The Little World

On a recent trip to the eastern states I went charged with the task of finding a 1:48 scale model of a Macchi jet trainer for my friend Warren. He had worked on them in the Air Force and a few years ago Italeri had kitted one up with RAAF markings. Indeed, they had also made a later model used by the SAAF so there was that to fall back on if the original kit was unavaiable.

As it happened there were no Macchis of any sort on offer – if you discount the one on a stick at Point Cook RAAF museum. They would not entertain my offer to purchase it and watched me carefully to make sure I did not make off with it. They are a suspicious lot at Point Cook…

So no Macchi. But I was determined to bring some trophy back and it wasn’t until the following week that a visit to Sherriff’s Mini Cars in Maryong, Sydney provided the answer. Sherriff’s are primarily concerned with die-cast vehicles but they have a considerable section of plastic kits that are a mixture of regular stock and stash buying. Tucked away on a corner of the nostalgia shelf was the Supermarine racer.

I know this kit well, having built one of the original Hawk models in 1956. Of course I built it as a child would do, with glue fingerprints and missing parts, but I loved it. Warren has a nostalgic interest in air racers of the time as well, and he has spoken of this plane. Now it will be his turn to do the deed – and fulfil the destiny that this re-boxed kit set out for in 1958.

Those were the days when men were men and boys were boys and glue was glue. Thick, goopy stuff that needed big locating pins inside the fuselage and heavy locating lines on the outside of the engine compartment. Surprisingly, there a number of delicate recessed panel lines cut into the fuselage though the wing lines are raised. And there is a mono-legged pilot.

The instructions are pure 50’s. If you couldn’t make a model based on these you were better off going outside and throwing bottles at passing cars.

The decals? Well, they are roughly the thickness of a laminate counter top and just a wee bit yellowed, but I reckon he can get them down with some Micro Sol. Or a hot steam iron. Or a hammer and nails. Warren used to hammer nails into F-111 bombers to keep them flying so he is not afraid of delicate work.

The real moral of this story is not to be too delicate, conservative, precious, or greedy when you have older kits…Build them. That is what they were meant for.