Category: Scale Models
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The Model You Always See
But can never buy. I look at websites and catalogues on-line. I would collect the paper ones if they were offered – catalogue dreaming was one of the great pleasures of childhood. There was no money for the big kits but you could still imagine building them. On a lot of the Australian screen sites…
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A Structureless Structure
The hobby club with no constitution. And no office holders, fees, or possessions. Yet it functions at two locations and has done so for years. I belong to two hobby clubs. One does have a constitution, office bearers, treasury, and possessions. It is housed by a public authority in its own club rooms and boasts…
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Do You Deserve Your Fate?
And if you don’t, but get it anyway, who is responsible? Every scale model kit that ever went into a box or bag was put there by people who hoped for something. They aspired to money, admiration, respect, or grudging acceptance. Like a marriage, really, but with sprue trees. Few of us got a decal…
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Short Skyvan – Part Three – Once Seen…
Never forgotten – provided you photograph it. The inclusion of detailed interiors in scale models is not new – this Short Skyvan kit had a full set of seats for Olympic Airways passengers in the 70’s and benches for Austrian skydivers in the 2020’s. When my example served as an arctic transport in the 60’s…
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Short Skyvan – Part Two – Lavez-vous?
How many of you ignore the warnings in your model kit instructions? How many of you do not wash the kit parts as soon as you open the box? The makers all tell you to, and give as their reason the mould parting agents that may cling to the plastic after manufacture. These might act…
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The Constant Search For The Ultimate Kit
Also known as the Styrene Itch. As soon as you get your first Airfix Starter Kit you are assailed by two desires: that of building it and buying another. Both of these are legitimate and in time you can succeed. However, as you do the urges mount, the pressure increases, and the pace quickens. Soon…
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The Compulsory Stash
Being tied to a plastic sprue tree… We sometimes encounter stashes that have gone from small to sensible to moderate to toxic. There is no actual number, but when the available storage space is exceeded and the floor starts being crowded out, you know that something is amiss. This is also the case for commercial…
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Start, Ya Bastard
You know, I am unable to convince some of my North American readers that there really is a product on the market in Australia called just that? Oh ye, of little faith… As it is, the expression serves perfectly as a reminder to scale modellers that the kit on the shelf is just a box…
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RAF Puma – Part Three – Old Faithful
The Colde Wellcombe helicopter hack. When you need to be moved from one miserable part of the country to another, you call out the Colde Wellcombe duty Puma. Bob and Ian are always ready to do their duty, as long as the mess is closed. You may wish to avoid calling them out on Saturday…
