Barry Harker's custom Roadrunner

Here is the very first custom vehicle sent in by Barry Harker. Here is what he had to say about it:

This one was the most labor intensive of all the models. After watching the new "DEATH RACE" Movie I wanted to build something similar. I like the idea of covering a car in lots of body armor and thought that kind of theme would work well in the world of MAD MAX. The model is a 1/24 1970 PLYMOUTH ROADRUNNER Revell/Monogram Kit. And what a nice kit it is too! Glad I bought two kits, it was almost a shame to cut up such a good looking car and nicely molded kit. I liked the look of the GRAN TORINO with the roof sliced off. So I decided to do the same with the ROADRUNNER only this time a lot more effort would be put in to the roll cage and armor on the Car. I wanted it to look more aggressive than the others so I decided to use rectangular plastic rods; this would give the look of a heavier harder edge to the car and look like lots of box section steel welded on to the vehicle. There is so much plastic on the model it almost weighs as much as a metal kit! First I decided to "beat it up a bit" before the armor went on to give an already used look, and then built the roll cage first using lots of different sizes of rod depending on where in the car it was going. For instance the main beams are very wide "the main roll cage behind the passenger seats" while all the other beams are a thinner width depending on the value of protection. The same plastic rod is applied to the front and back of the vehicle. The front bumper or "battering ram”! is made from a section of I beam plastic rod and then covered in upright sections of triangular rod, "Gives it the look of having sharp teeth!" The tires on the model are from a LEGO kit covered in plastic card to give the wheels armored protection. Once the model was built I sprayed it black first and then with a light over spray of grey to give the effect of shadows in the car and underneath. then I hand painted the red body work and gave it a black wash with ink to darken it down. From there I spent many hours weathering and high lighting with Games Workshop Hobby Paints. This is my favorite model far as I had the most fun building and painting it!