Modified Drag-u-la

Well, here is the next installment of the custom models by Rob Riley. At first glance, to my untrained eye, this model looked pretty stock to the way I remember seeing the model box "back in the day". However, after reading Rob's commentary, I am once again amazed at Rob's creativity and skill. I will once again leave the description of the car and modifications in Rob's own words:

This one is the Drag-u-la from the Munsters t.v. show. This kit has been out of production for a long time, but it will be back out by jan. 2010. When I got this, it had been built before and taken all apart more than once. It was just a box of pieces and a lot of the pieces were missing. There are a lot of parts that are unique to this kit, so I had to scrounge around and ask friends to find some of the correct parts (like the carb scoop, the canopy, and the organ pipes). I was missing the front axle, the front radius rods, the wheels, tires, the tombstone, the block hugger headers that connect to the organ pipes, the valve covers and the carbs. I scrounged through all of my parts to find suitable replacements. The front axle, radius rods, front wheels and tires came from a dragster kit. The rear slicks and radir mags are from my box of parts. I made the tombstone grill out of a flat piece of plastic, and I made the decal for it as well.

The body was in ok shape, but it had some glue smears on it from the previous builders. I had to carefully sand away the glue making sure not to touch the ornate scroll work with the sand paper.

The body is painted with a base coat of orion silver, and then aztec gold laquer. on top of that, there are 3 coats of clear laquer. I painted all of the scroll work on the coffin with a lighter color of flat gold and I put it on over the clear. The flat scroll work against the shiney gold on the coffin really makes it stand out.

This kit also never had a radiator like the real car had, so I made a radiator for it from an old model T radiator cut down to fit. I also made the body so it can easily be removed.

I painted the engine purple and added a set of chrome finned cobra valve covers to replace the original missing Mickey Thompson ones. The carbs are just holley 4 barrels from my parts box, and the scoop is located to them with pins and it is removeable. I found a set of chrome block hugger, try-y headers in my parts box that fit perfectly and I used them to replace the missing original headers.

The seat is painted the same purple color as the body, but I sprayed dull coat over it to make it look somewhat like fabric.

The chassis and rear axle tubes are painted the same gold as the body, and clear coated.

I made up some candles to go in the lantern headlights (the real drag-u-la has fake candles in the lanters as well) and I made the flames on the candles out of yellow post-it note paper.

I have a lot of work in this one, and I got parts from a lot of friends so I could complete it.

But now, the kit will be re-issued in 2010 along with the Munster Koach as a doube kit.

so all of the parts scrounging I did could have been avoided had I waited to build this.At the time I finished it (march 2009) parts were scarce, and I had no idea that it would be re-issued in 2010.

Wow! Once again, I'm impressed. Makes me which I had hung onto all those models I built in junior high that were destroyed when a buddy fell into the shelf while trying to lift a large amount on my weight set in high school. Should have kept all the pieces and built something REALLY cool from the wreckage!