AMT '63 Chevy II convertible, kit #-05-713-149 By Al Superczynski

Since Trumpeter apparently has a pair of Chevy II kits on the way later this year I thought this would be a good time to look at AMT's effort from forty years ago. It will be interesting to compare it with the new kit to see how much the tooling art has advanced since then.

AMT's Nova was typical of their efforts from the early to mid 60s, with lots of optional parts for custom or racing versions. Since full engine detail was still relatively new to AMT kits there's a prominent blurb on the box top calling attention to that feature. Strangely, the box art depicts a generic custom car rather than the '63 Chevy II inside, the only indication of the actual kit contents was on either end of the box. One side shows a '63 Ford (!) drag racer with a listing of speed equipment manufacturers while the other consists of an illustration of samples of the general types of stock, custom, and competition parts that were included in various 1963 AMT annual kits. It's not made exactly clear that the specific parts shown weren't necessarily included, an advertising concept that probably wouldn't do well in today's litigious society. There are also references to AMT's "Customizing Team" and "Custom Accessories Consultants" along with a plug for their *great* line of lacquer-based spray paints. Admitting that I used many of these in my day probably gives away my advanced age!

(As an aside, the Tamiya AS and TS spray paints remind me very much of the old AMT paints - their characteristics seem very similar.)

The kit contains 40 parts molded in white for the factory stock version along with another 10 plated parts, a metal hood clip, four chassis-mounting screws, a clear windshield, two clear red taillight lenses, and four vinyl black sidewall tires. A further 16 white and 38 plated parts are provided for the custom and competition versions, plus a pair of clear custom headlights (even though the stock headlights are integral with the plated grille piece), and two different pairs of clear red custom taillights. Unfortunately there's no option for an up top, only a boot cover for the non-existent top well.

The tires in my kit had reacted with the windshield and custom tonneau cover, a common occurrence in kits of this vintage, and have since been bagged to prevent further damage. The tonneau could probably be repaired but the windshield is undoubtedly too far gone to fix. Fortunately the damage is on the inside surface so it can still be used as a master for vac-forming or smash-molding a replacement.

The parts are cleanly molded with very little flash and while the exterior is very well-detailed the engine compartment, interior, and chassis details are fairly basic, as would be expected from kits based largely on the dealer promotional models that were AMT's mainstay back in the 60s. The battery, shock towers, windshield washer bottle, and radiator are all molded into the engine compartment, the suspension and exhaust system are molded into the chassis, and the interior is a tub with the seats and door panels molded in making for difficult detail painting, especially on the shallow detailing of the door panels.

Also included are a set of stick-on whitewalls and a generous sheet of decals for the custom and competition versions. The whitewall stickers in my kit appear to be useable but the decals are completely shot, being dried out and flaking. I made a high resolution scan of the decal sheet just in case I or someone else ever wants to redraw and recreate it with an ALPS printer.

The instructions are clear and comprehensive, as was usual for AMT, especially regarding the custom options, even giving suggestions for useful parts from other AMT kits (good marketing!). The one area sadly lacking is painting instructions but even many of today's kits leave much to be desired in that regard.

This kit isn't especially easy to come across even as a restorable built up and is probably 'worth' well over $100 in the mostly excellent condition of my example. It remains to be seen what effect, if any, the Trumpeter release (if and when it shows up) will have on the value of this bit of car modeling nostalgia. While a new state-of-the-art kit would probably be superior in almost every way it will almost surely lack all the cool optional parts and just won't have the panache of the 60s-style annual kits. In any case unless you have to own the 'real thing' right now you might want to wait and see if prices come down later.

As always, till next month, "Build what YOU like, the way YOU want to",
have fun and be sure to visit Al's Place while you're surfing the 'Net!