I made a decent 1/25 scale '85 Sunbird S/E turbo hatch back when I owned one in the late '80s.
It was a kit bash of the then still common MPC Chevy Cavalier hatchback (plain Jane Type 10, red color body + lace pattern wheels) + Revell's J2000 Sunbird funny car + the correct torque wheels and Goodyear GTs off the 1/24 scale Revell '85 Fiero GT. Wheels a tiny bit large but acceptable
I took the Sunbird from the window lower edge beltline, and everything above that line, and slapped iit onto the Cavalier body below that point, as the Cav had door openings, door pulls and locks and fuel fill cover that the Subird lacked. Also used the Sunbird F & R fascias and tacked it on, just like GM did!
I also scratch built the louvered WS6 hood out of plastic sheet. Also added the Sunbird S/Es foglights (tinted yellow) inboard of the hi beans, corrected the lower front bumper cover opening at license plate level to convert from Cav to Sunbird, and gave the S/E blackout treatment to the J2000's taillights.
Finally, I gave the black edge treatment to the windshield and ratch glass, and added a bit of wire to replicate the brightwork around the side window moldings. The Cav interior was used, as it was already pretty close to the Sunbird and closer than the J2000 funny car interior.- all I had to do was convert the steering wheel from whatever it was (2 or 4 spoke) to 3 spoke.
There were other details too, such as tiny plastic rectangles for badging, radio antenna, RWLs painted on the tires, converting the single exhaust tailpipe to dual pipe, added decals to replicate the louvered area just forward of the windshield for the defroster intake area. I added a sunroof to top it all off.
The models were cheap at the time, and my own car served as a reference. I custom blended silver and light grey to match the red over silver 2 tone body color. It was a lot of fun.
I removed the glass at one point in an effort to polish out the glass pieces and redo them, but never got around to it- so the F& R glass and sunroof do no lie as flush as they used to. Too many projects!
HOLY CRAP THAT IS BEAUTIFUL!!!
I'll be laughing at this for days, but wow that is cool you did that!
Funny you used Fiero wheels, since they do bolt on in real life anyway...which makes me ask about that--are you then able to use the same size tires from a Fiero on a J, or do you need to use a smaller size when using the Fiero rims?
In real life these wheels and tires were 14" and used on both the Fiero GT and Sunbird S/Es (and Trans Ams and Firebird S/Es) as you noted.
On the model, the Fiero, it's wheels and Goodyear Eagle GTs are 1/24 scale + larger size, and a bit large for the smaller 1/25 scale Sunbird/Cav kitbash, but it was all I had to work with.
The Cav kit tires were boring generic touring tires and at 1/25 scale are were too small to fit around the 1/24 scale Torque wheels so I did not use them, and used the Fiero tires. The effect is correct tire tread and profile, at the cost of the tire/wheels being a bit too large for the wheelwell. Imagine a 1st gen J body w/ 16" wheels and you get the idea. Most don't notice though unless they were J body fans
You need different springs to lower that baby!!
Joel
My questions are how many miles are on it,Does the trans shift properly,and do the door seals leak or need to be replaced.If this is second owner i am sure you can fix things up.
NEAT
