More readers’ cars

You don’t have to keep your Maisto die-cast the way they look from us. You can modify them to look the way you want them to.

Here are a few of a bunch of photos that Scott Schwartz sent to us. He wrote, “I thought I’d show you some of my custom police cars in 1/18 (a couple in 1/24). I like using the Maistos as a base because of the price and ease of taking them apart . I’ve been doing this for a couple years now and don’t
have any plans to stop. Please make a Corvette C6 coupe in black!” Scott, keep up the great work!

You can see more of his models at photos.chpcustoms.com

Keep in mind that Maisto has no control over what appears on others’ websites and that by including a link Maisto does not endorse, sponsor nor have any connection with the site nor those who created it.

Kustom Korner!

So we opened up the lines of communication to you and we have been overwhelmed by the amount of cool photos and stories we are receiving. Maisto has built a reputation for outstanding craftsmanship and an affordable, high quality die-cast model. Sometimes things aren’t tailored exactly the way some people prefer them though, and that’s when the kustomizers kick into gear and let their creativity run wild!

We received a message from Al C. who has been collecting 1/18 die-cast since 1991, and prior to that was collecting plastic and die-cast 1/24′s. Al re-discovered his passion for modeling after collecting High End models for some time started to become rather expensive and not as appealing to him. He has modded many Maisto models, adding carpet, plug wires, repainting and general detailing, and it has brought great pleasure once again to his collecting. Al says probably about 80% of his mods have been done with Maisto products.

Here are some photos of Al’s awesome customs, and some links so you can check out more of his work!

SSR
Diablo SV
‘Busa
Ford GT-90
’03 Cobra
Cayanne Turbo
Ron Fellow C4
Last C6
Night Rod
C6 Grand Sport
Convertible C5 Grand Sport
Chevelle trio
CHiP Z06
Texas DPS Mustang
CHiP Mustang
’65 GTO
’67 Camaro
Pete Estes ’67 Z/28 convertible

Way to go Al! We look forward to seeing more of your work and posting about future projects. If you have customs of your own or cool Maisto related stories to share, feel free to send them over and we will post them up on the blog!

The Tease, Take 3?

actually, my friends, not a tease at all. no, in fact this is an apology for the teases we gave you earlier this week. sometime the best laid plans are thwarted, and usually those thwarts have some damn lawyer making $400 an hour behind them. in this case, it was the man that came down on us, not bad, and certainly not stopping any plans we have. yet a friendly suggestion will cause us to err on the side of caution and hold off on our big announcement. but we have plans, my friends, we have big plans. a press release, a magazine ad, sell sheets, photos, links to web sites, all of this is in the works. so no more teases, only the straight dope at the very precise moment we can make an announcement.

1:24 Nissan GT-R: first photos

Here’s the latest in our continuing series following the making of a die-cast car from start to finish.

We just received the pre-production sample from our in-house model builders. We will be sending it to the Nissan license agent for their review. So, it’s possible that there will be some minor changes before it goes into production.

It has been said that a picture is worth a thousand words so we’ll quit writing and you can start looking. By the way, if you ever needed a car to speed around in underground, this might be the one.

Here’s a photo of one our master craftsmen working on the tooling model (the hand-made model that was the oversized prototype for the steel molds that will be used for the production models).

Tease, Take 2

sorry, we hate to do this to you guys. we hate to tease you with vague pictures of non-descript vehicles that don’t really give you any indication at all of what we have up our sleeve. the idea of tantalizing you by using a bunch of juicy, voluptuous verbage and sexy photographs is mean and cold-hearted. and yet, we do it. we must be secure in our relationship, or just looking to pad the post count. in any event, enjoy. and hopefully, tomorrow will bring us the announcement we are looking FOR…

that is so funny, by the way. I wrote this before CH did his post on an award we received for doing, not talking, and here i am Doing Nothing But Talking…

Maisto receives Ford licensing award

Maisto received the Communication Award from the Ford Motor Company’s Global Brand Licensing team last week. Presented during the Ford Licensing Forum in Dearborn, Michigan, it recognized Maisto for being the best of all of their licensees (companies that make Ford-branded items) for correctly submitting items for review, communicating to them about revisions, doing our accounting correctly and paying in a timely fashion. So, essentially, we were the best in following the rules on the business side of licensing.

The 4.5-inch tall award is a solid block of clear plastic with a three-dimensional bust of Henry Ford “floating” inside along with the text. As you look at it from different angles, you can see the image of Mr. Ford change, sort of like a hologram. The side view photo shows how it is different from the front view. The white marks in the side view are the edges of the Ford logo and the text.

In small print near the bottom is a quotation from the company founder: “You can’t build a reputation on what you are going to do.” That is so true. There is a big difference between talking and doing. Since 1967, Maisto has spent most of the time “doing” — slowly expanding and improving without doing much “talking” until this blog began a few months ago. Other brands are flashier and/or bigger than us but over the long haul, most of them are gone or have changed ownership. Maisto is consistent in bringing you vehicle replicas that look good at a reasonable price and are available worldwide.

Back From Vacation, And Ready To Knock One Out!!!

that’s right senors, we were off on a little holiday to the lovely dominican republic, getting out just before tropical storm fay ripped through the island. fortunately we had nothing but sunshine, skimpy swimwear, weak, but plentiful cocktails, intermittant a/c, and lots and lots of food. good times, mis amigos, good times.

so i got back to civilization, didn’t see too much activity on the blog. of course CH hammered another one, leave it to him to write about a vehicle we never made and now we have a new top 10 post – how does he do it??? he is currently on his way back from a conference at ford, hopefully he’ll bring back some nuggets from dearborn that we’ll find interesting.

for me, well, i’ve got one, yes sir i do. and it’s big. a new launch, happening this year. 1:24 and 1:64. but i can’t tell you. not yet. not until wednesday. then, the “official” announcement will be made. for now, let’s just enjoy the sunset, without a need for anything….

JUST IN…

These came in today, 1:24/1:26 scale AllStars, 2008 Hummer HX Concept and 2009 Hummer H3T. Very Nice! GO OUT AND BUY THEM before dimex does!

 

 

Heavy Metal!!!

Sometimes we sit and debate on things here in the CAPD. What vehicles to do each year, should the vehicle be lowered or lifted?, graphics or no graphics??? What are we gonna post on the blog today and keep everyone entertained and/or fed on their daily die-cast meal (apparently some people eat them). Explain that one to your dentist… If you remember a while back (you do read this daily right? We thought so!) we posted about B-rad’s son-in-law and our military-themed Elite Transports. (Read More Here)

Well, one of these debates was about reality vs. fantasy. Toy cars are fantasy right? I mean of course we want them to look real, but does one prefer realistic attributes over fantasy and making something look cool and fun? Could a heavy duty truck carry a tank for instance? Maybe, maybe not, but it sure looks bada**! What are your thoughts? E-mail us or comment on the post, we’d love to hear your opinions.

How rare is rare?

Often, die-cast collectors find that owning a limited run item is very desirable. Sometimes that rare die-cast can bring big buck$ as was seen with the sale of a very famous not-a-Maisto VW bus with a surfboard a few years ago. So, this brings us to probably the most-rare Maisto car: a 3″ 1999 Ford Thunderbird concept that never went into production. Through some turn of events, no tooling model was ever submitted to Ford for review and no license was obtained to make a 3″ (we did make fully licensed and approved 1:18 concept and later the 2002 production Thunderbird in 1:18, 1:24 and 1:43). When we submitted the pre-production sample shown here, Ford said “no” because they wanted their flagship car to only be made as a relatively detailed model and not an inexpensive 3″. Now that the full-size car has been out of production for a couple of years, maybe we should try again to get this one approved and into production. What do you think?