ParkRNDL
11-29-2006, 09:04 PM
I finally got around to picking up a couple of Dash Motorsports Galaxies, and these things are SCHWEET. I figured I'd post some pics of one along with an original Galaxie for comparison, and I made some surprising discoveries...
Original Aurora Galaxie:
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/rwurtz/images/galaxies04a.jpg
Dash Motorsports Galaxie:
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/rwurtz/images/galaxies04b.jpg
That's a resin driver figure from Weird Jack in the Dash car. He's not glued in yet, he's just there for show... also, the original is wearing Jack's thin Tjet tires, while the Dash car has Jack's standard Tjet tires. I Dremeled out the insides of the wheelwells to get the wider tires to fit... the Dash car has enough meat on it to thin that area a little and still keep the lines of the wheelwell intact.
From looking at pictures on the web, I had been under the impression that these Galaxies would be exact copies of the Auroras... that somehow a mold was made from an original Galaxie. I guess that idea sticks in my head from having many resin cast copies of existing cars. This is not the case here. From my limited knowledge of how this stuff works, it looks like an original Aurora Galaxie was fed into a CAD/CAM program, and actually cleaned up and improved slightly in the manufacturing process. The overall modeling style and "flavor" of the Aurora car is retained very well, so much so that if you didn't know what to look for, I think you'd be hard pressed to pick out differences in the Dash car without having an original to look at. Starting with the front view, the grille and bumper are very close but not exact:
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/rwurtz/images/galaxies01.jpg
You can see the slight difference in shape better on an angle:
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/rwurtz/images/galaxies06.jpg
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/rwurtz/images/galaxies07.jpg
The top corners of the grille/bumper piece are a little squarer on the Dash car, and the lip across the top is less pronounced. I don't think this detracts from the car at all. I don't know if the Dash pieces will fit as replacements for the original without modifications, but it seems they certainly would require only minor if any tweaking.
What struck me as more interesting is the fact that the Dash car is actually a much cleaner mold. Look at the cowl vents in front of the windshield. On the Aurora car, these show some imperfections. I thought this was because my car had been damaged over the years, but then I compared it with a beater original I have and the imperfections are exactly the same. The Dash car's cowl vent is perfect. The curve at the base of the windshield is SLIGHTLY different too, but as you'll see later, the two cars can still swap windshields...
to be continued...
Original Aurora Galaxie:
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/rwurtz/images/galaxies04a.jpg
Dash Motorsports Galaxie:
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/rwurtz/images/galaxies04b.jpg
That's a resin driver figure from Weird Jack in the Dash car. He's not glued in yet, he's just there for show... also, the original is wearing Jack's thin Tjet tires, while the Dash car has Jack's standard Tjet tires. I Dremeled out the insides of the wheelwells to get the wider tires to fit... the Dash car has enough meat on it to thin that area a little and still keep the lines of the wheelwell intact.
From looking at pictures on the web, I had been under the impression that these Galaxies would be exact copies of the Auroras... that somehow a mold was made from an original Galaxie. I guess that idea sticks in my head from having many resin cast copies of existing cars. This is not the case here. From my limited knowledge of how this stuff works, it looks like an original Aurora Galaxie was fed into a CAD/CAM program, and actually cleaned up and improved slightly in the manufacturing process. The overall modeling style and "flavor" of the Aurora car is retained very well, so much so that if you didn't know what to look for, I think you'd be hard pressed to pick out differences in the Dash car without having an original to look at. Starting with the front view, the grille and bumper are very close but not exact:
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/rwurtz/images/galaxies01.jpg
You can see the slight difference in shape better on an angle:
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/rwurtz/images/galaxies06.jpg
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/rwurtz/images/galaxies07.jpg
The top corners of the grille/bumper piece are a little squarer on the Dash car, and the lip across the top is less pronounced. I don't think this detracts from the car at all. I don't know if the Dash pieces will fit as replacements for the original without modifications, but it seems they certainly would require only minor if any tweaking.
What struck me as more interesting is the fact that the Dash car is actually a much cleaner mold. Look at the cowl vents in front of the windshield. On the Aurora car, these show some imperfections. I thought this was because my car had been damaged over the years, but then I compared it with a beater original I have and the imperfections are exactly the same. The Dash car's cowl vent is perfect. The curve at the base of the windshield is SLIGHTLY different too, but as you'll see later, the two cars can still swap windshields...
to be continued...