It’s hard enough to find 1:87 scale cars in stores, but the ones I do find, even in hobby shops are always like luxary/foreign cars like Ferraris or Lamborghinis. I want cars you see in everyday life. The ones that aren’t the Shelby Cobra or the Jaguar XKE look pretty shoddy and cheap.
I almost fell down when I came across an HO guage Gremlin the other day. It was the only one in the store and was perfect, because I’m building a '70s era layout. I also found a Smokey and theBandit Trans Am in 1:87, but lately nothing good. Any suggestions on where to find decent-looking HO guage automobiles from late seventies on back?
Walmart used to carry the Malibu and Fresh Cherry brands that I believe the two you found were in that line. For whatever reason, they don’t carry them any more. Model Power has most of the cars similar to that now, 68 El Camino and GTO and a few others. Classic Metal Works has some too, mainly 50’s and early 60’s.
A friend also found some Hotwheels in 1/87 that has more “normal” cars versus the fantasy ones they did a couple of years ago. However, they still have the large rear tires, I’m hoping to find a few as I think I can rework the wheels to get some really nice muscle cars. You can find them in all places, grocery stores.
Atlas, Classic Metal Works and Woodland Scenics all carry cars from the '70s and '60s. If you look on some of the aution sites, you might find some earlier Classic Metal Works or Mini Metals cars from that time period also.
Look down at the bottom of this page. There’s a section called “Trains.com Resources.” Click on “Coming Events” and browse around for train shows in your area. Most of these shows have vendors who have a lot of HO-scale vehicles. In particular, there are a lot of the models that Walmart used to carry. Walmart sold them for under $2, but most of them I’ve seen have prices more like $5 now. It’s a show, though, so if you buy 5 or 10 of them the vendor will likely cut you some kind of price break.
This one is a Mini-Metals that I painted and decaled:
Oh that General Lee Dodge Charger is perfect, because my railroad is going to be Georgia where I’m from and I still see the occasional General Lee driving around here now and then.
Athearn has done a munber of runs on Ford C cab over trucks, and Checker Taxis; many are shown as sold out, but may be found at train shows or hobby shops
Is that a 66 or a 67? It’s a nice job! But, you know the rivet counters will point out that the Dukes drove a 69. The early Chargers were cool; they had bucket seats in the back, and the console ran the length of the interior.
Thanks G. Paine. That Pinto Cruiser Wagin is perfect! Those things must’ve been all over the place when I was a kid and that Mercury Bobcat, too, my aunt had one. Thanks a lot. Those were just what I was looking for. You made my day!
Man, I gotta say this, at the risk of sounding like a crabby geezer. If you have been in this hobby long enough you can’t understand how anyone can complain about the choice and quality of HO scale vehicles that are available these days. This is the Golden Age for HO vehicles whether it seems like that way or not.
As to that Dodge model up above, oh my it reminds me of Driver’s Education circa 1967 when the local Dodge dealer donated the cars we learned in … the driver’s turn signal indicators were outside the car, up near the headlights …
While I can echo your sentiment, I still have issues with some of the stuff that’s missing (or I haven’t heard of yet). We have pickups from the 50’s and the 80’s+. but where are the 60’s or 70’s. I know Trident has at least one 70’s but it’s still pretty sparse out there. And when we get to semi trucks, the 60’s are again left out, no KW or Pete cabovers (except for hard to find Tyco KWs) or conventionals, still waiting for Ulrich to release their KW conventional. Thankfully, Athearn came out with the Mack R and the B was still going strong them too. The Athearn Freightliner can be backdated a little bit but its from the 70’s too. Everything Herpa/Promotex has is mid 70’s and later.
As someone stated earlier, hopefully the rivet counters don’t look too close. All joking aside, we have some of the most accurate trains ever, it would be nice to match up a few of the vehicles a little better.
Besides, I need about 10 to 20 67-68 pickups for my open autoracks![swg]
Thanks. The model is of a 67 Charger. They used both 68s and 69s for the show. Some of the car stunts were so extreme that they literally went through hundreds of vehicles over the run of the series.
I started with a white (or slightly yellow) model. The body was painted in an acrylic called “Pumpkin,” as I recall. I made my own decals with downloaded images, resized appropriately.
The above pic is beautiful. I noticed that in the pic of the General Lee on the crossing, there was no driver. Must have been the ghost General from that episode where they fooled Roscoe into thinking the car was possessed.
Seeing it on the track gave me an idea. I’d like to make a pic of the General Lee crossing the tracks as the General 4-4-0 engine (from Kennesaw, GA) is about to cross. I have a replica of that engine so why not have a General Lee on my layout as well.
I’ve enjoyed the recent explosion of vehicles available lately. I have at least 60 from Athearn, Mini Metals, Ricko,Model Power etc, etc. One thing that sticks in my craw is why does Athearn make an amazing 1950’s fire truck with alot of great detail and then put a light bar on it from the 70-80’s???
I"m new at this, but what I find lacking are autos from the pre-fiffties. Yet I still agree with the poster who said this is a “golden age”. The variety is astounding.
