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NASCAR MODELS by MR NASCAR

Dave Blaney's 2005 JACK DANIELS Monte Carlo
Daytona Test car!!


Dave Blaney, the 1995 World of Outlaws sprint car champion, is a veteran of 163 NEXTEL Cup Series starts since 1992. His most serious foray into the Cup Series began in 2000, when he moved to Winston Cup with Bill Davis Racing, and in 2002, took over from Robert Pressley at Jasper Motorsports, to be replaced in 2004 by Brendan Gaughan, as part of NASCAR's "youth movement". But that's another story... just ask Ward Burton... The 42-year-old Blaney began his tenure with RCR in June '04 at Pocono Raceway, taking over the reigns of the No. 30 Chevrolet from, ironically, another "youth movement" wannabe - Johnny Sauter. Blaney pilotted the 30 car with some success through 7 races until it was commandeered by Jeff Burton at the August Michigan race. He had been bumped from his Roush 99 ride by "youth movement" contender Carl Edwards - who looks like the real thing, by the way...

Blaney must have made a good impression on Richard Childress, as when the 30 car was reincarnated as the 07 Jack Daniels car, he was "on the short list" and ultimately landed the ride.

Ah, yes - the sponsor... in a final break with tradition, NASCAR has allowed "hard likker" sponsors! Jack Daniels was the first to jump in, and Jim Beam was not far behind. All are, of course, using racing to promote "responsible behaviour"... go figger... but with the dot-com bust, NASCAR was finding viable sponsors harder to come by, I suppose. (Wonder who will end up as the "Official Hard Liquor" of NASCAR??)

Sam sent these graphics to me shortly after the announcement, and I began to play around with them. Problem was, every time I saw a new pic of the car, the marketing types at J.D. had fiddled with the graphics, so I decided to cool it and see where it ended up. This is always an issue when you try and issue graphics before a car has raced in its new colours. Then I saw the car in test trim at Daytona on SpeedChannel, and my conundrum was solved! Charcoal primer, and that neat "NASCAR ACCELERATION" logo! We were in business!

I modified the files, added a few, and printed a set to represent Dave's test car as it ran in the Daytona testing. This was a simple build - whole car was painted in a charcaol colour that I blended from gloss black and white, straight from the rattlecans into a glass bottle. When the colour looked right, I thinned it some more with lacquer thinner, then shot it thru my airbrush, onto a body that had been primed with PlastiKote grey primer and wetsanded with 600-grit paper. Then I masked off the nose strip and primed it with PLASTIKOTE white primer, to which I applied a dayglo red. After it had dried, I applied a coat of TAMIYA TS13 clear to the whole body, to provide a smooth glossy surface for the decals. My reference pics came from Motorsports.com, who had some good sideshots, and on-track shots. I added silver foil outline to the rear fender Jack Daniels logos - I'm sure I could see them in the pics!

After the decals had had a day or two to dry, it was time to DullCote them, to make it look like a primed body. Well, there appears to be a Global Shortage on Testor's Dullcote, so, on the recommendation of a local hobby shop owner, I tried Testor's #1959 Clear Satin Finish. It worked great - not quite as flat as DullCote, but likely more in line with a true primer finish.

The chassis was built box-stock, except for seatbelts, and I moved the ignition boxes up onto the dash - I assume they will stay there in '05?

And will Dave stay there in '05?? Best results I saw for him at Daytona - in this car - was 35th place on Wednesday Jan 19th, with the Thursday draft sessions wiped out by rain. Word is that RCR engines aren't on par with other Chevies (read Hendrick) and he did outperform his RCR team mates, Burton (31) and Kerry Earnhardt (subbing in the 29 car for Harvick) so we'll see... The Real Story starts in two weeks! If anyone is interested, these decals are available from 3 Amigos. When the 07 scheme is finalized, a second version will be offered.

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