Category: adhesives
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Working With The Materials
As opposed to in spite of them. Modellers can be assemblers or fabricators; putting together a kit or building a model from basic materials. Either way they are making the wood, plastic, metal, or other stuff do what they want…more or less. Some kits, and some plans resist even the most skilled workers. Do what…
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The Puppy And The Old Dog
Makes you nostalgic, eh? We start with such high hopes and so much precision. then we encounter The Kit From Hell and the bottle of nuclear waste thinner and it all goes wrong. As the years go by the mat gets punished for our sins but the models get better. We watch as markings disappear…
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Been There?
Done that? Going to do it again? I’ll bet I am. I will take a model to an exhibition and it will break en-route. Or I will bring it home and the same will occur. Or it will just collapse on the show table from a combination of stress and snarkiness. No exhibitor should neglect…
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Can You Wait Too Long?
I suspect you can… And I am not writing about the 5 hr delay between when your family asks you whether you are ready…you standing at the door jiggling the car keys…and when they actually get in the vehicle. No, I mean between stages of a scale model build. Here are the reasons why I…
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The Half-Built Bargain
However you acquire a half-built – stash sale, donation, or legacy – you buy more than a box. You buy a dilemma. A fresh kit, with a sealed box or bagged sprue trees, is a clean field to play on. It may be old, with tatty decals and useless instructions, but at least when you…
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Bristol F.2B – Part Two – Struttin’ Wif’ Some Styrene
And I had much rather it had been wif’ some barbecue… The point at which you regret your choices in life occurs to all of us, but it comes repeatedly to the scale modeller who builds biplanes. The original designers of the aircraft were forced to use multiple wings and sticks and wire between them…
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Buy All The Superglue
And discover whether it really is super or not… I have looked with nuclear puzzlement at the cyanoacrylate cement racks in the hobby shop…as well as at the DIY shop. Frequently no idea at all forms in my mind, and I buy whatever is cheapest. The super-thin sort goes everywhere and into my fingers. The…
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The Overlooked Modelling Materials
I saw a very clever use of a DIY material that has fired me up to try it myself…but I don’t know what for…yet. John Brewer followed my workshop on scale model photography and the small tabletop studio by constructing one for himself and bringing it to the clubrooms. We experimented with his Minolta digital…
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Curtiss H16 – Part Five – Wing Walking Without A Safety Net
With my heart in my mouth and my underwear screwed up tight… I set out to put 12 inter-plane struts on the lower wing of the Curtiss – all 12 upright and at the same angle. The way I did it was to use three old foam-board shapes I had made when doing an Airfix…
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Petlyakov Pe-8 – Part Five – A Wing And Several Prayers
I am never so nervous as when I see a plastic model aircraft with a multiple-part wing. I don’t mean a top and bottom – that’s normal. I mean a top and bottom outer, top and bottom inner, internal brace, wheel well, separate nacelles, and no cementing tabs. Add two gun positions and it starts…
