# My Batmobile and Ecto-1A



## tolenmar

I'm gonna go ahead and separate these two builds from my other thread, since I will be taking more detailed pics as I go.

For starters, here are a lot of the pieces in fresh primer, black for the batmobile, grey for the Caddy:

















You'll note a few pieces painted aluminum. We'll be assembling the batmobile engine shortly (but probably not tonight).

The Ghostbusters car is interesting. There is no engine to assemble. I don't recall ever building a car model like that. I'm sure they are out there, I just never ran into it. The lower body pan has all the necessary details molded in already. However, I'll need to hand-paint a lot of bits under there to make them look like they are separate components.

Looking ahead at the instruction sheets, the batmobile is currently just a typical old car build. Pretty straightforward. My plan is to use Panther Pink* for the pinstriping, and as such, the next step for the body is to be totally covered in that color so I can tape off the pinstriping before a black coat.

Inside Ecto-1, there is an antique car phone. You know the kind. From back in the 80's when they weighted a couple of pounds... Too cool. And their computer monitor is to be painted light green. I just happen to have some glow in the dark medium to use there.


* I was looking at the real-world specs for the batmobile, and the color they used is called "Flourescent Cerise". A little bit of googling and I turn up a sample of the color, which to my mind looks so much like Panther Pink that it makes no difference to me. See here. It is lighter than Panther Pink, but it should work once the black goes on next to it.


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## Rattrap

Nice start.

Looking forward to watching your progress.


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## teslabe

tolenmar said:


> The Ghostbusters car is interesting. There is no engine to assemble. I don't recall ever building a car model like that. I'm sure they are out there, I just never ran into it. The lower body pan has all the necessary details molded in already. However, I'll need to hand-paint a lot of bits under there to make them look like they are separate components.


I look forward to your Batmobile build, is it the PL's Deluxe kit?
I also was surprised when I ran across kits without engines and that they cost
more then the far more detailed kit from Revell, go figure......:freak: The two
Hasegawa VW type II's have only bottom detail, so I bought two extra Revell Samba's just for the engine,transaxle and deck lids to make them the way they should have been designed. I think this type of kit is called a "Curbside kit", can anyone confirm that.


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## Zombie_61

teslabe said:


> I think this type of kit is called a "Curbside kit", can anyone confirm that.


Yep. A "curbside kit" is a vehicle kit that does not contain proper engine parts other than what may or may not be molded into the floorpan. Allegedly the etymology of the term comes from the concept that "It's not going anywhere without an engine, so it's just going to sit at the curb."


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## ilan benita

Project successfully:thumbsup:


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## tolenmar

Okay, got some progress made tonight.

Managed to convince my son that if he was going to buy a model kit, open it up and gush about how much he was looking forward to having it finished, it would require that he actually build the thing. So we got most of the engine ready:

















Further, I got the interior floor pan of Ecto-1a mostly done. I still have a few items to work on (radar detector, computer monitor, things like that). I followed the instructions as best I could, but they aren't as detailed as I would like. So a lot of this is best guess and compromise with pictures I found online. I admit that some of this was done strictly because I thought the detail would look better (such as the tan jumpseats). I still need to touch up a few things here and there.
























In addition, this is actually the second attempt. Initially, I worked from the primer, since much of the pan was to be grey. I hand brushed in the black parts, and then started trying to brush in white everywhere it was needed. The results were less than spectacular. So I took it back out, and resprayed with flat white, then put the grey and black in, and then began major details. Looks better, even if the details aren't completely accurate.


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## tolenmar

Two things occur to me as I work on these projects:
1) I enjoy kits where I have to try and model an actual car or airplane. In this case, Ecto-1a. It's less stressful than making things up and designing the finished look myself. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the custom aspect, but it can take a lot out of you.
2) I'm really thinking of grabbing another copy of this kit, just to see how tough it would be to make an old ambulance. I'm really digging this body style.

Ok, so where are we after today's work?
A little bit of trim on the hood, a set of emergency lights, and the antenna:
















The antenna has to be the worst designed piece in this kit, if only for the two places where it joins the sprue. The joins are very wide, very tough to cut (I was afraid it was going to break), and took a lot of filing to get into shape. Of course, it's also a chrome piece, so there's lots of white showing. Thankfully it's all at an angle where it will be very hard to see.

Now if you think that this all I accomplished over the last couple of days, you would be wrong. I finished the interior, too:
















I do really wish this kit came with a rack full of proton packs. That would just be so cool! I think that's the only thing missing.

But wait! How about some unlicensed electronic equipment of an unknown nature?
































Obviously, this is incomplete. Tomorrow I plan to finish the roof rack, which involves a few decals, another equipment pod, and some radar-dish widgets. The signboards come later. 

This one is a lot of fun so far.

the batmobile...well, as I mentioned before, my son likes the idea of modelling, but never wants to do any of the work. And since he just started High School today, his time is going to be tight. I imagine it will become a weekend thing.


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## scottnkat

it's coming along - love the trim on the fenders


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## tolenmar

Nearly there, a few details to add, some touching up to correct mistakes, and then decals.









































Unfortunately, I managed to get some marks on the windshield. Fortunately, I have already dosed it with Future, so I'm hoping to give it another coat and maybe fill in the rough spots, making them harder to see. It works with a spit polish, at any rate.

The interior gets glued to the floorpan, which still needs painted and detailed, then the axles go on, and the floorpan is glued to the body.


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## SfanGoch

A little late with the info; but, you could've used the chassis and engine compartment parts from the Monogram #2957 1959 Cadillac Eldorado Biarritz. The Ecto-1 is also a '59 model; so, there wouldn't be any major mods you would need to make.


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## tolenmar

Thank you, but that also requires buying another kit. I'm on a one kit at a time budget (My son bought the Batmobile from his own money).


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## tolenmar

Well, that's one more project finished.

































It comes with removable panels so that the flashing signs on the roof can be changed out periodically. Of course, they could have used a brighter red and green on those signs to make them easier to see...









In the end, I just didn't bother much with the undercarriage.A coat of flat black and some silver along the exhaust system was all I did. I'm not in the habit of tipping my cars over anyway, and knowing this one was pre-molded, it just didn't seem worth it to me to go the whole nine yards on it.

It'll be a few days before I start a new project, gotta wait for the ole payday to get here.


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## 1970AMX

It's a real beauty. Thanks for the pics


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## tolenmar

Batgirls Mobile?










Yes, it's pink. If you do a little research you'll find that the 'red' on the batmobile is actually called 'flourescent cerise'. It's another of Barris' custom colors. Further, do a little searching, and you can come up with color samples, and those samples are pretty bright pink, with maybe a tinge of red to them. At any rate, put pink next to black, and the red in it tends to show better. I think I posted links to color samples further up the thread. (Either that, or it'll look completely stupid, I'll remove the paint, and just start over using red.)

Anyway, now I can mask off all the striped area on the batmobile in preparation for the final coats of black. 

I'm doing this even though my son is currently at school because he is more of a builder and less of a painter. He enjoys the assembly, he just wishes he didn't have to wait for the paint to dry. So I'll do the painting while he's at school and in the evenings we can work on the assembly steps. (After homework, of course.)


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## Zombie_61

Y'know, like most people I believed the stripes on the original Barris Batmobile were red. After reading this thread again I took a closer look at some photos and, sure enough, the stripes have a pinkish hue. I guess you _do_ learn something new every day. Thank you for the education!


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## tolenmar

I just hope I got the hue correct. It won't be hard to start over, but it'll be annoying. I won't really know until I see it next to the black.


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## tolenmar

And now it isn't pink.

The masking job didn't turn out as well as I had hoped. I hesitate to blame my son, but it was his first mask job. For a first attempt, it isn't half bad. Now for some touching up.


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## scottnkat

that's much better than my first masking job... or my 10th!


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## chevyguy97

Man you did a great job on the Ecto-1A build, it's looks great, and man the details are awesome, i just got one of these kits, and i will soon be building it, hope mine turns out as good as yours, and i can't wait to see how the batmobile comes out.


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## tolenmar

Well, the Batmobile is my son's project, so it has to wait until he shows interest. However, we did today get the engine finished! Progress! Now on to the suspension...


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## tolenmar

Gonna get as much of the suspension together as I can. Had to send a parts request to round2, there are a couple of pieces that didn't get molded completely. Apparently a couple of air bubbles got stuck.

Oh well, I wasn't expecting to get this project done quickly...


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## glusnifr

the ecto came out great ,and i really like your batmobile progress..


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## tolenmar

I'll try to get pics soon, but just so you all know, this project has not been abandoned. Suspension is together, engine, body shell, interior. We are working on detailing everything (which is going to require me going over my pink stripes with a brush). 

My son has a lot on his plate (playing in a volleyball tournament, the first big round of exams at school, plus he's the class president now), so we work when we can. He likes assembly, not so much painting, so I do the painting while he's at school, and we try to go down once a week or more to build whatever is ready.


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## chevyguy97

_Good luck to you and your son on the batman car, it's look'n good so far._


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## H.A.K

Yeah like what that chevyguy said. Good luck. Im likin that G/B car. Looks great.


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## tolenmar

H.A.K said:


> Yeah like what that chevyguy said. Good luck. Im likin that G/B car. Looks great.


I still wish it had an opening rear hatch and the rack of proton packs. It seems a glaring error for that kit.


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## chevyguy97

*Yeah that would be cool to have some proton packs in the back, well all i can say is you can look into building some from scratch.*


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## tolenmar

Some pics of the workshop showing where we are with this:

































I should mention in this pic how the tie rod arm is another victim of the bubble in the molding process. The very end of it, which is supposed to snap onto a peg below is incomplete. 'Tis a minor thing, though. A little bit of glue will fix the problem.

And here is the box of small parts. I was trying to finish getting them painted, when my brother-in-law's father showed up to work on the wheelchair ramp for my wife. And since he is past retirment age, and has emphesyma, I decided I should probably help there. 









So they went out today for finish work:

















Since it is a bit windy out here (it is pretty much Fall after all), I lay down some tape sticky side up to hold all the little pieces until they dry. 

Finally, since the pinstriping really needs touching up, and the spray paint isn't designed for brush painting, it wasn't working too well. So I re-sprayed the body black:








Once this is dry, I'll use my brush enamel red and paint them on by hand. I can do a reasonably striahgt line with my fine tipped brush, and at any rate, I can make them a bit more "to scale" than the taped off version turned out. Yes, it does mean I lose the pink tone, but everyone thinks it's red anyway.


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## tolenmar

Well, we finally got this one finished. Personally, I don't like the way the finish turned out. It should have been a lot more smooth. But I was mostly trying to get my son to finish it up since he spent his money on it. I ended up (as I think I mentioned before) hand-painting the stripes, which left them a little bit less than perfect. But all in all, he's happy, I think it looks pretty good, and it looks good sitting on the shelf next to Ecto-1


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## scottnkat

Looks good, man - especially with hand-painted stripes!


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