The RDR Corvette looks almost as good on paper as it does in real life!

Growing up in the 70s and 80s, my generation was the last of the low-tech kids. We actually played with our Hot Wheels and Tonka trucks. We put baseball cards in the spokes of our bikes so they would sound like motorcycles. Our favorite TV shows were Night Rider, The Dukes of Hazard, and CHiPs. Unlike today’s generation, our toys were real, not digital.

One of my favorite toys were paper models. I had all kinds, everything from race cars to dinosaurs. I remember spending hours working on these complicated multi-page NASA space shuttles. My mom would sit down with me at the kitchen table, helping me with the hard parts. One day when I was 6 years old, I was playing with the Space Shuttle and I had my pet cricket inside one of the cargo boxes for the shuttle. I put the cargo box on the ledge of the porch and as I was moving a brick, it slipped out of my hand and smashed the cargo box. That tore me up for days. I buried the cargo box in the yard and put the shuttle on the shelf. I built a few more in the coming years, but as time goes by and you grow up, the pretend toys of our youth give way to the real thing. Most kids today never get to experience this side of the world, paper toys are hokey, they would rather spend 6 hours playing video games. For me, those hokey toys bring back all kinds of great memories.

So when I saw Jeff Allison’s paper model project, I was instantly hooked. I have been following Jeff Allison’s work for years, he is an amazing hot rod artist that works in my favorite 60s-style theme. I fired off an email to Jeff and gave him a challenge- design a single-piece fold-up of a C2 Corvette, modeled after the Red Dirt Rodz 66 Corvette Coupe I built for the 2014 SEMA show. Jeff took on the challenge and came up with an amazing design of a C2 with all the right curves and bends. Then I asked him to include the underbody, so we could show off the Speed Direct custom suspension and rack and pinion. He came through with flying colors.

All folded up, ready for some desk-top racin’

All of this effort has spawned a new series for Street Tech Magazine, the STM Fold-Up Cruisers. Each issue in 2015 will feature a different paper model of an iconic hot rod, muscle car, or classic for you to cut out, fold up and put on display. These are not overly complicated, most of them will be easy to fold and secure with bit of tape. The kicker of it is that the only place you can get one is in the print version of STM. Subscribers have the ability to download the PDF version from the digital edition as well.

We can’t forget the detailed undercarriage, now can we?

Along with Jeff Allison’s paper models, we are bringing back another classic- How To Draw Hot Rods. Jeff has signed on to author a series of how-to draw stories for STM, so you can draw your own versions of your favorite muscle cars and hot rods. Of course, there will be plenty of the hardcore, greasy-handed, knuckle-busting tech that Street Tech Magazine is all about. Sign up today and get yours.

Want to learn how to draw hot rods? Here you go.