74 with all those handpainted stripes and black panels and things, but later took the bumpers off to get rid of the ‘railroad tie’ look. I never did get around to putting it back together with something neater. Still, I thought I’d show it; a Pinto is surely the acme of Unexceptionality!
Naturally we have to have a big Chevy. How about the last Big Big Chevy? Not an especially detailed kit, and the parts fit is a bit approximate, but with some care it can be built to look nice. If I was to do another one, I’d have to do a vinyl roof, but I hadn’t started adding such details back then. (No, I have no plans…)
Gotta have a Pacer in the mix! This is an old MPC kit that has serious parts fit and location issues around the dashboard/chassis/windshield area. But I love the shape of these (the shape, I said, not the car!) so I had to build some. And you haven’t seen this one before.
We’ve got to have a Monte Carlo, don’t we? Revell did this curbside ’77 about ten years back, initially as a lowrider but then managed a stock version. Nice, but I think the rear wheel arches are a bit too large.
Malaise-era Dodge sedan, I think it’s a ’77. Unexceptional – or is it? It’s supposed to be a police car kit, but I made a civilian version. I know the tyres are too wide, but it’s packing a hot 440, so….
Peak Unexceptionality from Chevy, perhaps? This Chevette was built from a ’78 annual kit, doing a mixture of the various versions (hot engine, no bodykit) with a few bits from the spares box to make a nice little street car.
And from Mopar we have to have the Volare. Another seventies build, I removed the T-tops that were scribed in the roof (Reinforcement? What’s that?) and went to town with painting the detail.
The 1980 Monte Carlo was one of my first spray jobs, I treated this one to a wheel swap and handpainted the whitewalls. Of course it has a luggage rack.
We’re coming out of malaise. Ford turns the corner, returning their styling to the global mainstream – thankfully without overdoing it (like the first Sierra). This SHO kit has a beautifully-detailed engine.
Pontiac’s Grand Prix for 1989; this is the Turbo version (that year only, I think) from Revell. Style returns to the General with a shape that needs no apologies. Mind you, this was before Pontiac got into the Fisher-Price look.
Chevy’s Beretta wasn’t quite as pleasing somehow, but I built one anyway. Curious, but at least it wasn’t a B-O-P clone. The General was learning…
Let’s finish up with another Big Chevy, the Whale Caprice. Despite its popularity, the previous generation big Chevy was never modelled. Revell offered this as police, taxi or fire chief versions, then modified the kit to an Impala SS.
That wraps it up for today. No idea where we’re going next time, but I’ll see you then!
What a way to start a morning, with some juicy treats from Peter Wilding! The breadth and scope of the various models that you’ve assembled over the years is simply breathtaking to me. A little something for everyone (LOVE that Volare!). I often see collections of vintage model kits for sale, but I realize that I simply would never get them completed now! Can’t wait for what’s next! 🙂
Thank you, Moparman. It’s great to wake up to all these comments too!
There are whole eras I haven’t explored yet (like pre-1940), along with whole types of vehicles (exotics, older Classics, etc.). I’ve got about a dozen more themes to work through, and more individual years, then I’ll be onto what I haven’t shown already. One year in so far, and we might have seen a quarter of them.
What a cool post! I admire your modeling skills 👍
Thanks Shep. A lot of practice…..
Terrific theme, Peter. I love the idea of “unexceptional” model cars. Plus, I am now going to have the term “grey porridge” stuck in my head and will surely be applying it frequently.
I think my favorite here is the Chevette. Definitely peak.
Yes! The Chevette nails it. It’s one thing to re-imagine kits that are marketed to be hot rods or specialty vehicles into more mundane mall parking lot type cars, but building something so patently boring and frequently reviled as a stock looking Chevette surely elevates the art form. Very well played.
Thanks Jeff, and MTM. The Chevette had a lot of cool optional parts, like spoliers, flared wheel arches and messy coloured graphic decals for the full-cheesy look. I took it in a different direction: stock body, standout color, no graphics, but used the hot engine bits.
You definitely took it in the right direction.
I will say that the color is an unusual choice for a Chevette. Most that I saw back in the day were either brown or white or some other neutral color such as silver/gray.
I rather like the aqua on your model!
It’s a period Holden colour called Aquarius, used on the Holden Gemini, which was the local sedan/coupe/wagon version of the Chevette.
Great collection. I think either the grille is too small or the bumper is too large on that Cutlass. Also I think you’re right about the gold Monte Carlo – something is off proportionally. Maybe it’s the cowcatcher back bumpter, way too bulky for that car.
Excellent job. If you made that Chevelle SS in the 70s, it has held up very nicely. I used to use Testor’s cement, and it seemed to fall apart after years of storage.
I noticed that with the Cutlass as well. I think what happened is that what started as a 1973 model was given larger bumpers and new wheel covers to make it into a ’75, while the body mold wasn’t changed and retained the smaller ’73 grille opening.
Thanks Lee and Stumack. Never having seen one of these Oldses I didn’t pick that. It looked awkward, but I never noticed it wasn’t supposed to be quite that awkward. And you’re probably right about the body mold not being changed. Often kits were revised on the cheap and some details remanined unchanged; usually minor things like upholstery patterns, not bodies though. I think I was using Humbrol cement back then; British hobby stuff was easier to get here than American, and I’ve had others comment about my old models not falling apart. I’ve had small parts like mirrors or exhaust tips fall off, but never had that happen to whole models.
I remember kits that came as police or fire cars. I built a civilian version of a 1970 Ford Galaxie 500, complete with its cop-spec hubcaps.
I remember building a kit of a Pontiac Ventura II in the early 70s, but don’t recall the separate fenders. Probably a different kit.
I never liked the 71-73 Cougar well enough to build a model of one.
JPC, that ’70 Galaxie is back in the AMT lineup again, this time as a taxi. Funny, considering that those (in LTD form) were a luxury car here, and used to ferry government ministers to and fro. Somewhere I have one I built as a civilian car, too. Where IS that one now…..?
I think it may have been Graham Robson who coined the phrase ‘grey porridge’ when referring to everyday family cars. I see you actually managed to avoid grey altogether (yay!) but there’s certainly plenty of non-exotic variety. Having said that more or less any of these, bar the Chevette*, would be (and would have been back in their day) an unusal find here.
Nice work as always and some interesting observations about the fit of parts on some older kits.
* O.K. a Chevrolet Chevette would still have been unlikely, then again I did once find a 4 door South African Chevrolet Firenza in Dagenham doing a good impression of a Vauxhall Viva.
Bernard, that does sound very much like Graham Robson. It’s a very useful term, very graphic, and especially meaningful to those of us who have had unfortunate experiences with porridge; it can be nice, but…
American cars of this era were a very rare sight here, as the big three had pretty much all of the market covered by their local product. I did once ride in a 1976 LTD (funeral car), which I guess was impressive to look at, and wondered why you’d specially import one and have to go through the hassles of RHD conversion (mandatory back then) and adaptation to comply with local design rules.
We didn’t get the Chevette like this; the related Holden Gemini was pretty much pure Isuzu (and very popular), but never offered a hatchback.
Excellent job, Peter. You made these unexceptional ‘malaise’ era model cars look well-exceptional!
Thanks Phil. I remember being disappointed by new cars through this era, and tried to make the models as interesting as I could.
Very nice. The ASC/McLaren Turbo GP was 89 and 90 only, I had a red 90 with 4 tan leather buckets, a pretty amazing car back then. I need to build one!
Thanks. I think that’s been out of the Revell lineup since the car was new, but here’s what to look for, kit # 7148. There are later versions with the different front end, but without the good engine setup.
I’ve seen a lot of Colonnades, though most of them 30-50 years ago, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen a solid (non-metallic) red example like the Cutlass. Was that ever a factory color?
Of that I have no idea. I’ll defer to you American guys on this. This was the colour the kit was moulded in. I thought it looked nice, so I just went with it and clear-coated the plastic. Johan was notorious for moulding kits with whatever colour of plastic was lying around, so it may well not have been factory.
I have versions of two of these, but my modeling skills are far short of what turned out these gems!
The Plymouth Volaré was available in an earlier version representing the 1976-77…the grill differed. Mine is dark metallic blue.
The 1977 Dodge Monaco is an exact duplicate of the 1978, a car which I owned in 1:1 scale. I had the fullsize car painted and used the urethane enamel to paint the model. The dog dish hubcaps and 440 engine on the model also duplicated what was on the real car, which was a former California Highway Patrol car.
Thanks. I only ever saw the one kit of the Volare. This was a period when Japanese kits tended to be more common (at the shops I visited in my state capital, anyway), as American cars weren’t sold here. Although I tend to build what I’m reasonably familiar with, I ‘had’ to get the Volare as it represented the Valiant update we never got. And was a reasonably attractive car.
That 440 Monaco would have been a beast!
The Fiat 600 behind the big Chevy is what caught my eye. Have you shown that yet?
I probably have, Paul. Probably when I did older European cars. But there’s always something I forget to include, or leave ‘on the cutting room floor’. If I didn’t, here’s another shot of it.
Just realized I’ve been writing these for a year now!
And here’s the rear end.
Some model maker decided to sell a model of a 1974 Gran Torino Brougham? You have a nice build there, for sure, but why they would put that model out is beyond me. There are a few others that make me go why…
Maybe it was first put out during the Starsky and Hutch craze. I might have kitbashed it to represent the worst police car I ever drove, the 1976 Ford Torino. No, too much work!!
Yes, it was the Starsky and Hutch car. Revell later revised the kit for a sort-of stock Torino, but I broughamized this one myself. Hardest part was cutting the C-pillar windows; the plastic was about 3mm thick in parts.
Job well done there! I love the vinyl top and the opera windows.
Thanks Mike. I found a catalog on the net and copied the vinyl roof and opera windows as best I could. The side molding was the easiest part; though the wheel covers aren’t quite right they look plausible.
Peter,
there are some present day rarities there for sure. My favorite is the Colonnade Cutlass. I understand when you say you like the shape of the Pacer. I might not agree but I understand when you build a model you really get a feel for shapes.
Thank you, Dave. It was interesting to see the gradual falling-off of popularity of kits of new American cars as the malaise era progressed. I remember seeing five Chevy Beretta kits in one (big) hobby shop; of course nobody down here knew what one was. Muscle cars, pony cars and fifties-sixties cars remained popular; ones after that not so much. Even when I show them on the net, American guys comment they’ve almost never seen one built.
Wow, that Gran Torino in the first picture is REALLY well done.
Thanks Aaron. I nearly didn’t show that, as I had so many photos already, and I’ve featured it before. But I needed a good visual ‘hook’, so…
Way to go Peter! The Pacer wins. Because it’s a Pacer.
Thanks, Johannes. Of course it does. Like nothing else on the road.
Right, and now it only gets better!
come to think of it, if those were French people would be falling all over themselves saying how original and creative they were. They really were.
I have to say, I’m blown away by all the comments on this selection. Seems I really hit a nerve! It’s quite something to wake up in the morning and find so many comments. Thank you. 🙂
I’ve had this theme stewing away on the back burner of my mind (to mix some metaphors) for several months now, mindful that every now and then someone has said “When are you going to do…?”, and deliberately left several cars out for fear it would be too long. But we’ll catch up with those another time. Bound to.
These are my jam. I especially like the Pacer and Gran Torino. I also had that Jo-Han Cutlass model back in the ’90s (molded in beige), but alas, I didn’t see it as anything really special at the time and beat it up. I’m sorry about it now.
Great assortment and handiwork, as usual!
Thanks Joseph. To gauge by all the comments, I think a lot of the CC commentariat feel this way about this instalment.
I got the Johan Cutlass by mail order from the US, as Johan kits weren’t very common here. In those pre-internet and pre-credit card days, that meant a lot of fussing around – getting an estimate for postage, going to the bank and organizing a bank draft payable in US dollars – hoping the teller or accountant didn’t make it payable in a state the other side of the continent, as happened once! Next time the accountant grabbed an atlas to figure out where Pennsylvania was; turns out it’s not near California after all 🙁 . Then a three or four month wait for delivery, which is hard when you’re a teenager. But the delight when that box of models came.
To me, the Cutlass was always one of those cars that had a good basic shape (side) let down by klutzy detailing (front, rear). To me it’s still hard to imagine one of these being a mid-size car, they look so huge; that may have been part of the appeal. These days if I was building it I’d tuck the bumpers in some and reshape that front end.
I think the only one of these I have in miniature is the Cutlass. Mine is a darker red & is an original promo that I got as a kid when they were new.
On the other hand, I was at a large show yesterday & saw a pretty good assortment of this type of car. No Pintos or Pacers, but there was a Chevette, a couple of Vegas & a Gremlin. Also a 4 door Volare or Aspen.
Johan did some strange things with colours on their kits and promos; I’ve even heard of someone having one with a swirly colour finish from when they changed over the colour of the plastic in the injection molding machines. That would be a real rarity!
It’s always nice to see something different at a show. I left out my Vegas, but I’ve shown them before. One of these days I might do an article about Mustangs and Camaros, but it might be a while.
Peter,
maybe you know but some readers may not. Prior to Johan going out of business it was not paying it’s employees so some of them stole the tooling and sold it to make ends meet. That means that these great kits cannot be reproduced today. The tool and die makers at Johan were the best in the business.
Thanks Dave. Yes, Okey Spaulding who bought the company’s assets would up with less tooling than he bargained for. I think it had something to do with the grade of steel Johan used (beryllium?) made the tooling especially valuable. No excuse for not paying your workers though, so I can kind of understand their action..
I still have my Revell Caorice (done up in Oregon State Police livery. It has survived many moves and extended stays packed away. The only casualty has been the hood ornament.
Front shot of the Caprice (excuse my typo on the post)
Held up rather well for 30 years…
No worries Dave, my fingers get o and p mixed up all the time too, as well as throwing in extra letters. Nice Caprice.
LOL-Thanks! Old-Guy eyeballs/fat fingers don’t always play well with an iPhone 12s at 10:00 pm….
Tell me about it! I make at least one mistake per sentnce and have to go back and corrent them! (This is what happens if I don;t)
The Torino remains one of my all-time faves in yr collection. It can’t be shown enough. But the beige Cougar (I’d call it something like “Hunter Tan”) is really special. It’s on a par with the Toro.
Another fun post. Best wishes, Mr. W.