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radioscooter wrote:

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BatToys1966 wrote:

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Obviously people care about getting everything accurate or else no one would bother making metal beacons.

1.  Accuracy is of course, something most (if not all) scale modelers strive for. Some things are more important than others. For example, I don't really need to see the inside of the fuel flap to feel like I'm doing it justice in 1:25 scale.
   
2. There are lots more photo records of the beacon than say - the undercarriage of the Batmobile, or accurate, perfectly perpendicular overhead shots of the rear fins. Thus, an accurate beacon is not quite as speculative. (though please bear in mind that with those folks involved with making the metal beacons, there have been many, MANY passionate, behind the scenes debates surrounding its creation)
   
3. With any fictional, or (in this case) one of a kind  subject matter you will find a wealth of information documenting maybe (for the sake of this point) 90% of the details. Inevitably, the details surrounding the other 10% will launch a thousand  discussions, arguments, speculations and fabrications. IMO, it is this mystery that makes the constant search for scale accuracy a fabulous, never-ending challenge.  
4. All that said, we've got a pretty-well laser scanned model of the car that any modeler (or sculptor) can purchase, measure (digitally or by hand) and use to inform any new patterns or sculpts. I am inclined to believe that these newest models of the car are overall much more accurate than the original hand-scuplted Revell interpretation or any 80's/90's garage kits that were modified from it. And please keep in mind that there were really only about 3 garage kits that started out with Revell Futura bases. The plethora of others were 2nd and 3rd generation recasts of those. Including Siderio's & "Miky's" kits.
   
5. I think it needs to be pointed out *again* that in light of what materials and base kits we had to work with at the time, it is just flat-out astounding how great Andy's (and those built by Jim Apitz & Steve Silva just to name a couple others) were, and how they hold up a decade or more later next to these mass-marketed versions. I am excited to be building a few versions myself, but I am much more interested and looking forward more to everyone else's efforts, because that's where new ideas come from - observing others' work.
6. One thing we can learn from this thread is that - improved accuracy notwithstanding, one of the most important things we can do for our scale model Batmobiles is to find an $8 dust/protector/display case to keep them from getting dusty. And maybe wipe them down once in a while.