Author: Iron Modeler

Catching up

Howdy…

A lot has happened since we last visited in October.

Work picked up about the time I made my last post, and it was rather hectic through late March/early April. It has once again tapered off, but no work means no pay, so I'm working to suss out some work.

The holidays came and went. It is always a favorite time of year for me, but lately I get mired in a funk of childhood nostalgia during the winter holidays.

Then came New Year's eve. My wife and I had gone grocery shopping, and when we got home we noticed that our older Feline Justice Unit was having some difficulty. He had his surgery in August, and since then he had lost some weight. He saw his cardiologist, too, and got a clean bill of health. But in those last months of 2018, he started to slow down a bit. He was 16 years old, and we reasoned that he was starting to show his age. He started having a runny nose, too, but it would come and go, so we didn't think anything of it.

But when we got home, he was acting as if he was backed up–his back was arched and he looked like he was trying to push a load out. We called is regular vet, but they had just closed the office for New Years. His cardiologist was co-located at an Emergency Veterinarian clinic, so we took him there. They took some x-rays, did some tests, and thought he had a touch of pancreatitis. They prescribed some meds and a bland diet, and sent him home. My wife and I decided to see how he did over the next day or so, and if he didn't improve, we'd take him to his regular vet.

Well, he didn't improve. We called his vet on Wednesday, and they agreed to see him on Thursday. My wife got him in the carrier and took him. When she got there, the vet had a listen to his chest and told my wife she should probably take him to the cardiologist. She did, and over the course of several phone calls, she left him overnight to see if one of the things the cardiologist wanted to try would work. Basically, they gave him diuretics and put him on oxygen. The plan was to keep him on oxygen until early in the morning, then try to wean him off.

We got a call that night, and the tech said he was doing well. The call at 6 AM the next morning wasn't as rosy–when they tried to wean him off, his sat numbers took a nose dive. The cardiologist called around 9 AM, and said basically that Junior's mighty ticker was failing. We made the decision that our fierce, ferocious, and mighty Tennessee Walking Tiger would be allowed to go be the tiger he imagined he was, and the end came at around 3:45PM on Friday, 5 January.

As you might imagine, he left a big void in out hearts. He may have been our cat, but he was my wife's best buddy, editorial assistant, and near-constant companion. Smokey, our Little Mountain Guy, was out of sorts from the time Junior left to go to the vet on Thursday, and to tell the truth, he's still in a bit of a funk over the loss of his play buddy.

Fast forward a few weeks. I had a minor medical adventure of my own in late January, and after I came home I laid down on the couch to sleep. An hour or so later, my wife walks in and comes around to the front of our couch. Peeking out from her sweater was the cutest little tabby cat face. "Meet Gilda", she said. I knew my wife had already pre-applied to several shelters, and I knew that sooner or later we would have another feline member of the household. When my wife went to see what the shelter had to offer, she first noticed this one black kitty who was meowing and climbing all over everything. But she also noticed a little tabby cat sitting on a piece of play equipment, and when she went over to see, this little kitty climbed right into my wife's lap. Every time she tried to put the kitty down, it would climb right back into her lap. "You may as well get the paperwork ready, I believe I've been adopted…"

Gilda had been abandoned on the step of the animal shelter in the next county up from us on a frigid night with her brother, and her brother got adopted the day before my wife went to the shelter. My wife was happy that not only was she adopting Gilda, she wasn't breaking up any siblings to do so.

Once in the house, Gilda quickly asserted her will. She will prance through the house, head erect, tail straight up in the air, it's tip waving like a flag. I call her "Little Miss Gilda, Large and In Charge. Even Smokey has taken somewhat of a shine to her–they'll spend every evening chasing each other around the house. They'll scrap, sure, but they'll later curl up next to each other and snooze…

Junior's Christmas portrait, 2018. He was certainly a rakishly handsome tiger, and we miss him.

Smokey's Christmas portrait. This was the best of about ten photos, he wouldn't sit still for us. To be fair, neither of the boys actually liked wearing a collar, even if it did feature a chic bow tie.

Meet Gilda. She's our little princess.

She's a beautiful little girl!

Gilda and Smokey, in a calm moment.

*****************************

We're about 23 days away from the Second Annual South Carolina Scale Model Mega Show, coming up on 22 June at the Bluff Road Armory in Columbia, SC. It's shaping up to be a great show–if you're in the area, stop by and check it out!

***********************

The AMPS Central South Carolina Wildcats Chapter is in the middle of a rather large project. It has been interesting so far, between the research and the modeling. To be sure, I have had quite the education on U.S. Army helicopter units in Vietnam, circa 1970! Our client wants to keep it under wraps, so I can only post a teaser or two for now…

A quartet of 1/72 scale UH-1H Hueys, from the 1971-vintage Hasegawa kit. Several club members did the actual construction, I'm merely applying paint and putting the decals on them. One of these is mine, I used it as a pathfinder so I could tell the others what needed to be done. Three will be on the project–two as slicks, one as a dustoff.

An Italeri 1/72 OH-6A, also built by one of the guys. I merely squirted paint…we had bespoke decals made for the project, including the helicopters.

The last piece of the airborne puzzle: An Italeri 1/72 scale CH-47D, being backdated to a "Super C" Chinook and modified so it can be posed in flight with a sling load of howitzer ammunition. Early days here, but you get the idea…

***********************************

So, now you're up to date. Perhaps the next one will not be such a bummer…

Thanks for reading. Be good to one another, and I bid you Peace.

May 29, 2019
Missiles In Paradise

Howdy, all!

The following appeared in the March 2018 issue of the IPMS/Mid-Carolina Swamp Fox Modelers' newsletter, The Newsflash. It is a subject that I had been researching for a few years, and given that we are approaching the anniversary of the day in 1962 when President Kennedy announced the presence of Cuban missile sites, it seemed fitting to post it here.

********************************************************************

Many of you know that I’m a history geek at heart. I lived in South Florida for 30 years, and as a result I have an ongoing interest in Florida’s history. In recent years, I have taken to researching the area during the Cuban Missile Crisis. And, if you know where to look, you’ll find a load of Cold War history.

In 1959, a Cuban B-26 Invader left Cuban airspace and established a northerly heading. It landed hours later in Daytona Beach. It was never detected nor challenged by any U.S. Air Defense assets.

A year earlier, the U.S. Army had determined that there was a need to strengthen the air defense of the Gulf Coast, and formulated a plan to establish 41 Hawk missile batteries—12 were slated for Florida alone. But that would soon change…

In October 1962, U.S. Air Force reconnaissance planes discovered the construction sites for Soviet medium- and long-range ballistic missiles on the island nation—the Cubans had allowed the Soviets to base their missiles there as a threat to the U.S. mainland directly. President Kennedy established his “quarantine” on Cuba, and eventually the Soviets and Cubans backed down.

Meanwhile, Florida became one huge armory. Assets from all branches of the military were sent to various Florida bases on Temporary Duty (TDY)—some staying for months, others for years. At the same time, the air defense assets were also stepped up. South Florida became the scene for various installations of HAWK, Nike-Ajax, and Nike-Hercules missiles. Many of these installations remained until the early 1980’s before they were stood down, abandoned, and left to the elements…and if you know where to look, you can still see vestiges of them to this day.

The key to finding many of these sites is to know two things: the basic footprint of these facilities, and how many of them have been re-purposed after their military use. In the case of the HAWK missile batteries, many of them have reverted to local city or county control and have been used as sites for schools, day care facilities, juvenile detention centers, or other educational purposes. The Nike sites, on the other hand, were largely abandoned and allowed to become one with the scenery. The reasoning behind this is because while the HAWK batteries were single-location sites (the missiles and guidance packages were erected at the same site), the Nike sites consisted of a launch site and a control site a distance away. The launch site contained the magazines (in South Florida, these were large hangars the crews called “barns”; in other areas they were underground and hardened against attack). The control centers contained the radar sites (the Ajax used one type, the Hercules used another) that consisted of control buildings, antenna farms, and radar towers. The key to both are loop roads. That’s right—most of these sites were surrounded by a loop service road, and in a survey of Google Maps, they tend to stand out clearly. Many of these sites have not been totally bulldozed (yet), so their original layout is still visible. In South Florida, the one exception I have found is the Nike-Hercules site HM-95. The Launch Site is now the home to the Krome Detention Center and has largely been rebuilt and reconfigured since it shut down in 1979, and the Control Site was recently demolished after years of being an attraction for various groups of ne’er-do-wells and amateur archaeologists.

Initially, many of these sites were deemed temporary, but after the Missile Crisis was resolved, some were made permanent. Other batteries were relocated to permanent sites. I’m only going to cover the permanent sites and how they look today. The images are courtesy of Google Maps.

Finally, a note: For those who want to do your own “digging”, please note that many of these sites are private property, some of them are restricted, and if caught on site, you will more than likely be arrested and become a guest of the city, county, state, or Federal Government. They have not been maintained, and are therefore getting run down and quite rickety. They are usually in pretty remote areas, so if you have an accident, help may not be able to find you. And, given the fact that this is South Florida, many have become havens for the local flora and, more to the point, fauna—think spiders and snakes and other critters that can be unpredictable, especially when you come tromping in and invading their home. So, it may be best to visit the sites that are public (HM-69 is now run by the National Parks Service and offers tours) and leave the abandoned sites, well, abandoned.

Starting with the HAWK missiles, there were four sites around Miami and Homestead: HM-12, HM-39, HM-59, and HM-84. There were also four HAWK Batteries around Key West International Airport and Naval Air Station Key West.

HM-12: The battery known as HM-12 was located on SW 87^th Avenue in the Cutler Ridge area. The location now houses a school, one of the many uses these sites have served after they were vacated. Part of the original site has been left to nature, but one of the service loop roads remains.

HM-39: The HM-39 site lies approximately three miles east of the Homestead-Miami Speedway and three miles southeast of the Homestead Air Reserve Base on SW 334^th Street and SW 102^nd Ave. Like HM-12, it is now occupied by a school – in this case, a day care facility. It is largely used by employees of the nearby Turkey Point Nuclear Facility.

HM-59: HM-59 was located along SW 424^th Street, just west of U.S. Highway 1, south of Homestead in unincorporated Miami-Dade County. It is currently used as a Juvenile Residential Facility (“Reform School” back in the day).

HM-84: HM-84 lies in the Goulds area of West Miami-Dade County. It is now being used as a nursery. Most of the area in and around Goulds has become farms and nurseries.

Now, let’s take a look at the Key West HAWK sites. The following image was taken from the Keys History site, and shows the locations of the batteries. Key West International Airport is on the left, NAS Key West is to the right.

Alpha Battery: This is how Alpha Battery looks today. It is now the site of the U.S. Army Special Operations Underwater Operations School. The footprint is unmistakable.

Bravo Battery: Also known as the Little Hamaca site, it is located on the property of the Key West International Airport. It is rather decrepit these days, but again, the footprint is a dead giveaway of the site’s past. The FAA has a communications site and has erected several antennas there; otherwise it is much as it was when it was built.

Charlie Battery: Charlie Battery lies east of the NAS Key West runways. It appears to be overgrown, but there has been a movement in recent years to rehabilitate the site and use it as an RV park.

Delta Battery: Delta Battery is almost due north of NAS Key West. It, like Bravo, is a bit on the tatty side these days. A NOAA Doppler Radar is on site (the white ball on the lower left hand side of the photo) and the site is used for Special Forces training. Again, note the footprint.

The MIM-23 HAWK Missile was a medium range Surface-to-Air missile built by Raytheon. A more mobile missile than the Nike Hercules, it was also more compact due to the advances in electronics that led to miniaturization of the components. It saw U.S. Army and USMC service from 1960 until 2002. Other users include Israel, Turkey, Greece, and Iran (who modified some to be carried on its F-14A Tomcats!).

The best model kit of the HAWK is the new 1/35 scale AFV Club kit. It is well detailed, and per the online reviews, it fits very well. Next down the order would be the new Dragon kit, also in 1/35 scale. For the die-hard masochists, there’s always the Revell-Renwal kit in approximately 1/40 scale.

Now, let’s examine the Nike sites. They were designated HM-01 (later HM-03), HM-40, HM-65 (later HM-66), HM-69, and HM-95.

HM-01 started as a Nike Ajax site in Carol City, to the northwest of Miami. Later, when the missiles were changed to Nike Hercules, the designation changed to HM-03. An interesting tidbit on this site: My last apartment in Florida was about 5 miles as the crow flies from the launch site, and 8 miles from the control site. Here’s how they look today:

The control site for HM-01/HM-03 is a vacant lot, but still has the characteristic appearance of a Nike control site.

The launch site for HM-01 is located near NW 67 Ave (Flamingo Road) and the Florida Turnpike, just south of the Broward/Miami-Dade county line. The layout is typical for an above ground Nike site. The three cleared areas are where the barns stood that held the missiles.

HM-40: The HM-40 site is located off Old State Road 905 on North Key Largo. This site is largely overgrown these days. The native fauna is slowly taking back the sites.

The HM-40 Control Site. On the left side of the photo you can see the hexagonal tower platforms that were built for the guidance radars (LOPAR and HIPAR), almost covered by the trees–the towers are some 40 to 60 feet tall. To the right you can make out some of the site’s buildings, many of which still remain intact.

And here’s how the HM-40 launch site appears today. You can make out the loop road serving the launchers. The rectangular lake alongside the side was a result of the Army Corps of Engineers efforts to provide fill for the launch site. You will see that in several of the former missile sites in South Florida, and again around the Kennedy Space Center in Titusville—they would dig fill to make a mound, put a telemetry station (or, in this case, missile barns) on the mound, and let the hole fill in. The fishing around the sites in the Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge adjacent to the Space Center is particularly good, if you don’t mind sharing your fishing spot with alligators…

HM-65/HM-66: This site is located southwest of the Homestead-Miami Speedway, and is not consistent with the others in construction. The launch site is to the left in the photo, and the control site is in the center-right. It was initially a temporary Nike Ajax site, and was later allocated Nike Hercules missiles and moved to Key Largo to the site designated HM-40. Notice the lack of radar towers and the proximity of the control site to the launch site, typical of the temporary sites erected for the Cuban Missile Crisis. Why am I including this one? Well, in 1963 the site was leased by Aerojet General (the same people who brought you the Standard Anti-Radiation missile used by Wild Weasels) and used as a rocket motor test site for the space program. If you get curious, look up the Aerojet Dade Rocket Facility here: https://www.abandonedfl.com/aerojet-dade/ .

It is a neat story in and of itself.

HM-69: Of all the missile sites in and around South Florida, this is the one in the best material condition. Located in the region of the Everglades known as “The Hole in the Doughnut”, it is farthest away from the inhabited area of southwest Miami-Dade County.

This is the former HM-69 Control Site. It is now the Daniel Beard Research Center, featuring new buildings. The roads around the building are a mix of new and old.

And here is the launch site, complete with the three barns standing intact. This site is being run by the National Parks Service, and tours are available from December through April. There is an actual Nike Hercules missile on site that was restored to near new condition. Like the Titan at the Titan Missile Museum in Green Valley, Arizona, this was a missile used for training and was never fueled.

HM-95: This site is located in western Miami-Dade County along the road known as Krome Avenue.

The control site buildings, as I alluded to above, have been demolished. All that exists of the site now are the concrete pads and foundations. There is no news as to what will become of the site, but I imagine the city or county will find a use for it.

And, finally, the HM-95 launch site. The footprint of the upper complex, where the launch barns and launchers were, shows the typical layout of a Nike site, but a lot of construction over the years has altered the landscape to a degree. The butterfly-shaped buildings in the lower complex are the new detention buildings. This facility was used to house Cuban refugees from the Mariel Boatlift after it was found that the Tent City erected under I-95 in the Little Haiti area of Miami wasn’t adequate, nor were any of the others—they were too close to the population center, and woefully undersized and understaffed for the number of people housed there. The decision was made late in 1980 to consolidate everyone at the missile site, which had been in use by the Army up until the fall of 1979. At first, they simply moved the tents from Miami to Krome Avenue, and eventually erected the buildings you see here. The Detention Center is still in operation today.

In model form, one used to be limited to the ancient Revell and Renwal kits of the Nike Hercules and Nike Ajax. However, here's a news flash: Freedom Models now offers a Nike Hercules in 1/35 scale. I have to get one, I think…and perhaps they will see their way clear into a Nike Ajax, too!

There are several websites that cover the Homestead-Miami Defense Area. A few of them are:

The general Nike Missile history site has a little of everything. Dig around; you will find copies of tech manuals for your research and reference delight: http://nikemissile.org/

Ed Thelan’s site, a veritable treasure trove: http://ed-thelen.org/

The Park Service’s page for HM-69: https://www.nps.gov/ever/learn/historyculture/hm69.htm

Don Boyd’s South Florida site, with lots of pictures: http://www.pbase.com/donboyd/memories_missile_bases

Keys History’s bit on HM-40: http://www.keyshistory.org/KL-NikeSite.html

Another story on HM-40: http://www.thebohemianblog.com/2016/01/wmds-in-the-florida-keys-the-abandoned-nike-missile-site-hm-40.html

Another Nike site: http://www.nike252.org/

A general overview of the Homestead-Miami Defense Area: http://www.themilitarystandard.com/missile/nike/homestead-fl.php

Keys History’s HAWK Missile page: http://www.keyshistory.org/Hawk-KWMissiles.html

Another look at one of the HAWK batteries on Key West: https://conchscooter.blogspot.com/2010/03/hawk-missiles.html

A great page on the HAWK batteries on Key West: http://www.missilesofkeywest.com/

This just scratches the surface. I encourage all of you to poke around and see what else you may find. Be curious. Be resourceful. And never stop learning.

****************************************

That's all I have for today. Thanks for reading. Be good to one another, and, as always, I bid you Peace.

October 16, 2018
Who am I to Judge? (Or: I know art when I see it)

Howdy…

Today, I’m going to tackle a subject that I’ve skated around for a few years. This topic, more than any other in scale modeling, can be the most polarizing thing there is in the hobby —the topic is judging scale models. I will try to remain objective and neutral on my observations…

Full disclosure: I am an IPMS/USA and an AMPS member. My last full effort for competition in IPMS was the 2000 Space Coast show. My last model on an IPMS competition table was at the 2005 Atlanta Nationals. Why? One, I subscribe to David Sarnoff's (the guy behind RCA and NBC back in the day) theory that "competition brings out the best in products and the worst in people". I have been witness to more bent feelings, hot tempers, and bad blood at IPMS contests that I can shake a stick at, all because someone didn't get a big shiny to take home to prove to the world that he or she was The God of Styrene that week. Two, the actual construction of a model falls under the heading of “craft”, but the final finish certainly borders on being art. How do you judge art as a winner or loser?

For the record, I have a rather large box of plaques and medals that I've won at model shows through the years, from a 3rd place plaque from an Embry-Riddle model show in 1983 to a Best Aircraft and “Best Between the Wars” plaque, a special award, from the 2000 Space Coast show, so this isn't being colored by sour grapes. I build my models for me, and if they happen to garner some ugly plaque buildup, so much the better. I don't do this for adulation, because after the show is over I still have to go to work and pay the bills…

Without getting into the weeds with the various systems out in the world used to judge a model show, I will instead take a look at the two most common systems used here in the United States. They are the IPMS/USA system—commonly referred to as a “1-2-3” system, where every category (entries permitting) has a 1^st, 2^nd, and 3^rd place winner.

The other system is Open Judging, the best known being the system that AMPS uses. AMPS doesn’t so much judge a model as they do score it, and multiple awards are possible within any given category.

These are some observations that I've collected over the years–some of them are actually mine, but most are from talking with others. The general claims and observations are in standard type, my comments are in italics.

The IPMS system works like this—your model is placed on the table, in the relevant category. Once registration closes and all the models are on the table, a team of judges evaluates each category. They’ll look for basics: alignment, mold flaws, construction flaws, finish, detailing, etc. If a model exhibits major flaws, they’ll be cut out of the running. All the while, the models are compared to each other as well as to a mental “standard” that each judge is supposed to know and grasp.

The models that make the cut are again evaluated in the same manner but to a more focused look. Eventually, the team arrives at the top four or five models. The final cut is taking those four or five models and determining a 1^st, 2^nd, and 3^rd place winner. Remember, throughout the process the models are not only being evaluated to the nebulous “standard”, they are also being compared to each other.

So, the observations:

IPMS judging picks “Winners”! (and, by extension, “losers”.)

If you "win", you get a big shiny trophy! (But if you don't, you get bupkus. This especially applies to competition newbies–they haven't yet grasped the nuances of how the deal works.)

“If you want to know why your model didn’t ‘win’”, they’ll tell you, "ask a judge.”. (This is a noble effort, but it usually doesn’t result in anything. Asking a judge is usually futile, since they want to get out and go home, too–it also seldom works, especially if the judge or judges you consult weren't involved with your model, because part of the IPMS judging scheme requires the comparison of your model to the others on the table. So, even if the judge that worked your category was there and remembered the way the judging unfolded, they really can't say for sure why you "lost", since they don't have the other models there for comparison.)

IPMS awards the modeler, not the model. (Despite claims to the contrary from the IPMS Hard-Liners, the IPMS 1-2-3 system awards the model, not the modeler. Think about it–if it rewarded the modeler, their model's standing in the show wouldn't depend on what else was on the table with it.)

Under this system, a model could win Best in Show one week and get shut out the following week at the contest a few hours down the road.  (I’ve seen this first-hand, more than once. Any repeat-ability is purely coincidental.)

IPMS judges learn on the fly from people who aren't always the best teachers.  (Most are very good at what they do, but I've come across a few guys who call themselves “IPMS Senior Nationals Judges” who still don't grasp what it is that the Society is trying to accomplish–they see it is a zero-sum, win-lose "bloodsport", damn the “casual hobby” aspects of it. In short, they're bullies, bent on choosing only the models THEY deem as an appropriate “winner”. You don’t see this often at the Nationals level, but it is still hanging around in the Local/Regional areas. These guys are the ones who are insistent on judging accuracy, so you’ll know how to spot them…)

What the IPMS 1-2-3 system has going for it is speed–you can evaluate and judge a room full of models in a few hours. A good team of judges can take a category of 20 models and determine the winners in less than 30 minutes.  (It also appeals to most Americans' desire to be called a “winner”, where 2nd place is the “First loser”.)

Now, let’s take a look at Open Judging (sometimes erroneously referred to a Gold-Silver-Bronze system) as employed by AMPS:

AMPS uses an open system where your models are placed in front of a panel of three or four judges and the model evaluated to a written "standard", and are judged in a “stand-alone” situation rather than being compared to the other models it competes with. (That standard merely quantifies the basics–alignment, construction, detailing, and finish–the very same basics that IPMS judges are taught to evaluate. And note that neither organization judges accuracy.)

AMPS has several skill levels–Junior, Basic, Intermediate, and Advanced. It is a ladder system—as your skills improve, you can be promoted to the next highest skill level. This usually takes place at the annual AMPS International Convention.  (AMPS is one of the few hobby groups that also has a Master level–The National Model Railroad Association is the other, they feature a path to Master Model Railroader. Rather than just proclaim yourself a “Master Modeler” because you’ve built a gazillion models, won at the Nationals, and maybe written a few articles for a magazine, in order to become an AMPS Master you must win Judge's Best of Show at the AMPS International Convention. And, in order to do that, you have to be an Advanced member who earns a Gold at that show, and then go on to win Best of Show. ONE person gets elevated to AMPS Master per year.)

The judges write comments on the score sheet, and you get that score sheet back at the end of the show. (Most AMPS modelers want the score sheet with the judges’ comments more that they want the medal–we have one guy in our AMPS Chapter who routinely earns a fistful of medals every year, and he gives them back to us every year.)

AMPS certifies their judges through a standardized training system. (Up until a few years ago, it was administered by their Chief Judge, who would travel from show to show to train new judges, ensuring uniformity. These days, there is a team of trainers.)

The AMPS OJT consists of sitting for two shifts after you've received the classroom training. Only then do you get your credentials.  (IPMS' OJT criteria aren't as stringent. Not to say the way IPMS does it is "wrong" and AMPS is "right", just throwing it out there to compare and contrast. IPMS judges only receive “credentials” after 20 years as a judge at the National Convention.)

In theory (and in practice 99% of the time), a model that earns a Gold medal in a given skill level at one show will earn the same medal at another AMPS show.  (In other words, there is documented repeat-ability in the system.)

Now, here are the drawbacks. Open Judging, done correctly, takes time. A lot of time. We (AMPS Central South Carolina) host a show every year. Registration opens at 8:30, the show runs until 5. Judging starts at 8:30 and runs until approximately 3PM–and this is for around 100 models.  (Most IPMS local and regional shows draw a few hundred, and a National Convention draws a few thousand models. Most AMPS local shows–they call them regional–draws around 100, and their International show draws a couple hundred for scoring.)

The associated drawback (for some) is how AMPS actually confers awards. If you bring seven armor models, all in different categories, you have the potential to take home seven medals. But if you bring seven Sherman tanks, all in U.S. Army markings, you will take home the highest medal awarded to your body of work because their all entered into the same category. In other words, AMPS rewards the modeler and his or her efforts, not individual models. So, AMPS is sometimes seen as limiting the number of models entered by doing this.  (Those who poo-poo that idea don't realize that AMPS has always had Display Only space at their shows, something IPMS has struggled with through the years.)

The only place where someone at an AMPS contest can be a "winner" (in the "I'm Number One!" sense) is in the Best Of's. The Best Of's are chosen by taking all of the Advanced level Gold medal winners in a given category and judging them in an identical fashion to the IPMS 1-2-3 system: count the flaws and compare between the eligible models. Best of Show takes all the category Best Of's and does the same thing. Otherwise, you are submitting a 3D research paper and getting a grade.

All that being said, is one system better than the other? I don’t know. It all depends on what is expected from a model show.

If you want to be The God of Styrene for that week and have all the bragging rights associated with the title, if you want to be the Big Winner, you probably prefer the 1-2-3 system. It is a system, as we have discussed, that picks winners and losers. You won’t learn much from the exercise.

If you want to measure your abilities as a modeler, learn from your mistakes, and climb the ladder as you gain experience, the Open Judging system is probably the one you will choose. You get that feedback from the judges telling you what they saw on your model, both good and bad. You take that feedback and apply what you’ve learned to your next model.

Something else you ought to know–these days there are several IPMS Chapters who have used what they call a hybrid system, where the categories are evaluated as normal in a 1-2-3 system, then the top 5 or 6 models get the Open Judging score sheet treatment. I don't like this–the people at the top really don't need the score sheet and comments, as they usually have a pretty good grasp on what they're doing (yeah, sometimes we "experienced" modelers make boneheaded mistakes and don't realize it, but usually we're on top of things). The folks that don't make the cut are the ones who could really use the coaching. Plus, by not treating all the models entered in the show the same way, you insert a double standard into the mix.

I’ve seen some rather pointed comments made after a show here in the Southeast concluded, the group having adopted one of these hybrid systems. The main comment from one person I know was (and I’m paraphrasing here), “I got two Silvers, but if I wanted critique on my models with feedback, I’d take it to the club meeting. I want to know where I stand when I’m stacked up against other modelers.”

This all leads me to my last suggestion: Before you enter any contest, read the rules applicable to said contest. Don't like the rules? Don't play the game. It is as easy as that. If you see the show is running an Open system, and you don’t like it, don’t play. I can assure you that the show organizers aren’t going to change their judging system for you.

Finally, here’s some good reading material for you…

IPMS has their rules and a Modelers Guide to IPMS Contests available on their website. They are downloadable, and are worth perusing.

Here’s a link to the AMPS system and philosophy.

Both make good reading.

************************************************

This weekend, we traveled to the 32nd Annual Atlanta Airliner Collectibles Show at the Delta Flight Museum. As usual, it was a nice event. On the model front, I didn't get too much–I picked up an 8A Decals sheet for 1/144 Braniff two-tone DC-8's, and later at the "World's Largest HobbyTown" I managed to finally get a copy of the Eduard 1/72 MiG-21MF. I'll give both products a review at some point.

If you are an airliner geek, though, you go to this show simply because of the airplane watching you can do. The show's hotel is the Renaissance Concourse about a block away from the Delta Museum. If you go be sure to request a runway view. Granted, this IS Atlanta and therefore most of the air traffic wears Delta colors, but you will see a lot of other airlines, too, especially Southwest. Spirit, Frontier, Jet Blue, American, and United also have gates at ATL, as do Air Canada, Virgin Atlantic, Korean Air, Air France, and British Airways. Cargo operators include Challenge, Omni Air Express, China Southern, FedEx, UPS, and other smaller carriers. The variety of aircraft is interesting, too, from Canadair Regional Jets to Boeing 747 cargo ships. Here's a small selection of the photos we took:

A Boeing 737-900 from Alaska, complete with Chester's smiling visage.

A Delta A330 on the flare. One of my rides to Mesa last year was aboard one of these critters.

A couple of shots of one of Delta's new A350's, this one arriving from Inchon, South Korea. As the photos tend to show, it was a rather hot and hazy day in Atlanta for early October, but the sky colors were gorgeous.

An Air France 777. This feller usually arrives on Saturday afternoon, hot on the heels of a British Airways and Lufthansa flight–both of which didn't happen this year. A shame, too, since LH usually brings an A340 into town…

One of Delta's 777-200's. I have to remind myself that these are now considered "old" airplanes.

One of Delta's 757-300's. We saw a few of these this year…

Delta 767.

A FedEx 767F.

One of Spirit Airlines' A-319's. Looks like Stewie Griffin should be flying…

A Virgin Atlantic A330. I think I saw more A330's this visit than I have in the past…

The most unusual visitor this past weekend? A United Airlines 787, carrying the Los Angeles Dodgers to Atlanta for the National League Divisional Series. It was getting dark by the time they arrived, I feel fortunate to have snapped the photo. If they had been delayed a minute or two longer, the shot would have been difficult…

And, finally, here are a couple of shots of the new Model Room at the Delta Flight Museum. They're just putting this collection together, so it is a work in progress. You should visit if you haven't already done so, and next year offers a neat opportunity: The Airliners International show will be there next June 19-22. I'd imagine the Collectibles show will also be back next October…

That's all I have this time. More later.

Thanks for reading. Be good to one another, and as always, I bid you Peace.

October 8, 2018
Knowing one’s limitations; The more things change, the more things…change

Howdy, everyone!

Have you ever seen the Clint Eastwood flick “Magnum Force”? You know, the second of the “Dirty Harry” movies, where a band of rookie cops goes out and kills the hoods that have proven difficult to bring to justice using “the system”? Their leader (and Harry Callahan’s superior), Lt. Briggs, plays the role as the cop who is calm and collected, and when he reminds Harry that his weapon has never been out of its holster, Callahan tells him “You’re a good man, Briggs. A good man always knows his limitations…”

Why do I bring this up? No, we’re not playing Movie Trivia. I would hazard a guess that most of us who build models seem to forget the fact that we do, no matter how much we say we don’t, have a limitation. Or two…

The limitations that seem to always catch me are (in no particular order) time, skill, money, and desire. Let’s examine, shall we?

Let’s start with skill. I’ve been at the game quite a while, and during that trip I’ve developed my skills into what I think is a pretty formidable tool box. There are things I can do easily and quite well. On the other side of the coin, there are things I cannot do as well as someone with my experience should, for no other reason that I either have not attempted them or have limited experience doing.

For instance, to me photoetched parts are “the Debbil”! Why? I don’t use them often. I find a lot of things that photoetch is supposed to “make better” actually don’t. When I really paid attention to such things, I was always curious why Airwaves and Eduard would etch a brass replacement—a flat brass replacement—for an item like a door actuator or control stick that had depth and dimension (these days, Eduard does these in their “Brassin” lines).

So, by and large, I’ve avoided photoetch—until now. I’m starting to gain interest again in ship models, which, quite honestly, require a modicum of photoetch to be “handsome”. Without the PE parts, they look almost naked. What this means is that I will become better acquainted with railings and other bits and pieces as I build ships.

The skills that are holding me back right now concern armor models. My poor little StuG IV is more or less complete, but for two things: weathering and completing the base. Now, neither skill is completely foreign to me—I’ve weathered armored vehicles before, using “Old School” methods like washes and drybrushing. I’m still learning some of the techniques that have been developed over the time since I last built an armor piece, and I’m confident that I can get the job done—once I start. The same goes for the base—I just need to knock some rust off and get to the job at hand. I’m close, really close…but somehow, I haven’t been motivated for whatever reason. More on that later…

Time can be a real issue. It was when I was working 14-hours a day, 6 days a week. It isn’t as big a crunch these days, but for some reason I don’t seem to be getting any further on projects that I have up until this point. Hmmm…

When you don’t have time to model, it kills your momentum on any project or projects that you may be in the middle of. That’s largely the case for all of the half-built models I have on the workbench.

Money. It can be the equalizer of everything. Fortunately, I have such a large stash that I probably have any kit I’d want to build close to hand (the only new kits I would like to buy are the Takom 1/35 Merkava 2 and the Eduard 1/72 MiG-21MF). See my earlier comments on aftermarket—most of the time, I don’t see the need. My decal stash is kept in two copy paper boxes, so I think I might be set there, too. No, at this point money isn’t really an issue. Don’t get me wrong—I still need income, but as far as buying new models? Nah, I’m set. Really. Most of my hobby shop trips these days are to look more than anything else. If I do buy something, it is either a consumable (paint, etc.) or a reference book. Money—or lack thereof—isn’t what is slowing my production these days…

So, that leaves what? Ah, yes—desire. Another way to put it is motivation, or lack of laziness. Bingo. I admit, lately I have been a bit of a slug. Why? Well, I had some heavy lifting to do when I was elected President of the IPMS Chapter, stuff that (in my mind) needed to be done. Add to that an upcoming model show that wasn’t really being moved along, so now I’m busy running the Chapter and doing all those little things that need to be done for a model show.. In the space of three months, I managed to craft a Constitution and By-Laws for the club, design and have medals made for the show, manage the club website to include show updates, fine-tune my meeting agendas, and write something for the newsletter.

Once the show was over, I was hammered by an upper respiratory ailment that took a while to kick. I was not feeling much like riding the bike, so I’d plant my fourth point of contact firmly on the couch and vegetate to whatever was on the TV. I’ve told you about my periodic funks, and this is perhaps the largest one I’ve encountered in quite some time.

Now that I’m on the far side of everything, I’ve had some time to think—which is something a man should not do. One of the items on the list is the ever-bulging stash. I actually wrote a short piece on stash management for the club newsletter, but the gist of it is that I really need to do a SIDNA sale. Since I was part of the Show Committee in June, I really couldn’t tie myself to a vendor table, so I’ve had to think of other ways to reduce the number of unbuilt kits upstairs. While it doesn’t all have to go NOW—I don’t need the dough to pay for a kidney transplant or anything like that—the sooner I can move it, the better.

For those who ask, “Why would selling off model kits help your production rate?” For me, the answer is easy—I go upstairs to work on one project, it gets stalled (for whatever reason), and I have hundreds of other potential projects staring me in the face. In a word, it is a distraction. Second, I believe it would help me get back on point with some of the collections I’ve outlined over the years. And, finally, it will give me more room to work. My workbench becomes cave-like at times…

Were there other things that lit a bit of a fire under me? Since you asked, sure. First, our June show—model shows are real good places to draw some inspiration. When you have a chance to look at everything up close during judging sure helps feed the brain. Next, a few weeks ago, we had a display at the State Museum, where we simply put models out for people to look at. I managed to bring several, including the Corsairs, the ER-2, and the F-111F. And, finally, I took a few Works In Progress to the IPMS meeting last week. As I looked at all three, I noted that none of them was beyond hope (I took the StuG, the Macchi C.200, and the 1/72 F-101B), and that if I’d only get up and actually work on them, I’d probably have them completed before too long.

Stay tuned.

————————-

Last time we met, I regaled you with stories of Stuff We Used To Have. We covered paint, filler, and the like. This time, let’s look at model companies that are no longer with us…

I recall the first model magazine article I read that didn’t feature a kit from the American Big Three of my day (Monogram, Revell, Aurora)—it was the article on the then-new 1/48 scale ESCI kit of the IDF/AF Kfir C2, showcased in the March 1978 issue of “Scale Modeler”, the same issue that featured Shep Paine’s Marauder diorama (and my first taste of a modeling magazine)…

Now, I was familiar with the Mirage series of aircraft, having built the Revell 1/72 Mirage III kit a few years earlier. I knew the Israelis flew them. I had read a few short encyclopedia articles on the Mirage 5 and how the Israeli order was embargoed, and how Israel worked to develop an in-house replacement, but had never seen a picture of a Kfir. Here, in color, was a superbly built model kit, right there in the pages of my newly discovered magazine! But the article only raised questions…

ESCI? What the heck was ESCI? How do you say that? ESS-kee? E-sky? (For the record, it is an acronym for Ente Scambi Coloniali Internazionali, “International Organization for Colonial Trade”; most people pronounce it ESH-he). All I knew is that the kit got high marks, and I saw ads for others, including their only 1/48 WWII aircraft kits of the Hs.123 and Hs.129.

ESCI initially would design tooling, ship them to other firms (usually Italeri) to have them molded, then box and market them. In the course of their existence, the produced a series of 1/72 scale aircraft and armor that, for the most part, were excellent kits. They had a huge 1/72 scale armor selection by the time they folded, most of it exquisite. Their 1/72 WWI aircraft series, likewise, couldn’t be beat. In short, if the box said “ESCI” and “1/72 scale”, you could be pretty sure what you got was a winner…

Their 1/48 scale line wasn’t as extensive, and certainly not as finely done, but for the most part they were viable (several exceptions exist: their 1/48 scale F-100D and A-10A were the big stinkers of the bunch—interesting, too, since their 1/72 F-100D is still one of the finest examples of that aircraft in that scale).

ESCI also produced a line of automobile kits—European road racers, mostly—in 1/25 scale, and some motorcycles in 1/9 scale. Perhaps their most interesting kits were their 1/12 F-16 and F-104 cockpits.

ESCI kits had several things going for them, but first and foremost was that they were affordable. Their 1/72 scale kits were usually a few bucks each, and when Squadron would have a sale you could find them for as little as One American Dollar each!

Their fortunes waned in the mid- to late-1980’s, and by the mid 1990s the company had been sold to the ERTL Group. They were gone by the turn of the Century. AMT, also under the ERTL umbrella, took the F-100D and produced an F-100F kit, and produced an F-104G based on the ESCI F-104C.

Some of their kits are still available in other companies’ boxes–for a while in the early 2000s, you could find them in Revell GmbH boxes, and some are seeing new life in Italeri boxes. That’s a bit of a win for the better kits—as I said, I prefer their 1/72 F-100D to all other comers. Their F-104 series was also quite nice—now superseded by Hasegawa’s efforts, they’re a great “budget” choice when/if you can find them. Their 1/72 scale kits of the Sea Harrier, F-4C/J, F-4E, and F-15 still hold their own, too…

Otaki was a Japanese brand who was into a lot of things—airliners, aircraft, cars, even model railroad. My interest in Otaki came from their line of 1/48 scale WWII airplanes. The group included the P-40E Warhawk, P-47D Razorback, P-51D Mustang, F4U-1A Corsair, F6F-3 Hellcat, Ki-43, Ki-44, Ki-61, Ki-84, Ki-100, A6M, J2M, J1N1, K5W, Bf-109G, Fw-190A, and Spitfire Mk. VIII. These kits were quite well done, and for the most part quite accurate to boot. They, too, were affordable. Sure, they cost a little bit more than the usual Monogram kits, but they were less than contemporary Hasegawa and Tamiya kits in the same scale. They also had an interesting line of 1/144 scale kits, notably a Lockheed L-1011 TriStar and C-5A Galaxy, and an Aerospatiale/BAC Concorde, each of them superb. To wit, Airfix’s Concorde wasn’t as nice, Airfix’s and Revell’s attempts at a TriStar were lacking, and nobody attempted a C-5 until the Roden kit earlier this year…

By the time I discovered Otaki, they were on the verge of bankruptcy. I noticed that by the late 1980’s the boxes said “ARII” and no longer featured multiple color schemes and the color plate was missing. The plastic was still the same, though, so I was not really concerned at the time. Arii continued the line for several years, even sending kits to AMT, Airfix, and Matchbox to be packaged and sold in those boxes, too. In some circles, they still exist, now in Micro Ace boxes that still bear the Arii logos, so they’re not really gone, but to me, without the color plates and multiple decal options, they may as well be.

The interesting part of the Otaki saga is to this day shrouded in mystery and whispered rumor: before they went bankrupt, some disgruntled employees loaded some of the tooling on a boat and dumped it in Tokyo Bay! The kits usually associated with this heinous act are the two 1/144 scale kits, the TriStar and Galaxy. And, since we have yet to see these kits in anyone’s boxes for quite some time (Revell AG, Testors, and Doyusha all re-boxed the Galaxy while Otaki was still solvent), it stands to reason that there is some truth to the story. I wasn’t there, I can’t say one way or the other, but…

The last company I’ll talk about tonight is Monogram. Yep, *that* Monogram, before their marriage with Revell, before ProModeler, before the bankruptcy…

I discovered Monogram kits by chance. The first “look at the model I built all by myself!” kit I built was the Monogram Snap-Tite L’il Red Baron, the caricature version of the Tom Daniel classic. A year or so later, as I started down the path to being a “serious” modeler, I discovered their U. S. Navy aircraft—the SBD, TBF, SB2C, Hellcat, Wildcat, Corsair, and TBD. Of course, I just had to build them all and add them to the collection. As I would acquire and build each, I took notice of their other kits of WWII airplanes. As I was to learn, some were great, some were good, and some were, well, in interests of being fair, products of their time. And I built all of them, ignoring the things people cringe about today…

As I started to build jets, I was impressed by the quality of Monogram’s 1/48 kits. The cockpits were excellent, and the kits themselves would build up with no major issues—nothing I couldn’t handle, for sure. I built their F-100D, F-105G, F-84F, and a couple others while I was in college—the F-84F crashed and burned for whatever reason I can’t recall, but I built the same kit again and featured it earlier on this blog. Each of them was a treat to build…

Not long after I graduated from the Harvard of the Sky, I switched scales to 1/72 and discovered Monogram’s F-105G, F-4D, and EF-111A. I was just as impressed. The cockpits were veritable jewels, the completed models were lovely to behold in the display case, and, in case you forgot, they were affordable and, they were made right here in the good, old USA.

What made Monogram kits special? They had the right balance of detail and ease of assembly. They went together quickly. They didn’t need a lot of extra stuff, even after extra stuff became a requirement for some modelers. In short, they were just good, straightforward, well detailed model kits. Sure, they had the dreaded “raised panel line” disease, and some of them exhibited less-than-stellar fit (anyone who has even built their A-10A in 1/48 scale knows what I’m talking about), but for the price, they packed a lot of fun into those boxes.

After the mergers between Monogram and Revell in the mid-1990s, a lot of the kits began to appear in Revell boxes—the united company had decided to use the Revell name for business and financial reasons—and the plastic changed from that nice, hard, shiny non-brittle styrene that was a stock in trade from Morton Grove to the soft-ish, prone to warp, high vinyl/regrind content plastic that came from overseas. I still like a lot of their kits, but when I do build them I try to use an original Monogram boxing to get that nice plastic…

The new holding company who bought Revell GmbH and Revell USA now owns all the history and heritage that traces its lineage back to the old Morton Grove, Illinois location. That is good. It tells me that perhaps we will see these kits yet again. Hint, guys in Germany: Have your kits molded where the quality of styrene is better, you will make modelers world-wide happy.

There are other model companies who have come and gone, and I've talked a bit about some of them on this blog: Lindberg, AMT, MPC, HAWK, Accurate Miniatures, Hobbycraft Canada, and others. Fortunately, Round2 Models rescued AMT, MPC, HAWK, and Lindberg several years ago, while the Accurate Minuatures tooling seems to be in the hands of the folks at Academy (or at least the mold shops in Korea, whether it be Idea or ACE) and make regular appearances in Academy, Italeri, and (before the bankrupty) Revell GmbH boxes, as do some of the Hobbycraft Canada kits.

STOP THE PRESSES!

I originally had this post ready to post on Wednesday, 29 August, but as I usually do, I let it marinate overnight so I could proofread it the next morning. Well, as Ferris Buehler said, “Sometimes life moves really fast…”

The news was broken by the website cultvman.com yesterday: Atlantis Models, a company started in 2009, has announced that they have acquired some of the old Revell (and this would include Monogram, Aurora, and Renwal) tooling in storage at a warehouse in Oak Grove, IL. What exactly they got is still a bit of a mystery—the new Revell (Blitz Partners) owns most of the tooling that was being used at the time of the Hobbico bankruptcy.

From their Press Release:

Peter Vetri, President of Atlantis, states, “It’s a lifelong dream to own this historic tooling and archive material related to these molds; to be able to preserve the tooling is a real honor. We look forward to reissuing many classics that have not been available in quite some time. All of the model kits will be made here in the USA and all the tooling and the Archive have been moved from Elk Grove to our facilities in Deer Park, NY.

Atlantis Models has, in the past, re-issued or retooled several classic kits from the Revell and Aurora lines, so these kits should fit right into their lineup. I wish them well, and look forward to seeing which classics they have acquired.

You can read about Atlantis here.

BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE!

Salvinos J R Models, a new American model company specializing in NASCAR Stock Car model kits, announced today on their Facebook page that they, in a deal reached with Atlantis Models, are the new owners of the Monogram NASCAR kits from the 1980’s and 1990’s:

VERY BIG NEWS!

You may have read some very big news from Atlantis Model Co. that they have purchased a considerable portion of the molds for Revell, Monogram, and some of the other Hobbico owned companies from Revell Germany that were stored in Revell’s Elk Grove, IL warehouse. Well we were fortunate enough to work out arrangements with Pete and Rick of Atlantis Model Co. and Salvinos J R Models are now the proud owners and guardians of the entire catalog of Revell and Monogram’s American made stock car molds from 1980 through the 1990s! In the very near future we will be adding these kits into our catalog with new drivers, new decals and some updated bodies to go on these platforms.

——————–

So, there you are sports fans. I read about the Hobbico bankruptcy (I was still employed at the hobby shop when it all started to go pear-shaped for Hobbico), and I read about the Blitz Partners purchase, and I read all the doom and gloom about how “They’re gone! All those kits are gone!” Well, anyone who has been around the hobby for a while knows that old kits never die. They just get produced by different companies. As noted, ESCI kits are now found in a variety of boxes from Revell GmbH to Italeri, Otaki’s stuff can be found in Micro Ace/ARII and Doyusha boxes, and Monogram kits are going to be in Revell, Atlantis, and Salvinos J R Models boxes. Life is still good.

That’s all I have for now. Be good to one another, and, until we meet again, I Bid you Peace.

August 30, 2018
In the days of yore…

(Or: Hey, Grandpa, tell us a story…)

As the Cajun Chef Justin Wilson would say, "How y'all are? I'm so glad for you to see me some more!"

Since we last crossed paths, a lot has happened. Our Mesa Project is over, ended prematurely by our customer. So, no more treks cross-continent–which is a good thing and a bad thing, because as long as it wasn't in the summer months, I enjoyed the time I spent in Arizona. This also means that I've been between projects since January, which means I have time on my hands–and time that isn't always spent in the best of manners.

I guess that's why I volunteered to "un-retire" and ask the guys in the local IPMS Chapter to trust me to run the club for a few years. "I wanted a mission, and for my sins, they gave me one…"

So, having time on my hands and something that I need to spend time on has got me writing articles for our club newsletter. I've done a few so far, and I have two or three more lurking out there amongst my research materials on projects near and dear to me. The first I wrote was a short piece on the various Army missile sites situated in and around South Florida during the aftermath of the Cuban Missile crisis and how those spots look today. Since we're in South Carolina, and I have never seen anyone in the club do so, I also did a two-part history of the 169 Fighter Wing, the flying unit of the South Carolina Air National Guard. Waiting in the wings? I'd like to do a short piece on the 321st and 340th Bombardment Groups, two units that were assembled and trained here at what is now the Columbia Metropolitan Airport. I've also been refining my "Model Building 101" seminar that I first presented at the 2016 IPMS/USA National Convention. And, while all this has been fun, it has caused me to do some digging in back issues of old magazines–where I'm greeted almost every time with some sort of "Blast from the Past"…

The first thing I recalled were the Alpha Cyanoacrylate Cements (ACC, also known as CA, "Super Glue", "Krazy Glue", and a host of other trade and nicknames) that we had available to us in the day. Dad would usually have one of the syrette-type tubes of Krazy Glue hanging around, and every now and then he'd bring home an expired bottle of Eastman 910, the great-granddaddy of all ACCs from work–he worked at a bio-medical company for a while and they paid strict attention to dates. The glue was still perfectly fine, except the date on the container said it couldn't be used.

A few years later, I found Satellite City's "Hot Stuff"–the original bottles were flat-topped and used the little piece of Teflon tubing as an applicator nozzle. And, boy, did it work! I first discovered it when my brother was building a Dumas tunnel-hull radio control boat. I happened to be building my one and only "real" model (according to Dad), a Guillows large scale Spitfire. I used Titebond for most of the construction–I wasn't concerned with weight, since I was building it as a shelf sitter–but when I needed to lock something into place NOW, I'd hit it with Hot Stuff, and pow, it was secured. I tried it on some of the plastic models I built later on, and found that it worked fairly well on them, but that I was still a bit lacking in my technique–so what I usually wound up with was a misaligned bit of model that took a while to sort out. But it was good stuff, and it is actually still available. In the years since, I've used the Pacer "Zap" line of ACC, Carl Goldberg's "Jet", the "Krazy Glue" formulations, and the Bob Smith Industries products, but if it was still as readily available as it was in the early 1980's, I'd probably still be using Hot Stuff…these days, Bob Smith is what is usually available, so it is what I use…

Another product from days gone by are fillers. Back in my formative years, there was only one readily available hobby filler worth using, and that was good, old, Squadron Green Putty. And boy, did I use it by the metric ton. I'd glue the parts together, and once the glue was dry I'd smear a nice bead of putty on every seam. I guess I liked sanding for weeks back then, I dunno. As my technique improved, and as I realized that I didn't need to use the whole tube on just one model, I started to use less. At some point, I used Duratite putty, and later tried the Dr. Microtools' red putty–nice stuff, but if you are painting something white, it was a huge pain in the hinder. About the same time, Squadron introduced their White Putty. I've used it ever since, at least as far as solvent-based putties go. I've added a few to my arsenal–namely, CA, Deluxe Products' Perfect Plastic Putty, and Apoxie Sculp. That last one reminded me that I originally used Duro's E-Pox-E Ribbon–you probably remember it if you used it, it has a blue and a yellow component, and when it cured it was this garish green color. Once I discovered Milliput, thought, I switched. And, when Apoxie Sculp debuted and I could get it easier than Milliput, I switched.

But of all the products I look back on, the one that I always come to is paint. In my kid days building models in the neighborhood, you were either a Testors fan or a Pactra kid–a lot depended on where you shopped for paint. It seems to me that the drug store closest to the house (as well as the local K-Mart and Treasury discount store) carried the Testors Pla Enamels, and the drug store across the street carried Pactra 'Namel. Back then, we only knew we needed paint, we weren't particular, but I was always under the impression that the Testors bottles held more paint that the jewel-faceted 'Namel jars did. I used the Testors Flats, mostly, and continued to use them when I transitioned from using the hairy stick to using the airbrush for my final finishes. That is, until about 1981…

Remember my stories of the Otaki Corsair, and how it became my Great White Whale, and how I so thoroughly botched my first attempt that I had to wait until the shop got another kit? Between those two, I built the Otaki Hellcat, and since I had already bought the paint for the Corsairs, I'd simply use them on the Hellcat, too. These were different–these were the square bottles of Pactra's Authentic International Colors. And boy, how I loved that paint. I had discovered that using Aero Gloss Dope thinner really cut the Testors flat enamel paint and made it lay down well and flash quickly, and it held no surprises when I did the same with the Pactra stuff. Of course, my luck being what it is, a few months after I discovered the stuff, it was being discontinued. No matter, as I was in for a change anyway…

When I started college, I was trying to be considerate to my roommates, so I tried the original Polly-S. For those of you younger than 30, this was the original hobby "acrylic"–actually, it was latex paint. It hand brushed very nicely, but to airbrush it was a bit of a crap shoot. See, you could thin it with water or alcohol, neither of which was 100% reliable with any given bottle of paint. Some bottles would do well with either, other bottles would only work well with water, and some bottles would curdle into a tight little ball if you tried alcohol. I got real good at troubleshooting paint in those days, and I used it until it, too, was starting to pass from the scenes. When I couldn't get colors like RLM02 and Non-Spec Sea Blue, it was telling me that I needed to find a new paint. It actually found me…

About the same time Polly-S was sinking, the gang at Floquil had begun to produce the "re-formulated" military colors, in the form of their "new" (for 1992-ish) line. Now, I was quite content to use Polly-S (as well as the Tamya and Gunze/GSI acrylics), but given the range of colors, I just had to try the new Floquil line. I did. I liked it. I used it. Well, until the advent of PollyScale…

There were other acrylics that I tried back in the day, too. I liked the original Tamiya acrylics. They were an absolute joy to use. They then started to fiddle with the chemistry of their paints, and for several years I simply could not get it to work, come Hell or high water. I also liked the Gunze Aqueous line to an extent, but I found that it didn't give as good a coverage as the others did. Along the way, I also tried the Testor Model Master Acrylics (the line that preceded the Acryl colors we have now), and found them to be the most useless model paint I ever encountered. The experience I had with them colored my opinion of the later Acryl line until I tried them.

Then there was "Niche"/"Red Paint". They came out in the early 1990's with these supposed hyper-accurate paints formulated for late war Luftwaffe and Soviet colors. I have actually had good results with the one bottle of "Soviet Dielectric Green" I bought (check out the MiG-21 I built–the antennas are all done with this paint), and wish I had bought more when it was available.

I tried the ProModeler paints once, too–the less said, the better. They weren't as useless as the Testor Model Master Acrylics, but they came pretty close.

Coming full circle, one of the last of the "others" that I really liked were the Pactra Acrylics. And, as my luck runs, it wasn't around long once I discovered it.

Back to PollyScale. Bar none, this is the best acrylic I have ever used, before or since. I liked it so much that I simply gave away all my Floquil enamels. If this stuff was still around, I'd be using it. No question. But, as we have seen from RPM (the parent company of Testors, Bondo, and Rust-Oleum) a few times, well, they just couldn't bear having "sister company" (as Floquil was at the time) show up the Home Team. Yep, they discontinued the PollyScale colors in favor of the Acryls…

Since PollyScale went away, I have re-learned how to use Tamiya colors, I have liked the Acryls, and I have adopted a new favorite in the form of Vallejo Model Air. Sure, it isn't PollyScale, but as I have been experimenting and getting used to it, I like the stuff. I've been able to pull off some pretty nice paint jobs–see the Hasegawa F-111F, the pair of Corsairs, and the ER-2 as proof. They make the best, to my mind, acrylic metallic colors, too, as the MiG-21 proves. So, while my winding road through the world of hobby paint has been long and slightly tortured, I think I'm where I need to be.

———————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————–

And this doesn't even scratch the surface of the list of the kit manufacturers we had back in the day. We had Otaki and Nichimo, neither of which are around any more, although Arii picked up the Otaki line for a while–it is now marketed by Micro Ace in Japan. We had Fujimi, kits from whom have only recently started to hit these shores again. We had Life-Like, Inpact, ESCI, SMER, VEB/Plasticart–none of which have survived to today.

And, the latest additions to the list: Monogram and Revell. They were victims of the Hobbico bankruptcy. Hopefully, the new owners of Revell Germany–who now own the entire Revell and Monogram catalog–will re-establish some sort of U.S. branch, but I'm not holding my breath.

On the other hand, due to the efforts of Round 2 Models, the likes of AMT, MPC, Lindberg, Hawk, and Polar Lights…

Perhaps next time, we'll take a look at those manufacturers.

Until then, thanks for reading. Be good to one another, and I bid you Peace.

May 22, 2018
#historyiscool

Howdy…

I was on the road again for the past two weeks. The phrase "It's said the West is nice this time of year" is certainly true–nighttime lows in the high 50's, daytime highs in the mid- to high 80's…

————————————————————————————————————————-

I had occasion to speak with a high school classmate a few weekends ago. That 20-minute phone call stirred up such a rush of nostalgia that it prompted me to bat out a six-page missive that was originally intended to be posted here as a follow-on to my last post. The more I wrote, the more I decided that the piece was more for me than it was for anyone else, and has been filed away in my folder called "Personal Musings".

In effect, it was an essay on history–my history. And I think it is good to go back and visit history, whether it is your personal history (either through memory or some sort of journal), as well as events that shaped the world around you.

I grew up in a small suburb of Ft. Lauderdale called Lauderhill. The family moved there in August of 1971. At the time, Lauderhill was only starting to grow on the west side of the Florida Turnpike, and we were there to see the beginnings of it. Now, I didn't know squat about history then–I wouldn't take an interest in history for another year or two. All I knew was that the folks on the East side of Lauderhill had been there for a while, while most of us on the West side had only recently arrived–from other areas of the city, from other areas of the county, and, like us, from out of state.

I had a lot to learn.

As time marched on, I started to be aware of the events around me. My first real knowledge of a historic event had to have been the 1972 Munich Olympics hostage crisis. I didn't fully understand what was happening, but I know the story I was seeing captivated me. I didn't really understand the significance of the events until I was a few years older, then it took on a whole different meaning to me.

The next event I recall would have been the 1973 Yom Kippur War. Why? The Oil Crisis. It was a direct result of the war. Again, I still didn't understand the strife between the Arabs and Israelis back then. I soon would, and again, my mind was opened up to the vast amount of history that I did not yet know. 1974 saw Watergate and the Nixon resignation. 1975, the evacuation of Saigon. And so on…

It was about then that I started to make a conscious effort to learn history. On my own, no prompting. I read books. Lots of books. Fiction? Nope, don't need it. I wanted the straight dope, the real stuff. For some unknown reason, my interests focused initially on the Second World War. More specifically, they focused on the air war from 1935 until 1945. I ate the stories up. I read all the books I could. I asked for–and received–Edward Jablonski's massive tome "Airwar" one Christmas, and read it from cover to cover over Christmas break. (If you've never heard of it, it was initially a four-volume set. The version I received was all four volumes bound into one book. It is a big book!)

All of this, of course, fed my interest in making models of all those airplanes I read about. When NBC started airing the show "Baa Baa Black Sheep", I wouldn't miss an episode. I had seen a photo of the F4U Corsair earlier and thought it was the coolest airplane I had ever seen. Those of you who sat through my "Every Model Tells A Story" seminar at the 2016 IPMS/USA National Convention know that finding the "best" model kit of a Corsair became my Great White Whale until about 1981, when I finally laid hands on the Otaki 1/48 scale kit…

Growing up, I was fairly good in school. I had the good fortune of being able to suck up information like a sponge and manage to retain it for quite some time. I was especially good at the Liberal Arts stuff–writing, social studies, history–and I was good working with my hands. On the pure science and math side of the ledger, I did okay, but if you'll recall my post of a few years ago titled "1984", it couldn't quite carry me through Aeronautical Engineering. At a crossroads, my mother reminded me of something that I will never forget. She told me, "Your dilemma is that you have Technical hands and a Liberal Arts mind."

She was, of course, correct. As I considered my path forward, I thought of switching to a History major. But, here's Mom again, reminding me that History majors do one of two things: Teach or work at museums. For peanuts. (My wife, whose undergrad degree is in History, has also reminded me of these facts…)

As much as a career as an historian intrigued me, I fell back on my Technical hands and studied avionics, earned my degrees, and have worked in the industry pretty much ever since. Even when I got laid off in 2009, while I poked around looking at Master's courses in history, I knew that the Siren named aviation would come to me, calling me back into the fold…

Then came last year. Actually, August of 2015–the time we were told that the company was moving the shop from Columbia, and that we could move with it if we wanted to, with everything that entailed. And once again, I began poking around, looking at Master's programs in History. This time, I came to the conclusion that should I head down that road, I'd be 70 years old before I paid off the loans, and would be thrown right back to the bottom of the employment totem pole, making peanuts. Every now and then I still think it would be a cool thing to do, but the mortgage and light bills pull me back to reality.

By the way, my selected field, had I actually enrolled? Middle Eastern History of the 20th Century. It fascinates me.

Instead, I'm exercising my Liberal Arts mind in another way, writing technical documents to support avionics modifications programs. That's what has seen me traveling back and forth to Arizona. That's what's paying my bills.

But I still have that undying curiosity for all things history. It is, to this day, reflected in the books I like to read, in the models that I build, and the places I go. I've written before how I was on an aviation museum kick back in 2012/2013. My last post spoke about how I finally paid a return visit to the Pima Air and Space Museum in Tucson. For those of you who follow me on Facebook, you see it in my posts–most of them have some historical tidbit that I toss out to people, hoping they'll bite on the nugget and go read further.

Why?

I just find it, well, cool.

What frustrates me is that I don't see a whole lot of young folks who have the same curiosity. For anything, let alone history. It came as a breath of fresh air when a Facebook friend posted that her son wanted to teach history.

There is hope for us yet.

—————————————————————————————————————————-

While in Mesa, I was able to catch a few hours of ModelZona 2017 at the Commemorative Air Force's Falcon Field location. I thought it funny when I started to bump into people I know, one after the other, within minutes of entering the venue…I was having a difficult time trying to see the show itself!

I thought it was a nice show–not having been there for the whole show, what I did see was well-run. There was a lot of great work on the tables, too many for me to recall right now. Probably the most interesting model I saw was a scratchbuilt 1/48 C-54.

All in all, it was an enjoyable break from work. Thanks and congratulations to the Craig Hewitt chapter of IPMS/USA for putting on such a fine event.

—————————————————————————————————————————–

Speaking of model shows, mark your calendars now for the South Carolina Scale Model Mega Show, to be held on Saturday, 23 June 2018, at the Bluff Road Armory in Columbia. It will be a jointly-hosted show between the AMPS Central South Carolina Wildcats and the IPMS/USA Mid-Carolina Swamp Fox Modelers. Details to come…

—————————————————————————————————————————–

Thanks for reading. Be good to one another, and, as always, I bid you Peace.

November 13, 2017
A Toast to Old Friends

Greetings, everyone!

I find myself once again in the Big City of Mesa, Arizona for work. An old college (and scale modeling) friend of mine had moved to Tucson earlier this year and had been asking if I could meet up with him at some point since my first visit back in March. I told him, workload permitting, that I'd find my way down there for a visit. Well, I had time this visit, so I drove down that way yesterday…

It was a fun visit. We went for a visit to the Pima Air and Space Museum–he has signed on as a volunteer there, and I had not been since my first visit in 2012. As we walked through the place, he pointed out the new additions to the museum as well as the recently refinished aircraft. The museum has been cycling their assets through the restoration hangar where most are simply stripped and repainted. "Restoration" is sort of a misnomer here, because they rarely totally disassemble, repair, and refinish an aircraft as the Air and Space museum and National Museum of the Air Force do. The desert climate tends to make corrosion a minor issue, but the sun takes it's toll on the paint, hence the repaints. Right now, they have the NB-52B, "Balls Three", in the process. I'm happy to see the museum continuing their excellent work, and I'm proud to be a member of the Arizona Aerospace Foundation.

New additions (to me) were the Dreamliner, the English Electric Lightning, and the new Hangar 5. It was nice seeing the new additions to the collection. Spending time with old friends, both of the aviation variety and the human variety, is always a good thing. My friend and I hadn't met face to face in almost 15 years, and we spent a lot of time catching up and telling tales of our time at The Harvard of the Skies, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach. A lot of time was passed remembering our days at the Air Force ROTC Detachment, recalling mutual friends, and sharing notifications about friends who are no longer with us. I'm happy that I was able to make the trek, and I hope it isn't another 15 years until the next time…

—————————————————————————————————————————————————

Speaking of old friends, I received an e-mail from Eric, another friend living in Ft. Lauderdale. He wrote to let me know that the hobby shop we all knew, Warrick Custom Hobbies (re-branded first as "The Hobby Superstore" and later "Maniac's Hobby Complex") will be closing (alas, according to Yelp, it has closed) it's doors forever.

I have fond memories of Warrick. I've written before how I discovered the shop in the early 1980's, how I finally found my Holy Grail, the Otaki 1/48 F4U-1A Corsair, on their shelves. I discovered the first edition of Sheperd Paine's "How to Build Dioramas", the test issue of a little magazine called "FineScale Modeler", and a few other Kalmbach books there, too. I met many friends in the aisles of the store, regardless of whether it was the Twin Oaks Center location on Davie Boulevard, the Griffin Road location, or the two locations in Plantation. Many of those I met at the store remain friends after all these years.

And that doesn't truly tell the full story. For me, Warrick was a hobby shop, a reference source, a meeting place, a part-time job, and, at times, a refuge where I could tune out the world and take in all the plastic wonders one could ever want…or need. During my days as an employee, I got to know the Warrick family. Peter, the founder, would stop in from time to time, especially around Christmas. His daughter Pamela worked there when she was a kid, and her brother Wally would take the reins when Peter died in 2010.

And that's not to mention the good folks who worked there with me, and the folks who shopped there. First and foremost is my good friend Rick, who was the Plastics Guru In Residence when I first discovered the store. Rick is one of those guys who not only builds a great model, he isn't afraid to help you. Back when I met him, he was immersed in World War One and Japanese World War Two airplanes, although he would build armor and ships as well. He would also do commission work, the first person I knew who built models for other people–and got paid for his work! Rick introduced me to the concept of SIDNA–Shit I Don't Need Anymore–and stash purging. And when Rick would do a SIDNA sale, it was always fun. Rick's kits were like Forrest Gump's box of chocolates–you never know what you were going to get. When he made his last SIDNA purge a few years ago, he gave me a large box full of various 1/72 scale airplanes he had begun and was thusly unable to sell. In one box, I found two photoetch sets and a package of resin seats. In another, there were three Excel #1 knives. In a third, there were parts enough for two complete airplane models. That was how Rick did it. He would eventually manage the store. He's now in North Carolina, and he's limited his collection to 1/32 World War One airplanes these days…

Scott was the Keeper of Model Railroad Knowledge, also a scale modeler (quite talented, too!), and an RC guru in his own right.  He was also one of those folks with a quick mind and a wicked sense of humor. More than once did Scott have us laughing for hours. A born tinkerer, there were few things he couldn't fix.  When Peter wanted to set up a railroad layout in the window of the new shop, Scott had it up and running in a few days. No written plan, no materials list, he thought it up, bought the materials, and made it happen. He moved to Las Vegas in the late 1990's, and I haven't heard from or about him since.

John took over the store management when Rick left. John was another hobbyist. He was an RC boat person, and he was the person who recruited me to help do the scale judging every year at the annual regatta that the Shipcrafters of Broward would host. John is an educator, and I believe he now lives in Tallahassee.

Mister Mac was my Saturday part-time counterpart–he would work Saturdays, I would work Sundays, and we'd both stop by every Friday to see what the FedEx and UPS man dropped off that week. Mac was a good foil for Scott–like Scott, he had a quick wit and deeply twisted sense of humor. A retired Air Force crew chief, he once owned his own hobby shop and was teaching high school shop class when I met him.  He knew Rick from when Rick used to haunt his shop as a young man. One day, Rick came in with a Revell 1/32 Hawker Hurricane he was commissioned to build. Mac looked at the contents of the box, and remarked, "When I built big scale stuff, I cleaned up my parts the same way. And I painted my instrument panels the same way. And", he lifted the box, "there's a reason. You got this kit from me!" He would put a number on the bottom of the box, and enter it into his inventory spreadsheet. He later moved to Kentucky, then Port Orange. I haven't heard from him in a little while, so I owe him a quick message.

Bob was one of the shop regulars, too. He built armor, specifically armor of the IDF. Bob had served with the IDF in the late 1970's/early 1980's. Bob fit right in, since he had the same sense of humor the rest of us did.  Bob usually had about a month of free modeling time, the month during the summer when his wife and kids would go to visit family in Israel. We knew when they were out of town by Bob's model output. He once brought in an Italeri 1/35 M109 that he had converted to the Israeil fit. As folks looked at it, one wag started to go off about how it was "Wrong! All wrong! I crewed M109's, they don't look at all like that!" within earshot of Bob. Bob was about to go nuclear, when Scott looked the complainer in the eye and said, "Look again. Wrong army, asshole!" We all got a good laugh out of that one. That, and the time one of the kids working RC drilled a hole in Bob's fingernail when he offered to hold the part for the kid. There were times when Bob would bring his daughters into the shop, and when I think they're now both married, I realize how old I'm getting. I keep telling him that I remember his youngest–"the little one"–when she was knee high, and would hide behind him.  Bob, his wife, and younger daughter moved to Israel in the early 2000's, and she served in the IDF and became a teacher.

Larry became one of our best friends over the years. When my then-girlfriend moved to Florida, she would spend Sundays with me at the shop, and she and Larry would swap jokes. Larry would move to Venice, Florida–and later Brevard, North Carolina (he's now in Coastal SC)–and yet we would usually meet up once every year or so, most recently at several of the Atlanta Airliner Collectibles shows at the Delta Flight Museum…alas, this year he has other plans.

Mike, who had moved to Florida from the Los Angeles area (he later moved back to Cali, then back to Florida), would talk airliners, WWI airplanes, and ships with us. He's back in Cali now, and he and I trade e-mails every once in a while. When he first showed up at the club meetings, he had a 1/350 scale USS California model he built from (if I recall correctly) an Iron Shipwrights kit. It was superb all around, and yet, when asked about it, he had an "aw, shucks, its not my best work" reply for us. He excelled at model building, and when he moved away the club lost a major talent and mentor.

Mikey would bring his kids with him, too–his son is in the Air Force and his daughter is married with kids now. Mikey would always have some very nicely done models. His models sometimes seemed to have stories of their own, too–he once built a Tamiya 1/48 Corsair, and when he applied the Dullcote, it frosted. As he told the story, he was about to toss it in the garbage, but for some reason started to wet sand it. The completed model was fabulous! Mikey is one creative guy–he's also a phenomenal jazz musician. One of the first dates I took my wife on was to see Mikey's guys play. He's now in Huntersville, NC, still playing jazz. He's recently returned to the hobby, too, which is a good thing.

Eric and Mark introduced me to the whole "spend Saturday at the airport watching airplanes" deal. Yes, it is exactly as I stated it. We'd meet at Mark's house, load up cameras, pile into the van, and head to Miami International Airport. We'd stop for breakfast on the way and meet some other folks. Once we arrived, we'd stake out a parking spot and set up the cameras. Around noon, we'd pack up and head to Orange Blossom Hobbies. We'd spend a little bit of time perusing the wares, then we'd go to lunch with Pat, giving him a break from working behind the counter. We'd finish lunch, drop Pat back at the hobby shop, and go find another parking spot at the airport. Eric would set up his tripod and video camera on the van's roof, and they knew the traffic patterns and arrival/departure schedules, so they knew where to be when they wanted to catch the afternoon British Airways and Air France 747's. I went with them several times, and it was always a fun day. Eric's still in the area, but Mark moved to Ocala in 2001.

In a roundabout way, Eric was the person who introduced me to the girl who is now my wife. She had built an Airfix 1/144 Boeing 727, and posted pictures to her website. I emailed and asked her if she would be interested in doing a brief write up for the club newsletter.  The rest, as they say…

Rafe is another one of those folks. You know them–friends with whom don't have contact for years, but if one of you needs to talk, you know that the other will be there. Rafe was the guy who reintroduced a lot of South Florida modelers to the fun aspects of the hobby. Like me, he dabbles in a lot of different things, but he is a gear head at heart. Many times he'd bring in a hot rod in "Jersey Suede"–matt black primer–to show everyone.

Mac would move to Kentucky in 2000. I moved to South Carolina in 2001. The guys who took over our posts, Danny and OD, would become Keepers of the Plastics until around 2006, when the store took plastics in a new (and not in a good way) direction. All of the aftermarket decals, photoetch sets, and resin parts? Gone. Reference books? Out. The odd collection of limited run kits? Bye-bye. The specialty paint lines? The racks emptied slowly, leaving the racks looking like what they call in my parts "Summer Teeth"–some are there, some aren't.

I ran into Danny and his wife at the 2016 IPMS Convention. Like Bob and Mikey, his two daughters would usually be with them when Danny was a customer. I will always remember them with their Beanie Baby sheets, ticking off the ones they had and making lists of ones they wanted. And, like Bob and Mikey, Danny's daughters are now delightful young ladies, all grown up.

OD is a volume of stories in and of himself. A Marine F-4 pilot in Southeast Asia, he later flew with Eastern Airlines. He's quote the globetrotter, having worked in Iraq for a few contract companies. His latest travels take him to Central and South America. He was one of the die-hard 1/72 scale modelers in the club, and, when asked, "What color was the cockpit in your F-4?" he would reply that he was too busy trying to not get shot down to worry or care about it. When I met him, he drove a VW bus painted in the classic Eastern Airlines colors of Ionosphere Blue, Caribbean Blue, and white. And the bus even had a pitot tube on the roof. He's one of those characters you're glad to meet during your voyage through life…

My last (and, as it happens, final) visit to Warrick was in March 2012. By then, the plastics shelves looked for all the world identical to what you would find in a Michael's or Hobby Lobby–mainstream Revell, Acadamy, and Tamiya kits. Testor and Tamiya paints. No aftermarket to speak of. No short run kits. Very few reference books…

The saddest part of all is that Warrick/Maniac's was the last large, full-line hobby shop in South Florida. Sure, there are smaller shops specializing in Radio Control, or trains, or paintball. But none of them ever came close to what Warrick Hobbies was in the heydays of the 1980's and 1990's. Between Warrick and Orange Blossom Hobbies in Miami (and, to a lesser extent, RC Hobbies/Tri-County Hobbies in Tamarac, who closed in 2014 or 2105), if they didn't have it, you didn't need it or it was never made.

We had a new member show up at one of the IPMS/Mid-Carolina meetings a while back, and as we introduced ourselves, one of the guys made the comment that he had met some of his best friends through the hobby. As I write this, I realize just how many friends I've made through scale modeling. And I continue to make new friends alone the way. If it weren't for the hobby, I would not have met my wife, so that should speak volumes…

People have asked me over the years if I miss South Florida. I tell them I miss people who, largely, don't live there any more and places that don't exist as they were or have closed their doors. I'm saddened to have to add Warrick Custom Hobbies to the latter category on that list.

————————————————————————————————————————————————–

Earlier, I mentioned the Atlanta Airliner Collectibles show. I'll be heading there next weekend–I leave Mesa on Friday morning and will be in Atlanta by 5PM. A quick hotel shuttle, and I'll meet up with my wife.  We usually spend a few hours watching airplanes from the hotel balcony, then grab some supper. We'll spend the morning Saturday at the Delta Flight Museum, where we usually will see at least two or three other friends. Usually, we'll bump into Patrick, Mike (a different one), Paul, Danny (another one), and sometimes Donnie, and our version of "The Alabama Gang", Mike (yet another Mike!) and Tony from Huntsville. We always have a great time, talking airplanes and models. Once we've had our fill, we head to Kennesaw to visit the HobbyTown (the chain's largest store, we're told, and I believe it). And, we usually grab lunch at El Nopalito right next door. Sometimes it is just the two of us, other times we'll share a meal with Patrick, Larry, or our friend Rob when he visits from Alaska.

After lunch, we go back to the hotel and watch airplanes again. If you're not an airplane geek, you won't get it…

If you're in the area, stop in. I'm not affiliated with the show, I just think it is a fun day…

—————————————————————————————————————————————————-

Thanks for reading. Be good to one another. I bid you Peace, and remind you to cherish your friendships, wherever you find them.

October 1, 2017
On a roll…

Howdy, all!

Working from home is a big plus. Sure, there are distractions, but working from the house means I don't spend two and a half hours driving to and from to start and end a 12-14 hour day. The lack of travel time means I can spend it at the workbench after I'm done pecking away at the computer at the tech documents that work requires. That means I have been getting things done. I've showed a few of them in previous posts, but those were all projects that I began recently. What about those projects I've been telling you about for years? Thanks for asking…

First up: Monogram's F-82 Twin Mustang. This was another recent project that started out as a scribing demonstration for the club. I finished the re-scribing, attended to some molding issues with Evergreen, and them finished it using some ancient, out of production Microscale decals from the decal dungeon.

Next: Trumpeter's 1/35 scale SA-2 Guideline Missile with Launch Cabin. Pretty much out of the box here. I used photos from my friend Ed Okun's blog as a loose reference on finish and display. You should check out Ed's blog, by the way. He has been there, done that, and got the T-shirt–and he's a great model builder, too!

Another long-time resident of the In-Progress drawers is up next: Special Hobby's 1/72 scale ER-2. Another OOB build–but with Special Hobby, OOB includes resin and some multi-media. The only place I varied from the instructions was to add a square-section brass wing spar. The kit joints are butt-glued, and those long, heavy wings would have come loose with little effort were it not for the spar. The only difficulty I had with the kit is that stripe–they didn't give a curved decal to get around the nose, so I sectioned the straight stripes to make it conform. I think I was marginally successful All the other problems I faced during construction were self-inflicted.

In the spirit of "we all learn from the misfortune of others", here's the litany of shame. It is mercifully short…

1. I didn't pay attention to the relationship between the wing, fuselage, and the Superpods. As a result, the Superpods wound up pointing outboard about 3 degrees when I attached the wing. With much gnashing of teeth, I carefully cut the pods loose and re-set them in the proper position. I was fairly successful at getting them correct, but don't look too close…

2. While painting, I initially primed with Vallejo gray, then followed with Vallejo white. The white got a little rough in the areas where the wing, fin, and horizontal joined the fuselage. It got really rough around the datalink pod. I thought I had taken care of the issue until I clear coated the model for decals with what used to be called Future. What do you say when the clean, white surface of your model looks like 120 grit? Well, I wasn't happy–but I wasn't worried. Before I applied the decals, I took an 1800-grit Micro-Mesh Soft Touch sanding pad and smoothed out the offending areas. Easy. And because I had applied the clear, I had a bit of "sand-through" insurance. During the process, I saw some areas that were a little light on coverage, so I touched them up. After that, I proceeded as normal. The results are as you see them here.

Continuing with the Hit Parade comes a model I have been wanting to build since 1986, and have been working on since 2013 or 2014. I'll let it speak for itself..

Yep. Hasegawa's 1/72 scale F-111F marked as Karma-52 from Operation El Dorado Canyon. This one was a love-hate affair. I had built one of these kits back in the early 1990's when they originally hit the market, and I thought at the time it was pretty good. Now, don't get me wrong, the Hasegawa Aardvarks are still #1 in 1/72 scale, but either I didn't pay attention, didn't care, or didn't remember how fiddly they are. All the flaps, slats, and vanes mean more finishing worries–maybe I brush painted all the red areas on that model, I dunno–as well as some display woes. Look at photos, and the majority show the wings swept. For the photos that show the wing spread, the flaps, slats, and vanes are retracted. And sure, you can build the kit that way by doing some minor work to the basic kit–and next time, I may well do just that.

But the big stumbling block for me was the paint scheme. I had not done a tight feather-edged scheme in 1/72 scale since the late 1990's on a Hobbycraft Caribou. In the intervening time, I switched airbrushes several times–from an Aztek, to my Badger 150, to a Badger 105 Patriot, to a Grex Tritium TG.3. I also have changed paints, from PollyScale all the way to Vallejo, with a few stops in between. The first attempt I made on this model was with Hataka acrylics. No bueno. Now, I haven't worked with them enough yet to give them a big thumbs down, but I didn't like the way they behaved. So, I reached for the Vallejo paints.

F-111's in Europe had tight, soft-edged camouflage. I was going to use raised paper masks, but I got frustrated early while making them. So, I decided to go the poster putty route. Try as I may, it never looked right. By this time, I had achieved nothing but Ugly Paint Buildup. A rag soaked with Isopropyl Alcohol got me back to square one…

I finally decided that if I could do a freehand, tight, soft-edged scheme on the Caribou, I can do it on this one. I literally had to re-teach myself to "paint small"–I thinned the paint a little more, removed the needle cap, and had the tip of the airbrush literally 1/4" from the surface of the model 99% of the time. I probably didn't need to, but I also used the .02mm needle/tip in the Grex. Well, it worked. I'm actually proud of the job I did, and I'm happy that I could get my airbrushing chops back.

Between the ER-2 and the F-111F, I faced some adversity. I faced it, slapped it around, wrestled it to the ground, and made it my bitch.

The lesson bears repeating. As Chief Lone Wattie recounted in "The Outlaw Josie Wales" , all you need to do is "Endeavor to Persevere".

And yeah, I know–not the greatest photos. More on that later…

So, now that I'm getting things done, what's next to head to the display shelf? Well…

Washed, filtered, and drybrushed, the Dragon 1/35 scale StuG IV is waiting for final assembly, weathering, and a base (which is also in work).

Another one in the final assembly shop is the Dragon 1/700 scale Mini Mighty Moo:

Last night, I gave both the StuG IV and the Cowpens' hull and flight deck a coat of Satin Varnish, and I painted the Acrylic Gel Medium on the ship's base. Getting closer all the time.

The next two after these will be the Special Hobby 1/48 C.200 and an Academy 1/35 T-34/85. After that, I'll complete the Aeroclub 1/48 Gloster Gamecock. After that, I haven't decided. Perhaps a 1/72 CH-47 Chinook, maybe something else. I'll cross that bridge when the Macchi and T-34 are in the finish shop.

***************************************************************************

Now, the photos. Yes, they're low-resolution iPhone workbench photos. Yes, they need to be better. They're wide angle shots. They're sometimes overshadowed by the background clutter. I've been planning a quick and easy photo booth setup, and think I finally found one that is quick and easy. It was relatively cheap, too, since the materials come from Lowe's and cost all of about $20. I have a point and shoot and a DSLR already, and we have some reflectors and lights (although I did get some Ottlite flip LED lamps on sale–two for less than $20), so I'm going to play around over the next little bit to see what this rig is capable of. Stay tuned…

***************************************************************************

So there you are. Progress on all fronts. And not only have I gained momentum again, I got my mojo back…

Thanks for reading. Be good to one another, and as always, I bid you Peace.

August 11, 2017
Pappy’s Pirates

Howdy…

I've actually had time to put in some workbench time–the joys of working from home and having flexible hours means that I can step away from the desk and visit the workbench. As long as my work assignments get done, the boss doesn't care. What I usually do it start work (the job) at around 0800, work through the day, and knock off at anywhere between 1600 and 1800. So, I've found myself actually finishing projects. Here's the first to be documented…

This project all started when we were discussing the availability of kits for the hobby shop. I noted that the Monogram kits of 1/48 scale World War Two aircraft were getting to be a bit expensive (between $17 and $20), given what they were. Most of them are old enough to collect Social Security and Medicare, and a good many of them are really nothing but shells with gimmicky working parts. Sure, there are some–the Stuka, Devastator, Mustangs, and Thunderbolts–that are still great kits, but not at today's prices. I remembered back in the day, when one wanted to take the next step, we went with the Otaki kits. They were fairly easily obtained back then, and cost around $8 at the time. A tad more expensive than the Monogram kits to be sure, but they were, for the most part, better kits. Recessed panel detail, complete cockpits and wheel wells, and decent decals were some of the high points of the Otaki offerings. Sure, they had their low points, too–the swept leading edge on the P-40E wing, the subtle shape issues on the P-51D Mustang, and the lack of the gull section of the Spitfire VIII wing where it meets the fuselage. But as a whole they were all a cut above Monogram, even now that the Arii/Micro Ace issues of the Otaki kits only have one decal option and lack the color plates that we used to collect.

So, I went looking for the Otaki kits–by the way, I still refer to them as Otaki products, even though Otaki went insolvent in the late 1970's/early 1980's and the kits have been distributed by Arii (and now Micro Ace) since then. Anyway, I searched all of the domestic distributors. Stevens International used to carry them. Apparently no longer. Squadron doesn't have them. Sprue Brothers? Nope. I would try Sentai, but they got assimilated into the Squadron/MMD Borg under the previous owner. So, let's look further afield. Try as I may, I couldn't find a distributor. Until we tried to get a wholesale account with HLJ. And there they were…for about $8 USD a pop!

Now, the owner is still working with HLJ, and we think we found another source, so they may well become New Arrivals at the shop. But that's a different story…

One thing I have noticed while dealing with novice modelers is this: If they're not familiar with the manufacturer, the product will sit. You can explain until you're blue in the face how good or bad a product is, but they won't pony up the dough until they actually see the product. That's where I come in…

I had previously built an Otaki F6F-3 Hellcats for a model building class that I wanted to hold at the shop back when I managed the second HobbyTown branch in Columbia. I also had a surplus to my needs F4U-1A Corsair kit kicking around upstairs–it had been on and off either my wife's or my SIDNA stack for years. I decided to build the Corsair as a companion piece for the Hellcat so they can be placed in the shop's display case as a sales aid. Somewhere along the line, the Otaki Corsair we had gathered a Verlinden update set for the Tamiya kit, so I decided to incorporate that into the kit, or at least a little of it. I also wanted to see how the Vallejo WWII U.S. Navy aircraft colors stacked up. So, I started to do dry fits and some mental engineering to see how well the Verlinden parts would work.

I was working at the shop one day, and noticed that we had two copies of the recent Revell AG 1/72 F4U-1A. So, I formulated a new plan–build the Otaki kit as a sales tool, and build the Revell AG kit as a scale comparison. The Revell AG kit comes with markings for "Lucybelle", the aircraft widely assumed to have belonged to Major Gregory "Pappy" Boyington while he was commanding VMF-214 on Vella Lavella in the Southwest Pacific. Of course, we all know that nobody in VMF-214 had an assigned airplane, and that Boyington usually took the worst airplane ready to fly on a given day. Basically, "Lucybelle" was the prop for a photo-op for the squadron in late 1943…

I had already noted that the decals for the Otaki kit (Phil DeLong's aircraft with rows of bomb mission markings) were decidedly shot, and remembered that I had the old MicroScale sheet number 48-38 with the same airplane (although the name was "Lulubelle, as it was widely assumed to be back when the sheet was researched. And yes, it still had the manufacturer's price of $2.98 printed on the envelope!). With that, I bought the Revell kit…

OTAKI 1/48 F4U-1A Corsair:

This kit was, up until the advent of the HobbyCraft and Tamiya kits, the best WWII Corsair in this scale. It had a few shortcomings–the engine was anemic, the cockpit was basic, and there were some molding curiosities present (the indented ovals on the prop where the manufacturer's logo is, the blob that was, at some time, a raised strap on the cowl). But in comparison to the only other WWII Corsair in the scale, it was a gem. Several companies came along in the mid-1990's with resin update sets, which made them an even better choice, even in light of the release of the HobbyCraft kits (which had some goobers of their own). It was the release of the Tamiya kit in the late 1990's that finally relegated the Otaki kit to bottom of the SIDNA stack, novice modeler fodder.

My copy was what appeared to be from after AMT had the U.S. distribution of the kit (Matchbox and Airfix, too, at one time issued these kits). The indented ovals were still there, the cowling had been cleaned up a bit, yet there was now a mold defect in the crown of the canopy. I was originally going to use a Squadron canopy on this little feller, but decided that the kit canopy wasn't bad enough to cry about.

As I said, I had the Verlinden set designed for the Tamiya kit–like that kit needed anything. Verlinden gives you an engine, a cockpit, and some elevators and assorted bits and bobs. I decided to use only the engine and cockpit. Now, I'm really bad about taking in progress pictures, so I don't have any to show. What I can tell you is this: I used the kit aft cockpit bulkhead and control stick, and engineered up a control system with some Evergreen rod and strip stock. I used the Revell kit as a guide (a handy thing to have, too!). Otherwise, I assembled and painted the Verlinden cockpit parts and offered them up to see what I needed to do. The forward bulkhead needed some trimming, so I cut it back until it fit within the fuselage. It took a little bit of work, but nothing beyond the capabilities of an average modeler.

The engine was done in much the same manner–I had to sand down the cylinder heads a wee bit to fit within the cowling, but nothing too difficult. Be sure to have assembled the cowling halves and allow the cement to set overnight before you start fitting the engine, since forcing the engine into the cowl will split it back apart. The biggest thing to watch for is the alignment–the magnetos are on top of the gear case. What I did was dry fit the cowl to the fuselage and marked the top centerline. Then, when I installed the engine, I made sure that the center of the crankcase was in line with the mark. Easy…

I bored a hole in the crankcase to accept a prop shaft made from Evergreen rod. Fill in those oval depressions, and the prop is ready. I drilled out the flattened bumps that Otaki wants us to think are exhausts. I figured I'd paint them in after the rest of the paint work was done. If I build another one of these, I'll do what I did in 1981 when I built my first Otaki Corsair and bore out the exhausts completely and insert new exhausts made from tubing…

The rest of the assembly was per the kit instructions. I didn't do this, but if your test fitting shows a gap along the wing roots, you might want to install some sort of backer so that any filler you use has a place to grab on to. My example did need filler, so I swiped a bit of Perfect Plastic Putty (PPP) along the wing-to-fuselage joint and cleaned it up with a damp Q-Tip. The stabilizers fit quite well, no filler was needed. The only filler I needed on the fuselage was to fill the holes for the belly tank mounts–I first plugged them with scraps of styrene, then filled with PPP. The cowl was the last thing to attach, mind the gaps.

The canopy was cleaned, masked, and installed on the airplane. There was a gap along the windscreen, so I shot some flat black paint (the interior color of the windscreen frames), let it dry, then applied a little PPP into the gap. I cleaned it up with a damp Q-Tip, and let it dry. I then shot some FS34102 green over the canopy frames (the cockpit interior color) and allowed it to dry. By the way, the black paint was applied first so that the white putty wouldn't show…

I installed the landing gear and struts at this time. Not something I do all the time, but I did it to save some time. I painted the wheels and tires separately from the rest of the model.

The rest of the paint job was standard U.S. Navy Tri-color from 1943. I used the Vallejo colors, and I liked how they looked–the remind me of the old Pactra Authentic International Colors that I used on one of these kits (and an Otaki Hellcat) when I originally built them in the early 1980's. The key to the paint scheme is to paint the white, then the Sea Blue, then the Intermediate Blue. The Sea Blue tends to "absorb" the overspray from the Intermediate blue, so you only need to be really fussy along the Intermediate Blue/White demarcation. Even so, I had to do some touch-up work on all three colors.  I'm still getting the hang of the Vallejo paints, but I think everything came out well.

After the paint had a few nights to fully dry/cure, I clear coated the model. My clear of choice is whatever they're calling Future these days, thinned 50-50 with Isopropyl Alcohol. I usually apply three or four thin coats and allow it to dry for a day or so…

The Microscale decals were a gamble I decided to take–they were originally purchased in 1987, but had been kept indoors, in an air conditioned house, in their sealed envelope. I figured they'd work well, and I wasn't disappointed. They went down beautifully, and all I needed was some diluted Solvaset to get them to hug every surface detail like paint. Given that the research for this sheet was done in the '60's and '70's, it achieved the results I was looking for. As an aside, I botched one of the "86" decals on the strut door–I later found it balled up on the Future bottle! One of these days, I may replace it…

Final finish was Vallejo's Matt Varnish. Next time, I'll probably use the Satin Varnish, since the Matt Varnish is absolutely, completely dead flat. Almost too much so. In any event, it is what it is now. I probably could have wet sanded the model with 3200-grit Micro Mesh to knock it down some. Maybe next time…

I mixed up a tinting color of about 50% Matt Varnish, 40% airbrush thinner, and  10% of a black/red/brown mix and added the beginnings of exhaust stains. Once that had dried, I accentuated them with pastels. The wheels got added to the model and weathered with pastel dust, and I called it done.

REVELL AG 1/72 F4U-1A:

I bought this one, as I outlined above, on a whim. I will say this right now–if I build another 1/72 F4U-1, I will probably seek out either the Tamiya or Academy kit. Not that this was a bad kit, per se, but it certainly is different…

The first think you notice is that it is molded in white.  White plastic makes it difficult to spot molding defects like sink marks–this kit is rife with them. It is also a bit softer than, say, gray plastic. The next thing you notice is that the kit has some parts breakdowns that make you scratch your head–especially the wing. The outer wing panels attach two ribs into the fabric covered outer panels, which leaves a fairly prominent seam. The fabric effect is overdone, too. The bomb racks have depressions in the wing of the same size and shape, which are difficult to fill (especially on a -1 Corsair that didn't carry bombs). The oil cooler inlets have a strange fit, as do the gun muzzle panels. Moving to the fuselage, the panel from the windscreen to the cowl is separate, and the fit isn't all that great–I used Squadron white putty to fill the gaps. The forward end of the fuselage–the cowl, especially–is an overly-complicated assembly and took some additional care to get aligned correctly. Two sets of cowl flaps, one closed and the other open, are included. The open set has that gap-toothed look so common in kits these days. The exhaust pipes are on an insert to be fitted to the forward edge of the fuselage assembly. The rudder is separate, and is the only control surface to be a separate part.

On the other side of the coin, the cockpit is quite nice for the scale. The seat belts are decals, but there's nothing stopping you from making some simple paper belts. The fit of the rest of the kit was good. The engine is a bit tight in the owl, so you might want to trim the bulkhead a bit. The kit went together with no real difficulty, but as I said, you need to pay attention during some assembly steps.

The paint was the same as the Otaki kit. I free-handed the camouflage, and it looks pretty good. Again, I started with the white, added the Sea Blue, then the Intermediate blue. Touch ups were completed, the airplane clear coated, and allowed to cure.

The kit decals were the Shop-Vac of suck. Seriously. They were stiff and unyielding. Were I building this kit for a contest (not a chance!), I'd opt for aftermarket. As it was, I needed the "Lucybelle" scheme and didn't want to search out aftermarket on them, so I stuck with the kit decals. Nothing I tried would get them to conform–Solvaset, Future under the decals, hot water, or 99% Isopropyl Alcohol. I didn't attempt the Tamiya Super Thin Cement trick, I just left well enough alone.

Once the decals were dry, I cleaned up the decal residue and applied Vallejo Matt Varnish. As before, I added exhaust streaks, installed the landing gear, cleaned up any glue spots, and called it done.

Something to add here about decals of any type–how many of you apply the decals, let them dry, then final finish the model? How many of you who do this wonder in six months where those brownish stains on the model came from? When the decals are dry overnight, use a soft, lint-free rag and some water (I use distilled water for decals, since my tap water–even filtered–has a high mineral content) and gently clean off the decal glue and solvent residue. You'll be able to see it as you remove it–there will be tide marks visible when you wet the surface of the model around the decal. Gently wipe the tide marks away…

Another trick when painting combat airplanes is to mute the colors. White, especially, sticks out like a sore thumb. Remember the mix I used to add exhaust streaks? Well, thin that way, way down–it should be mostly thinner–and mist a thin coat on the model. It won't take many coats to impart a drab, homogenized look to the colors…this is definitely one of those things that carries the adage "If you think one more pass will be good, stop!" You can't un-do it if you overdo it short of stripping and repainting the model…

I made some simple display bases from craft store plaques. Don't just take them home and slap a coat of varnish on them–sand the too marks out first! I used some 100 and 220 grit paper to smooth out the imperfections on the bases, then applied a few coats of clear polyurethane to the bases. Once dry, I glues some felt to the bottom to prevent scratching when the base would be placed on furniture and to give it a finished, professional look. I then cut some mat board (I got a pack of off-cuts from the craft store for about $5, which has been good for about ten models so far) to fit the bases, and attached them to the base with Elmer's Tacky craft glue. Put the base on a flat surface and add some weight in order to ensure the mat board adheres to the base. This is where 90% of my bases start…

Because the aircraft dispersal area at Barakomo Airfield was crushed coral, I could have landscaped the base in a few ways–white glue and some fine railroad ballast, glue and some fine sand, or some other product. I used "some other product"–in this case, Liquitex Artists' Gel Medium with grit added–they call it "Stucco" at the store. I masked off the area for the placards after positioning the models to goo effect, removed the model, and spread on a very thin layer of the stucco. I let this dry overnight, then dusted it with pastels to represent oil and dirt on the ground. The airplanes were white glued to the base (yes, not terribly strong, but easily removable).

The placards were made on the iMac. I used Neo Office to create the text, then imported a clip-art version of the Anchor, Globe, and Eagle emblem of the United States Marines. I printed the design on to some colored card stock (65lb. sold under the "Astrobrights" label), cut it to fit, then attached them to their respective base with spray photo mounting adhesive.  That put the cap on the project. I may make new placards, since in my effort to make everything fit the space available, I unintentionally deleted the "VMF-214 Black Sheep" line of text. D'oh!

In the past, I have used photo paper for the placard. The card stock worked well, and I'll try it on a few more models before I make a final decision as to how I like it. I foresee using both products in the future, as the case warrants…

There you have it. What's that? Oh, yeah…pictures. Pictures, or else it didn't happen…

This would be the only in-progress photo that I have. You can see the goofy wing and fuselage construction on the Revell kit.

Here's the Otaki kit with the original kit parts alongside. You can see how basic they are, from the anemic engine to the basic–and incorrect–cockpit. Early Corsair cockpits had no floor…

Here's the Revell AG kit. It is a handsome model, to be sure, but not my favorite 1/72 F4U-1 kit…

Here's a so-so shot of the Verlinden engine in the Otaki kit. Much better…

Here's the completed pair of Pirates. And yes, you can see I left off the squadron information when I made the placard. I can always print new ones and glue them over the old, something that is more difficult (read as "expensive") with an engraved brass plaque.

——————————————————————————-

I have a Trumpeter 1/35 SA-2 in the weathering phase, to be followed by the Dragon StuG IV. The Special Hobby 1/72 ER-2 is close to the paint shop, along with the Hasegawa F-111F and 1/48 Special Hobby Macchi C.200. After that, the Mini-Moo should get a turn in the finish shop. The Gamecock will be a slow burn–I have to engineer wing struts, attach the wings, and then it'll see the paint booth. So, there's no end to the projects in progress just yet…

That being said, I did what I usually do when one area of the workbench is occupied with a nearly finished model–I pulled a partially started kit down and started playing with it. In this case, I bought one of the reissued Monogram 1/72 P-82G kits and used it for a very abbreviated scribing demonstration at a club meeting. I tossed the parts back in the box, and tossed the box on top of the stack. While I was waiting for some of the finishes to dry on the Corsairs and Guideline, I opened the box and realized that I hadn't made a compete hash of the rescribing that I did for the guys, so I cleaned up what I did, and continued. The wing is now 95% done, and I've started on the fuselages. Other than that, I think this will be an out of box build (well, the gun openings on the wing center section are short-shot, so I have to engineer a fix for that), using the kit decals. This is a Revell USA kit, so I'm hoping the decals behave. If they don't, I do have a Microscale sheet waiting in the wings. I still haven't decided whether I'll build the F-82F in all-black or the F-82G in natural metal and Insignia Red–I guess it all depends on just how successful the re-scribe job was…

———————————————————————————-

Thanks for reading. Be good to one another, and I bid you Peace.

May 8, 2017
Big ol’ jet airliner…

Howdy…

With the new job, I've had reason to do some air travel over the past few months. A few observations…

First, I had a trip to the Dallas area in late February. It was my first ride on an Embraer 175/195, and I was surprised. Unlike the older 145, there wasn't the annoying Dutch Roll through the flight, which was good. And, unlike the Baby Jungle Jet, it was 2X2 seating. Which kind of sucks. I liked getting an A seat, which was the best of both worlds–a window seat and an aisle seat. No matter, it was a neat airplane.

About 5 weeks later, I was called to the Phoenix area. I chose to fly Delta, since, well, when you're in the Southeast, it is simply what you do. The flights between Columbia and Atlanta are predictable, with predictable equipment: MD-80's or CRJ's. Now, the MD-80's (MD-88's, usually) aren't too bad–I've flown on them many times. As long as I get an aisle seat (or at least seat on the right side of the airplane in the two abreast row), I'm good. CRJ's, on the other hand, I don't like at all. They're cramped, the windows are too low…and, if you sit over the wing, you know right away when the landing gear either hits the uplock or the pilot selects gear down–it sounds like a gunshot. One of these days, I'll schedule a flight on one of Delta's MD-95's…

The first Atlanta to Phoenix leg was on an Airbus A330. Not having flown on a product of Toulouse, I was surprised at how nice the ride was. It was certainly one of the better flights I've been on, air transport-wise. I'll do it again, too. I liked the fact that even the "Cattle-Class" seats were roomy enough–although the guy next to me didn't understand boundaries, and wanted to try and sit side-saddle–in the four abreast middle row. Those of us on either side of him had to constantly tell him to get back in his seat–the one he paid for, not that one and half of ours, too. I am a big fan of Delta's seatback monitors–I caught the Amy Adams movie "Arrival", which was an interesting movie. I had some time to go, so I started to watch "Office Christmas Party", and yes, it was one of those stupid silly movies. And yes, I enjoyed it.

The return flight was okay, too, but it was on one of Delta's A320's. I can't really complain, but Delta has found a way to install seat-back screens on everything short of the CRJ's. This one? Nope. Not a big deal, as I was fighting a bit of a cold that day. It was probably just as well that I could snooze during the flight.

The first trip was like clockwork up until the last leg between Atlanta and Columbia. But even that wasn't a big deal, we had a maintenance delay that saw us arrive an hour late. However, you would have thought they told us we weren't leaving for a week by the reaction of some of my fellow travelers. More on delays and how unbearable other people can be in a minute.

My most recent trip? Well, I was scheduled to fly on April 6th. If you recall, that was the day Delta had a little bit of a problem with airplanes and crews out of position due to some bad weather. I got the message that my flight was cancelled before I had a chance to take a shower. I went online and called at the same time–and got a message that the call waiting list was up to at least two hours. So, I rebooked online. I tried to rebook for the next day, no dice. I did the next best thing and rebooked for Saturday, April 7th. Surely, things would be better by then…

Well, two things I learned: When you rebook a flight, for some reason you don't get the text alerts. Well, at least I didn't. I got to the airport with plenty of time to spare–which was a good thing–only to find the Columbia to Atlanta flight had once again been cancelled. So, I joined the queue at the Delta ticket counter. Now, maybe my 30 years in the aviation industry has prepared me for things like this, I dunno, but I watched a young lady rip the ticket agent up one side and down the other because of the delay. It wasn't the ticket agent's fault, so I don't know what this lady thought she would get in exchange.  She stormed off, and I approached the agent. She took a look at my ticket, and offered a voucher for a taxi from Columbia to Atlanta–which is about a four-hour trip. I had some time to play with, but I had to leave quickly if I was going to make my connection. "Oh, there's a line of taxis waiting outside", I was told. Uh, sure there were. We're talking Saturday of The Master's weekend–Augusta is about 80 miles up I-20. Rental cars and taxis are usually in short supply.

A few Checker Yellow cabs drove up and picked up people in the same boat we were, only they were headed for Charlotte and Charleston. Minivan taxis with one passenger. Not too efficient.   But I did call them, and I told them that there were at least ten people who needed to get to Atlanta, and quickly. So, the minivan pulls up–and the driver only wants to take two of us. Not happening. We told him to load the minivan up, which after a call to the dispatcher, he finally did. The ride was uneventful otherwise–given that a bridge on I-85 on the other side of Atlanta had collapsed days earlier, it could have been much worse. We arrived at the Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport at noon, my flight out was scheduled for a 2PM departure.

Now, when I go through the Security Checkpoint, I'm pretty efficient–once I clear the boarding pass/ID check, I put the contents of my pockets into my briefcase or backpack. When I get to the scanner line, I'm pretty quick to pull the laptop out of the briefcase, place it into a tray, grab a second tray for my shoes, belt, cell phone, and toiletry baggie. The briefcase and backpack go on the conveyor, and once it starts into the X-Ray, I approach the scanner. I'm usually in and out on five minutes once I pass the ID check podium. Well, because Atlanta was so backed up, it liked to take forever. Part of the problem was that people still don't understand that your pockets must be empty–hell, one of the TSA agents walks up and down the line and tells you that! Then there are people who want to argue about taking their shoes off. Look, if you don't have a Known Traveler ID, your shoes come off. Don't argue–these people have the authority to make sure you don't fly that day. Do what they tell you. It isn't difficult.

Anyway, clear of the checkpoint, I go looking for a Departure monitor–which Atlanta seems to be short of in the checkpoint area. Sure, there are plenty in the underground areas and gate areas, but I'd like to know which terminal I need to head towards. I finally found one, noted that we were scheduled out of gate A23…and that we were delayed two hours. I'd rather be at the airport than on the way to the airport, and Atlanta's terminals are like shopping malls, so I am more than happy to stooge around the airport while waiting.

Every now and then, I'd check the Departures monitor. Yep, still A23. I grabbed a quick snack–I don't really like flying on a full stomach–and sat down. I checked Facebook, I caught up on my e-mail–personal and work, I caught some of the cabbed TV. And, every 30 minutes or so, I checked the board. About 45 minutes before our departure, a few of us noticed that the Gate Monitor now said "Miami". Hmmm. Check the Departure monitor–the Phoenix flight was still scheduled out of A23. But so was the Miami flight. Three minutes apart. We asked the gate agent. She wasn't sure. This went back and forth for a few minutes until I noticed they had finally changed Phoenix to A24. Right across the way. No big deal. Other than the 4PM departure was now 4:30. I think we finally got boarded and pushed from the gate sometime around 5:15…

The flight was on a 737-900. The last 737 I had flown on was a USAir 737-400. Night and day. My seat was towards the aft cabin, and was a bit bumpy, but nothing too bad. Otherwise, it was a nice flight. I got a chance to see "Rogue One", which was also kind of cool, as I hadn't caught it in the theater. I also watched the first half of "Hacksaw Ridge"–I had seen that one in a theater, so I selected it to fill some time. By the time we got to Phoenix, it was 5:30 local (8:30 on my internal clock)…and I still had to summon an Uber (a new experience for me, but kind of neat), get to the shop, pick up the company truck, and drive to the house. Yep, we leased a house and bought a vehicle, since we reckon we'll be there for a while…

Oh, and air travel aside–that Sunday I truly did catch up on my "Star Wars" movie watching when I caught "The Force Awakens" on one of the movie channels at the house. Interesting film, I see many parallels between it, "A New Hope", and "A Phantom Menace". I've seen all of 'em up until now-even the revised versions–so I'm interested to see how Disney finished the main story as well as how well they do the other stories like "Rogue One". If "Rogue One" is any gauge, they're on the right track…

I spent the week in Phoenix–and if you've never been, you owe yourself a vacation in Arizona. I've been to Tucson once and Phoenix twice, and the weather has been gorgeous on all three trips–I think it rained one night on my first Phoenix trip, otherwise the skies have been blue and clear. I'm figuring that my flight on Friday should be smooth sailing. Right…

The scheduled departure was 10:24. The airplane pulled up to the gate–an ex-Northwest 757-251, the passengers got off the airplane, and the crew followed. Then I see a guy in a reflective vest and the Captain go back aboard. And I notice one or two guys looking under the airplane. Then they opened the main wheel doors. The Captain and the other guy walked back to the gate agent. There was some discussion, and one of the red-vested Delta "Help" agents showed up. I had a suspicion, and it was confirmed when they made the announcement that they had a maintenance discrepancy. The flight would be delayed until 12:30. I heard whispers of a hydraulic issue. Specifically, some hydraulic control module. And then I heard something that told me we weren't leaving at 12:30–"We don't know if we have a part, and we are looking for one now."

About ten minutes later, the "Help" person started handing out those red "Need Help?" cards. Doing the wise thing, I rebooked my connection from Atlanta to Columbia for the last flight out that evening. Surely they could get this airplane fixed and to Atlanta before 10PM EDT…

In an ideal world, that may have happened. But then the announcement went out–4:30PM. And then 7:30PM. When the departure went to 4:30, I called and rebooked my connection for the first flight out of Atlanta–10:30AM. And then I waited. And was once again amazed at what happens to people when things don't go their way. "Get us another plane!" It ain't that easy. Phoenix isn't a Delta hub, and Delta generally doesn't have airplanes sitting around idle. "Work overtime!" Uhh, these folks have 24-hour maintenance crews. "Fly a part in!" Yep, that's what they're doing–from LAX. But they can't snatch a part off the shelf, throw it on an airplane, and leave it to that. There's all sorts of procedures that need to be followed, and they take time.

By about 5PM, the gate area was nearly empty–only the die hards like me who stuck with the original flight. Delta got some pizza and brought out the drink and snack cart for us. I was content to wait–I didn't have to be anywhere right away (sure, I wanted to get home, but I could wait), there were others travelling for the holiday, or Spring Break, or needed to be in the office.  Most of them rebooked for the 1:30 and 4:30 flights. Knowing I wasn't getting out of Atlanta until 10AM the following morning meant I was going to spend a lot of time at an airport, and it didn't matter much to me whether I had to wait in Phoenix until 7:30. Did I say 7:30? Yeah, that's what Delta told us, too. Until they slipped it to 9PM. Still, no matter to me…

About that time, another red-vested Delta "Help" agent approached our gate. "Are you all waiting for 1546 to Atlanta?" When a few of us indicated that we were, she called us to the podium. "We need to rebook you–we have no cabin crew." She looked at her computer, and called maintenance control. Sure enough, they had the part, they were ready to install it…and the cabin crew hit their duty time limit. My trip would continue…

We all got rebooked for the Red Eye departing at 11:30. So, I once again found a bit of a snack and a drink, and wandered the terminal for a while. Oh, a hint–Terminal 3 at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport has a Wendy's, a Taberna Del Tequila, a Starbuck's, and a few News outlets. Terminal 4 is where all the action is. Anyway, I stayed in Terminal 3, where I could watch the Frontier flights come and go. I like watching airplanes anyway, so I was good.

About a half hour before we were supposed to board, I noticed a few folks on the 10:24 flight appeared at the new gate. I thought they had rebooked for the earlier flights and were gone, but apparently they sent their afternoon at Taberna Del Tequila. And they apparently had consumed some beer. A lot of beer.  There were about a half-dozen of them, and they were all shit-faced, a couple almost falling-down drunk. I was speaking with one of them when another showed up and got boisterous with some of the young ladies sitting around us. They had started to board anyway, so I gathered my gear and slipped away. The interesting part of the boarding process was when these folks checked in–the gate agents were closely watching them. The same thing played out once we boarded–the Flight Attendants were certainly aware that these folks were inebriated. Toe of them were seated in an exit row, and I was amazed that they were allowed to remain there. Fortunately for all of us on the airplane, all of them passed out (literally, I think) soon after we were on our way.

I wanted to catch some sleep on the flight, but my neighbors had other ideas. As soon as the cabin lights went down, their reading lights went on. And stayed on for the entire flight. So, I watched more movies. Or tried to. I would nod off, and then wake up. So, I caught about 40% of "Rogue One" again, before I switched to "Office Christmas Party" to catch the last 30 minutes of it. And then we were in Atlanta. One step closer…

We arrived at around 6AM, so I had some time to kill. I was going to try and find someplace where I could get a sit-down breakfast, but no joy. So, I did what I usually do–find some snacks and a drink. By this time, I'm running on nearly 24 hours with little sleep, and it was all I could do to contain my crankiness/grumpiness and stay awake. Knowing full well that I have a CRJ ride, it took all I could muster…

The flight was uneventful. And fast. We arrived almost 20 minutes early. I met my wife, we headed to the house (stopping at the grocery store on the way), and went to the house. I had some lunch. And I don't remember much else about last Saturday…

But back to one of my observations. I watched more people get nasty with airline representatives that I could count. It wasn't their fault. Weather happens. Airplanes break. Plans get changed. I've learned to roll with the waves–unlike another airline who made the news for another reason last week, all the problems I experienced were typical air travel issues. Screaming at, yelling at, cussing at, and abusing the people behind the counter doesn't make things better. Stay calm. Be patient. Go with the flow…

The other thing I did with my time was people-watch. I ask you, since when is a steamer trunk classified as "carry-on baggage"? I routinely carry a small canvas briefcase and a small backpack when I travel. Those are carry on bags. But I've seen people try to pass off those huge roller bags or huge backpacks as carry on bags. I watch people struggle to stuff their bags into the overhead bins. I know the airlines have caused the problem in part due to their checked bags fees, but people, c'mon. Use some sense…

I'm happy to be home for a few weeks. I'm about traveled our for the time being. I think I've caught up on my sleep, too…

Thanks for reading. Be good to one another, and, as always, I bid you Peace.

April 21, 2017