So summer’s gone and fall’s come, so long good opportunities to snap photo’s of a better quality than indoors mush. Sorry, ’til spring comes around again or when it’s a extraordinarily good day outside I’ll recapture this one and the one’s coming soon(the Pontiac GTO, so forth) in far better light but ’til then, this has to do I’m afraid!
Anyway, the Superbird. Plymouth’s, or rather Chrysler Corp’s answer to the 1969 Ford Talladega which was dominating the ’69 and ’70 NASCAR seasons something fierce. Along with the Talladega and it’s cousin the Mercury Cougar Spoiler II, it just ripped the competition to shreds. Then came Chrysler with the first attempt at beating it with the Dodge Charger 500, which did better but wasn’t quite there yet. And along came the two “winged warriors”, the ’69 Dodge Charger Daytona and the ’70 Plymouth Superbird. Both of which have been a staple of Revell-Monogram’s model line for a long, long time now.
Hell, to give you a idea of how long; this particular kit was cast in 1987 and sold in 1995. The age shows, although that doesn’t mean it’s a bad kit, it just means that the decals are about as rancid as they’re gonna get. But what the hell, it’s something you gotta deal with when working with things that old.
The exterior looks fantastic, especially the color which the entire kit is molded in minus the chrome bits. Yep, the 1980’s trend was molded in color and this one was still part of it. The kit came with a few little extras like a bunch of sturdy post cards with a light yellow Superbird on it, which is a nice little extra, I mean why not?
But to get back to the color, its molded in a semi-gloss light blue so a glossy clearcoat’s a definite purchase for this kit. But beyond that? Ya’ can’t argue with the result, it saves a lot of time and again it’s a case of mixing that particular color of blue is a nightmare to start with so it’s even appreciated. Although if you’re looking for a molded in white version, look for the ever so rare Revell release which has a orange Superbird on the front under the Streetburner line(#85-4921).
That one does have the extended decal sheet that also has the Superbird logos for on the front and the wing, mine are just Roadrunner logos from the left over decals I had from the ’74 Roadrunner kit. But yeah, minor details!
While the exterior detail is very, very good, the interior is a little bit less. That being said though, it’s still fairly detailed with good molding but it’s nearly all one big piece with just the dash, console, steering wheel and seats to put in there. It was a trend of Monogram back then to release really high quality models that were little hassle to put together, so the interior detail and in some cases even the engine detail got overlooked a little bit in favor of making it a little more approachable.
The engine bay in particular’s a bit hollow. It has a very appropriately giant 440ci Six Barrel beast of an engine, the block itself has some good detail to it but the air cleaner and the carbs are just two chrome slabs that you glue to each-other so no point in leaving it removable, the battery is also a chunk that goes all the way down the wheel well.
For that reason I figured I’d not wire it up, it looks reasonable enough without it. But that’s exactly the point I wanted to get to, actually. This kit is a glorious rut-breaker! It’s molded in the color it has to be so it’s just a matter of gloss coating it and painting the vinyl roof, the interior’s nice and easily put together and the build itself is fuss-less. It all goes together like a charm, hell even the wheels stay on for a change!
I mean, if it weren’t for the decal sheets of the 1980s and 1990s going dingy yellow over the years, this might easily be the best coming-back-to-the-hobby kit ever. And even so, it’s still a wonderful kit to work on with a gorgeous result once it’s all done.
Besides, it just looks good next to it’s older brother. Even if it’s a bit bigger, it being 1/24th and all.
(Edit Nov 29th ’16: braved the freezing cold and photographed some new shots on a literal sheet of ice on top of the glass table, hell yeah!)
’70 Plymouth Superbird specifications:
Kit: #85-2758
Skill Level: 2
Parts: 67
Molded in: Ice blue
Scale: 1/24