Key Model World haul

 

No surprise that my rucksack came back a little fuller from KMW, than it started with. I wasn't looking for projects, but when has that ever stopped me? 

First up, a Polish (I think) kit for a glider. Costing only £4, it was odd enough to appeal, and at 1:72, possibly even useful. Looking inside, it appears that these gliders don't have canopies, or at least there isn't one in the sealed bag. 

Then a vintage Hornby bank kit. I pick these up when I see them for sensible money, for my column in The Collector. It looks like an attractive model, and not one you see very often. Under that is a Langley vac-formed 7mm scale viaduct. Useful if I ever need an O gauge photo plank with a background. I've also bought another Wills halt kit. No idea what I keep acquiring these, but it was only a couple of quid. 

More practically, some paint pens I fancy trying out. I've been reading good things about them, so want to try for myself, 

Finally, a monkey bike. No, I don't know why this appealed, but I just loved the look of it. Well, it's fun to buy a silly kit. 

And, most excitingly, the first person I chatted to, was my old friend Chris Mead, builder of the layout "Overlord". He presented me with some jam. 

And it's very good jam. The rhubarb and ginger is delicious on my breakfast sourdough toast. So nice, I need to ask him for another jar...

More plastic kits for the stash

 

Scale Model World was always going to be a spendy show. It's part of the fun, and my bank account was prepared. In the event, the bill was about the same as a single Rapido Y7, which isn't so bad. I certainly came away with a few boxes!

First up, the planned purchases. SMW is great for bargain prices on current kits, so as I wasn't in a hurry for these, I waited for my visit. As an added bonus, it ensured I'd leave with a new toy, and not just something random. 

The MiniArt holidaymakers are in wonderful poses. I've certainly seen people doing just this!

Airfix's Alvis Stalwart is a prototype that fascinates me. Now, I don't do military stuff, but I had a plan. One that I wasn't the first to think of. 

No need for camo, when a civilian version is available, thanks to Matchbox. OK, it's probably not real, but I remember having one of these toys when I was a kid, and the paint job will certainly be easy!

Mind you, I rather like the look of this version too. 

Moving on to impulse buys, I'm a sucker for a VW Type 2, and this looks like a rather nice kit. 

There's a satisfying number of parts in here, and options to produce four different liveries. Sadly, on the bargain stand, there wasn't the airfield "Follow Me" version, but I suspect applying to the all-over transfers would be a nightmare anyway. 

In the stash is a three-wheel bakers van, and I decided to add some figures and a stall to the project pile. 

 

The "Piste Circuit"? Well, the name made me snigger, and it was only three quid. What I have is a slice of racing circuit to use as a diorama base. Not sure I have much to pose on it, but I'm sure that can change...

Finally, a tool purchase. 

While I own an airbrush cleaning pot, but the rest of the bits have been on the list to buy for a long while. A tenner for the lot? Bargain. 

I'm sure some of you are thinking about the wisdom of adding more kits to my stash. Truth is that there are some that have been "maturing" for many years. I don't think I've built anything from last years pile for a start. Each kit represents a little possibility. I love making stuff, and while my time for this sort of personal project is sorely limited at the moment, I dream that one day each one of these will make it on to the workbench, and we all need a dream, even if it is a silly one involving plastic, glue and paint. 

Anyway, how many of you lot don't have a stash of your own?  

Scale Model World 2025

Plenty of inspiration at the IPMS modellers annual extravaganza. As every, it's a big show, that takes all day to go around, and that's only because I pretty much ignore anything military, and didn't get the chance to visit the competition this year. 

To be honest, trying to describe everything, or pick a favourite, is a waste of time. Have a look at my gallery on Flickr, and tell me what catches your eye.  

1980s Hornby garage in The Collector

 

Another classic kit in the latest issue of The Collector, the house magazine of the Hornby Collectors Club. 

This is another reboxed kit from the period - easily spotted because the painting on the box has German text on the garage, and all the cars are from the same country. 

Because of this, it's HO scale, and the Tri-ang cars won't fit in the bay, but I don't think this is too much of an issue. The result is a useful building, which was, until recently, in the Gaugemaster Fordhampton range, albeit rebranded as a BP service station. 

Airfix Mini

This is to be a simple stick it togther job. Not a major project with lots of fiddling, just glue and basic paint. I bought the kit for hardly any money, and so if it all ends up in the bin, then so be it. 

I'd normally start a write-up with a photo of the kit, but if I did take one, it's lost in a folder on the computer. Not to worry, I always hate cleaning up the background on these shots anyway, so the pain can be restricted to publications paying me money.

The body is mostly a one-piece mouding with just the front and back to be attached. Part fit isn't bad, but I do wonder if they could have been included in the main body. Did the designer feel that this wouldn't be "kit" enough? To my eye, the shape appears really nice, and the detail has a finesse that diecast models lack.

Colour was decided by the handiness of an old can of Halfords ArtFix paint. Not in the current range, I thought a red colour car would be fun, and stuck the body on my painting stick with some Blu-Tack, then applied a few thin coats of paint. 

Initially, this looked like a bit of a disaster, there was a definite hint of orange peel to the finish, but overnight, this settled down to an acceptable semi-matt finish. Not perfectly smooth, but not bad enough for me to want to attack it with T-Cut. The lesson here, is not to panic I suppose. 

 

IPMS 2024

I visited the International Plastic Modelers Show at Telford on Sunday rather than Saturday this year. As ever, it was an excellent show, for me, well worth the £25 entry fee (free to IPMS members). Loads of terrific, and inspirational modelling on show, and the chance to leave your money with the trade in return for more plastic kits that will take me ages to get around to building. 

I partucally liked this diorama made up from Meng kits.I have the harbour in my stash, but have been at a loss to know how to use it. Now I have an idea!

There are loads more photos, including some interesting Airfix items, over on Flickr.

(Non)Muscial TB4- Part 2

 

And there we are - done! I can finish projects!

With the two halves of the body screwed together, presumably to allow access to the battery, the rest of the bits clip on easily, although I used a bit of glue too. 

Lines and text are thin stickers, described as "seals" in the instructions. Some, like the line around the nose, are weird shapes, but fit really well. I've left the body in unpainted plastic because this is a quick and fun project. Also, it's a better colour than the can of spray paint I bought to paint it. 

Only 9cm long, this isn't going to take up much space in the display case, and I think it looks pretty cute. Someone's done a good job of caracaturing the Anderson craft. You know what it is, but it's more cartoon than realistic. 

I'm still not sorry the sound unit packed up though.

Musical TB4 - Part 1

 

Surely a musical Thunderbird 4 shouldn't morph into a major time-consuming project? After all, I only paid four quid for it, so the end result doesn't have to be that special. 

Imai's CD Boy TB-4 kit is designed to be easy to assemble. Pretty much clip together with no painting. 

One snag is that there should be some axles, and a couple of self-tapping screws in the bag, but these were missing, as the kit was shop soiled. Not a problem, I'm not worried about wheels, and suitable screws were found in my drawer of bits. 

More of an issue is that the circuit board takes a G8 battery, the one supplied in the kit is furry, and I could only find a G10, which is thicker. It goes in with a shove that breaks the board, but proves the circuit works. Shine a light in the bottom of the model, and it plays the Thunderbirds theme tune. Until it packed up. I decided I didn't care as the noise was getting on my nerves. 

After this, there is a bit of pre-painting for chubby Gordon Tracey, and some vents I decided would look better silver (as per the real TB4) than yellow.

Goodies from the IPMS show

Now, it would be rude to go to a plastic kit show, and not come away with at least one box, wouldn't it? 

Well, I wasn't rude. I also know why I have a 35 litre rucksack. 

Starting with the big buy, a kit I don't really understand. It's a sort of walking robot suit, that a pilot sits in and operates. More than that I do not know as all is in Japanese.

My guess is that this is from a Manga cartoon of some sort. I'm not into manga, but I just love the idea of the model. It looks fun, and that's what the hobby is about. It's also as far from toy trains as you can get, and still be making models. 

If anyone can enlighten me further, I'd be fascinated. 

These three were proper bargains. Dug out of a box of similarily packages models, I eshewed the Japanese robots, I haven't built last years purchases for a start, aiming for Gerry Anderson pastiche's. The exciting thing is that the two CD-Boy kits include sound chips. What is the sound? No idea, but for four quid each, I'm happy to find out. 

OK, there is one Japanese robot, but he's from the same box of water damaged (so I'm told, hence no boxes, but a saving of six pounds in the TB4 kit) stock. It turns out there are two robots in the kit - one is a pendant for the SciFi robot loving love of your life presumably. 

TB3 is just because that's my favourite Thunderbird. I think there was a CD-Boy version, but someone snaffled it just before me, such is the scrum around these boxes.Boo. 

Kate - I'll be right there, is a kit I've been meaning to buy for a while. Purely because the main character in our excellent novels is called 'Kate'. She doesn't look much like the plastic Kate, but I think I can fix that. The model is from a range called "Dangerous Curves". I leave investigating further to you. 

The gladiators were two quid from the Bachmann MCC stand. I can't resist a bargain, and feel they might one day be made into a model of the people discussing things on a popular web forum. 

Something a bit more sensible now, a set of graduated sanding sticks. For the moment, these will be kept for best work (yes, I do some!) especially the really fine ones. 

The bookazine has Daleks in it and some behind the scenes stuff, and was three quid. I'm not flicking through a mag for that price, I'll take the risk on the content being interesting. Get me. 

Finally, a Bond Bug, to replace the one I messed up. This has been a tough kit to track down, it's been such a good seller that all the retailer are out of stock. Possibly one of Airfix's best sellers of recent times. 

And the SR-N1. Well, it's another kit I've always fancied, but not enough to shell out eBay prices. 

All this probably looks very profligate. Just north of £100 blown on plastic kits, that I might never get around to building at my current rate of progress. I don't care. This show has been on my calendar for a long while, and I was determined to enjoy myself. Part of that is buying interesting kits, and dreaming I will one day get around to building them.Maybe it could be said that I left with a bag full of dreams...

IPMS 2023

 

"I've seen some photos, and it doesn't look that busy." said one of the great brains on Facebook. He was pretty quickly corrected. The show was well back to pre-Covid levels of attendance, both visitors and traders as far as I could tell. 

Walking around the mainly trade area on Saturday morning was difficult. Getting into those second-hand kit stands was difficult. And it stayed a lot like that until late afternoon. I know that because I got in just after 10, and left about half past 5. £23 for severn hours entertainment. 

As usual, I largely ignored military models and stuck to things I liked. Even doing that meant I filled my time. Apart from at lunch, when by chance, I ended up chatting to Chris Sandham-Bailey, who designes the transfers for Airfix, over a rather nice burger meal. 

Yes, I bought some stuff. You don't go to a show like this and NOT leave without at least one box. Well, not unless you are dead miserable like the guy on Facebook, and I'm sure he wasn't there, and just wanted to rubbish to show to make himself feel superior. 

Well Mr Facebook, you missed some amazing modelling. But, we need to let the photos do the talking, so head over to my Flickr album and enjoy. 

Bond Bug body

 

The Bond body is a prettysimple afair. A top and a bottom, the later includes the wheel arches, slot together nicely. Handily, there's even a seam running along the join on the real car to save us some sanding. Mind you, since it was a fibreglass moulding, I suppose that's not much of a surprise. 

Interior detail is limited to a gear lever, hand brake, pedals, staeering wheel and speedometer. Plus "the dude", but he goes in later, after painting. 

The canopy just sits in place right now. Part fit is all pretty good, especially for a kit whose origins are the best part of 40 years ago. 

One nice touch is this piece of sprue to hold the wheelarches apart the correct distance, which can be cut away later. 

The chassis plugs into the bottom, and fits perfectly too, which was a relief!

Bond Bug chassis

 

Starting with the chassis, the kit shows its age. The side rails are joined by four cross pieces, and it's all a bit floppy. My solution was patience - three cross pieces fitted, and then the whole thing left to harden overnight, suitably propped up on a flat surface. In the morning, it was nicely solid. 

After this, the suspension components were fitted. The location, and angles of these is a but vauge. For example, the rear trailing arms don't stick straight back, but splay out a little. Glue, let it go tacky and then try to position them in the right place worked here. The shock absorbers need to go in at the same time - a three handed job really, but I managed.  

At the front, the steering arms are just as bad. All hanging in mid-air until you get glue on them. Not sure how you'd sure this, although more accurate holes in harder plastic would help perhaps.

The engine assebled OK, but exactly where it fits in the chassis is a little mystery. It sort of sits between the middle cross member, and the front one. Except that if you do this, the fan and the front crossmemeber try to be in the same place at once. I bent the fan to clear, but the results aren't pretty. Fortunatly, they will be hidden. 

Bond Bug

 

When the Bond Bug appeard in the Airfix Vintage Classics range, I was soooo pleased. It's a car that has always fascinated me, even though I doubt I'd fit in one. Many years ago, an antiques shop had one in the window for £500, and I did seriously consider it, although on balance, not raiding my savings was probably a wise move. 

It's not just me either. This has been the most pre-ordered kit in the range ever, so there are plenty out there who like orange wedges of motoring fun!

Mostlty produced from original, and refurbished, moulds, the parts are clean, but moulded in a slightly soft plastic. Not Dapol soft, but not as hard as you normally find. 

The exception are the clear parts, which I believe are new moudings, reverse-engineered from original parts borrowed from a collector. Certainly not bought - original kits are stupidly expensive!

Transfers are also new, and well up to modern standards. 

In theory, this should be a quick, and fun, build.

Saturday Film Club: James May builds a Pug

 

Big bits, swift progress

 

Detailing the Bullodog isn't a slow process. Great big lumps of plastic clad the inner body shell. Part fit is excellet, so it's just a case of splodging on some Contacta cement and pushing the part into position. The nearest to difficult, is making sure the louvres on the side are the right way up. 

Around the back, there is a hatch that can be opened behind the seat. Is this a boot for the farmer to store his tools and sandwiches during the day? 

All the mudguards are on a single part, and it locates on to a few stubs, but I found a clamp helped it sit perfectly on the side of the body, there is a couple of mm gap otherwise. No problem getting the clamp in on such a large model though!

Talking of big lumps, I made up the wheels. Each tyre is solid rubber, and quite a weight. The centres just clip in, making sure the treads are the right way around at the back. I'm not sure if the colour on the tyres is mould release, or some sort of weathering. I don't dislike it, so it can stay. Maybe a wash of brown will sink in and give it a bit of colour eventually.

Do NOT glue...

 

 

 

The Bulldog should, if built correctly, have working steering. This means there are quite a lot of parts that mustn't come into contact with the glue. 

First, we have a sterring stuport, which is made in two halves with a plastic axle within. First go, glue seeped where it wasn't wanted and gummed it up. I quickly pulled things apart, and then had the good sense not to try and rush thing - leaving all the parts to dry before sanding and reassembly. 

On the second attempt, with some really tiny dots of Contacta cement, all went well. 

The cog you see poking out of the bottom of the support, should engage with a cog inside the body. A cog, I had forgotten to fit. 

My excuse is that, if fitted when the instructions tell you too, one end is floating free and will fall out. So it's Pola's fault. 

Anyway, the bidy had been assembled by this point and a sensible person would just write off working steering as a gimmick they didn't need. I'm not sensible, so forced a blade along the join and prised the body halves opon. OK, a bit of plastic cracked, but it's plastic, a touch of glue will fix this if required - it wasn't. 

I'll admit the job was a bit brutal, but at least the steering should move!

Painting plastic bits

 

I've mentioned in the past my aversion to self-coloured plastic parts in kits. Mould them any colour you like, but I still prefer paint on the completed model. It's just looks better to me. 

The VW engine is supposed to be screwed together, the only tools required being some clippers to remove parts from the sprue, and a cross head screwdriver. No paint. 

Anyway, I want my model to look a bit more realistic, and so the manifold and exhaust parts have been given a spray of grey primer, which looks the part to me. The carb and end of the oil cooler are a random silver, possibly aluminium, from the paint drawer, and the body of the coller silver from the Liquid Metal range. This should be finned, but hopefully simply painting it will look OK through the clear fanhousing. 

It's difficult to decide how much to paint, but I'm working on the basis that if it's coloured plastic, then I'll look at a better colour. I do wonder if someone is going to produce a more detailed carb though. Possibly a job for 3D printing.

Announcement excitement

 

After last week's Hornby group announcements, I'm sure you are all desperate to know which ones excited me the most. Well, even if you aren't, this is my blog...

Number 1 - Airfix Bond Bug. The moulds have been found and refurbished for the most interesting car from the old 1/32nd range. Let's be honest, Reliant's cheese-shaped three-wheeler is an amazing looking vehicle. I'll admit that I slightly regret not buying one seen in the window of a local antique shop 20+ years ago for £500. I've not idea if I could fit in one, and suspect the ride whould be claustraphobic if I could, but it's bright orange, how could I not want at least a model? 

On another note. With a bit of modification, could this make an interesting small spacecraft? 

Number 2 - Scalextric FAB1. It's scary to think that Thunderbirds is set around about now. So, it could be me driving Lady Penelope around in the big pink Rolls, along all those weirdly empty motorways seen in the show. 

Actually, it's better I stay away from slot cars as the Tyrell P34 looks tasty (always loved that car) and a Series One Landrover? That's a mad racing car surely...

Number 3 - Hornby Dublo Deltic. I've never really got the whole Deltic thing. Perhaps it's because I've never seen, and heard, one working, but I'm much more a fan of a similarly shaped Class 37. However, Hornby are producing the prettiest Deltic for the collectors market and I think it will be a nice looking model. Admitedly, I'm mostly swayed by the illuminating headlights. In fact, they sort of remind me of the classic Dock shunter in that respect. Same nose I think.

Close call - the two-tender Flying Scotsman in Amercian tour guise. The double tenders are as interesting as a six-wheel formula one car as far as I'm concerned. I remember being being fascinated about them as a kid. 

Number 4 - HM7000. While the locos are a bit of a dream, I'm unlikely to actually buy them, the new control system does strike me as something I want to know a lot more about. The idea that you have a super-stay-alive capacitor in there makes me wonder if this is a step towards battery powered locos. 

Being able to fiddle with settings on the move sounds good, and putting a lot of the "brains" in a smartphone, seems smart. I'm hoping I get to play with one of these for work. It might be a bit of a gamechanger for model railway control systems. A nice example of the Margate team looking to the future. 

Anyway, that's my list. Did anyone else spot something to pique their interest?

ARII Ghost box - painted and working

 

Here we go. Job done. 

Painting the stonework was quite fun. I started with Humbrol 64, pale grey. Once tacky, some 147 was sponged on lightly, followed by talculm powder to blend the colours and add texture. Left to dry overnight, the finishing touch was a thin wash of 67 grey, dried with a hardryer. This last step is partly because I was impatient, but it also allows me to see the effect and add to it if required. 

The soil is earth colour, washed with track colour. This caused the base to lift in a couple of places, I should have given it a longer drying time, so a bit of scruffy static grass held down with hair spray adds a suitably run-down look. 

On the front, you can see a skull and crossbones sticker from the sheet provided, either side of which are the metal contacts that sense a coin is in place. So that this will happen: 

Isn't it brilliant? Best of all, if the claw doesn't grab the coin properly the first time, it has another go, which is properly spooky!

Time taken - probably just over three hours, split 50:50 between building and painting. For £15, that's about the same as being in the pub (I'm not a fast drinker. YMMV) but unlike most plastic kits, there's plenty of play value for the future to be had as well. If you've never built a plastic kit before, it's not ideal, but the mechanism isn't hard to figure out and is very much part of the fascination for me, so I really enjoyed this build. 

ARII Ghost box - mechanical bits

 

Here's what makes the Ghost Box work. The mechanism clips and screws together easily enough. The builder needs to pay attention to the orientation of the parts, but You can't put the things together wrongly really. 

Theres a lot of pressing gears and cams on to axles, and the kitmakers suggests a small hammer to force them home. I prefered to use a vice as a press. Even the little one on my bench opens wide enough to do this, and I feel that the gentle pressure is better for the plastic parts than shock forces. It's also easier to control things as you can stop th pressue when the vice jaws hit the end of the axle. 

There's some clever work here as obviously they don't want people soldering, so the wires are designed to be twisted around the metal parts that the cam operting the hand woks. I decided I could solder, and so I did. It should make for a more reliable mechanism. 

An AA cell fits in the base, and by touching the ends of the wires, you can test things work OK. Without the lid, that hand flaps about a bit, but as long as things are moving, all should be fine. I hope.