Atlantis Models has provided the IPMS/USA reviewer corps with Tom “The Mongoose” McEwen’s “AA” Fuel Dragster (front engine mount) in 1/24^th scale. Per Scalemates.com, original mold for this kit is from 1971 by Monogram/Mattel. This review is for the 2024 boxing.

In the Box

The kit is enclosed in a top open box with a painted illustration. The main color is blue with white accent in the middle of the body. There is one white sprue of parts, right and left side body halves, one chrome plated sprue, and one vinyl sprue with tires. Decals are on a single sheet.

Instructions are well illustrated and have ten assembly steps along with a decal placement guide in Step 6.

Review Process

As a notice to all model builders, when building parts with chrome plating, it is important to remove the plated surfaces where parts will be glued together to have a plastic-to-plastic connection. If not removed, the plating acts as a barrier between plastic parts and nothing will bond together. This is noted throughout the instructions.

This is a box stock build. So, no aftermarket parts are used.

The instructions have you starting with the engine assembly and then installing it to the RHS of the dragster body per step 2. Instead of installing the engine in step 2, I decided to cut off some of the circular receptacle (top part) to make a slot fit on the interior of the RHS body half. This will allow the engine to slip into the body opening once the painting and decaling is done after step 6. Additionally, I installed the exhaust pipes at this time (from step 8).

I also did not glue the axle (Part 27) into the body half receptacles but just slipped it into place. This will allow the axle to rotate and give me the chance to angle the drive shaft to be installed into transmission bell housing when I install the engine at the very end.

In step 3, 4, & 5 is the assembly of the driver, seat, and installing the dragster body together. I followed the instructions sequence during these steps except I did not glue the driver seat to the body halves. This allowed movement of the driver while the body seams are filled and sanded. Note, this is a 1971 mold, and the seam filling & sanding will require lots of time smooth out.

After this, I primered the body with Mr. Surfacer 500 gray. Next was light wet sanding with 800-1000 grit sandpaper to remove some of the roughness. This was followed by a coat of Tamiya XF-2, Flat White, as a base coat. Trying to color match the box illustration of the dragster’s blue color, I found Tamiya X-14, Sky Blue, a very close match. Since the Sky Blue was a gloss paint, I went straight to decaling the next day.

Decals are in good registry and color and react well with Micro Sol. The large white center decal was a little transparent but note this should be the first one to be applied since other decals will be located from its location while the “Hot Wheels” sponsor will rest on top of it. If I was to build this again, I would paint the white area for more opaqueness.

Finally, I glued the driver seat to the body halves and installed the parts outside of the dragster body: Tires, engine, wheelie wheel, control rods. After that, I considered it done.

Note: I decided to not do the drag chute for this review. However, the instructions are very detailed on rigging and how to display if the builder wishes to do so.

Conclusions

This was a fun kit to complete and brought me back to my ‘70s childhood days of building dragsters and funny cars. For the most part a simple kit to build and looks fast just sitting on the shelf.

Highly recommended to all skill levels. It is a simple kit, low parts count, and easy to assemble. But do keep in mind the extra work in seam filling and sanding.

I want to thank Atlantis Models for providing the Mongoose Rail Dragster and IPMS/USA for allowing me the opportunity to review.