A look at Revell's 1/25 scale 1956 Ford pickup through the years...

First released in 1962 as kit number H-1283:198, Revell's '56 Ford pickup was typical of their car kits of the time; compared to the AMT and Jo-Han 3-in-1 annual kits then available it was much more detailed. Unfortunately that detail, along with a multitude of working parts, meant that their kits were also much more difficult to build and many a young modeler must have given up on them in frustration. I don't recall ever having seen many finished examples and even today it's rare indeed to see a well-built model based on one of those 60s era Revell kits.

A true 2-in-1 kit molded in white plastic, the pickup could be built stock or custom and included a surfboard, wheels that could be assembled as either stock steel or chrome reversed rims with baby moon hubcaps (see the second picture on the right), and a nice set of five white sidewall tires, all parts that would not be seen again in subsequent reissues.

Re-released in 1978 as H-1388, this time in metalflake (!) blue, it now included custom wheels and two-piece tires only, although all the other stock parts were still in the box. Gone forever were the chrome reversed rims, baby moons, white sidewalls, and surfboard. Another retrograde step was that the taillights formerly provided in clear red plastic were now on the chrome parts tree.

Issued for the third time in 1995, now molded in red, all the custom parts (other than the seat) along with the optional supercharged Pontiac engine were deleted. New stock steel wheels were added to the tool and for some reason unknown to me the bottom of the pickup bed was retooled, the configuration being somewhat revised and wood-grain detail added to a previously completely smooth area.

Finally, we now have kit number 4178, again molded in white as was the original and thankfully also again offering a choice of custom and stock parts. See my in-box review elsewhere in this issue for more details of this release.

Having been sidetracked by the release of this kit, next time I'll return to the old kit theme I started last month. Till then, model on and "Build what YOU like, the way YOU want to."

Be sure to visit Al's Place while you're surfing the 'Net!

Al Superczynski