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How To Make A Small Fortune At The Big Local Model Exhibition

Start with a large fortune and go there to sell model goods. Well, you knew that punchline was coming when you started reading. You should have stopped then. Too late, you have to finish reading this article now. Going to the Big Local Model Exhibition at Cannington Central with goods to sell is a sure-fire…
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Do Kit Designers Hang Upside-Down In Caves?

I ask this because I have noted some of the priorities they assign to their kit designs. In the case of the beer, pretzel, and borscht bureaux, the decisions they make about the level of photo-etch to include in a cockpit area vs the basic fit of the thing into the fuselage hints at it.…
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RCAF Privateer – Part Five – The Rockcliff Transport

Until now I have been having immense difficulties reporting the completion of this model. If you are reading this I have succeeded… The Rockcliff Privateer probably had a different name attached to it, but I am pleased that the Matchbox decal sheet was replaced by a Revell one that eliminated the nose graphics – they…
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RCAF Privateer – Part Four – When To Commit Yourself…

Or alternately…when to have yourself committed… You have to make a decision eventually – whether to cement every blessed little part on the model and then try to paint and decal around them, or to break it down into stages and make your errors in a more orderly fashion. One road leads to madness and…
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RCAF Privateer – Part Three – I Hate Windows

Not just the computer operating system – windows in general. Particularly when they are all down the side of a model airplane but only on the inside. If I want them to be open I have to carefully cut them out myself. That’s one of the horrors of the multi-purpose kit. I thought this sort…
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RCAF Privateer – Part Two – Rebox Heaven

I don’t really understand the actual process of re-boxing kits. Whether they are pre-made kits that are packaged up or whether they are re-moulded sprue trees taken from old moulds is still unclear. I think we might be seeing both processes in action sometimes. In any case, I am delighted to report that it works.…
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RCAF Privateer – Part One – Hello, Old Friend

The last time I saw you, you were in three colours in a Matchbox kit. Scalemates says that you have been sold to Revell and reboxed. It also said that you were originally fitted out with alternate nose and tail sections to make an RCAF transport aircraft. Is it possible that you still have those…
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If I Hobby For Money…

Am I hobbying at all? Good question. The idea of making money from your hobby is one that has occurred to 105% of everyone. 75% of us have tried it, 3% have succeeded and the rest…some 230,000 hobbyists…have decided just to go out and buy another kit. The saddest man in the hobby shop is…
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Is There A Worse Feeling?

I mean a worse feeling than seeing someone succeed brilliantly with a model kit, material, or technique that you have failed in. Not bad enough that you threw your model against the wall, but the other person has managed to win a medal with theirs. Jealousy is a green-eyed monster in many fields; love, business,…
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MiG 21 – Part One And Only – The Buffer Zone Interceptor

We often forget that there was more than one side to the Cold War. West, East, and Neutral. And Neutral broke down to Undecided, Uneconomic, and Uninterested. The DDR were trusted by their Soviet masters more than you’d think. The Russians were no fools – they knew the quality of the East Germans and had…
