1967 Mustang tooling model for 1:18

Although this looks like a black-and-white photo, it’s in color. Before a die-cast model is made, we hand make one from plastic resin that is 1-1/2 times larger than the finished car. This tooling model serves two purposes: 1) it lets the tooling people know that all of the parts will fit together the way it was planned, and 2) we submit it to the licensor (Ford, in this case) so they can be assured that it looks accurate before we make the steel tooling for the production models. It may look a little strange to see the chrome, windows and tires in primer color but the purpose of this model is show the shapes and the way that they fit together, not colors. Plain cylinders represent the wheels and tires — CAD drawings are sufficient for these so it isn’t cost-effective to make a model of them.

Here’s the pre-production sample. You can see a slim area where the paint didn’t cover below the bumper ahead of the front wheels. That was fixed on the production models that are just arriving in stores now. In addition to the Highland Green Metallic color shown, it’s also available in Candy Apple Red. The SKU is 31166.