PLEASE...

As I explained before, that is actually a picture of F1 (F/A-18F CUM 1) in a flight test configuration....it's not really a G.

There's modeling, and there's scale modeling...I prefer the latter...

You meant F...yer not at Pax, are ya?..

No, I mean you Aussies...you just bought F/A-18EF. First foreign sale of the jet. And I've got at least one of your A+'s in my backyard, and a small contingent of you over here buying Harleys and supporting the local economy...

Fine for you - just don't judge those with a different view as somehow inferior. Jack G.

It's not so much "judgment" as curiosity...I'd seriously like to know why modelers get things "wrong" - i.e.; whether they don't know, don't care to know, or are just mis-informed. That's what separates models from toys, and why I'm an engineer. We all make mistakes.

Generally, I find most that claim to be "serious" about modeling and build "mistakes" to just be mis-informed, or under informed. Including the manufacturers. It wasn't until I became "serious" that I appreciated the study of history.

Strombecker had a plastic X-1B. Scale was 1/48th or larger.

Bill Banaszak, MFE Sr.

Somewhere out there there's a photo of the boxart on a X-2 kit showing it flying over the surface of the Moon.

Pat

I'm in North Dakota; we've had only one F-18 up her in all my life - Dan Sadd's aggressor squadron F-18 in "Baltic Blue" camouflage and Russian markings. I didn't even know that he was here (he's from Jamestown), till I went to work out at the airport, took one look at the plane, and thought "what the f**k is that?". They look great in Russian camouflage and markings. I assume they use them to simulate MiG-29 Fulcrums.

Pat

Pat

And Nick Argento (Glencoe) has the molds. He was trying to get them up and running, but I haven't heard anything from him lately....

(Rufus) wrote: cyberborg 4000 wrote: Please don't get Too Mad at what I am gonna say here. But =3D I'm one of those people who sometimes put those Large Guided Bombs and Missiles underneath the Wing of the Plane just because they seem to LooK Sooooooo CooL hanging there beneath a different wing like that. And Yesss I sometimes Know they don't belong there. But Darn it they just LooK really really Sharp hanging there though I guess that's one of the many reasons I think that they call it modeling :) :) :) Sorry Everyone - Okay - Now you Know one of my Deepest =3Dn- Darkest Secrets =A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0... Carl ..........

,, There's modeling, and there's scale modeling...I prefer the latter...

Jack G wrote:

That's exactly it. I'm very new around here, but we'd all better face the facts. The facts are that there aren't many new kids coming into the hobby versus the model builders who are getting older and leaving the hobby due to failing eyesight and manual dexterity (and that's a mighty sad thing; I can neither see as well or manipulate a paintbrush anywhere near as well at age fifty as at age forty; experience and tricks learned during the years of youth makes up to some extent for some agility lost as one ages, but it's in the end a losing battle). And that makes us a bit like a Australian Platypus; a creature echoing a time from long ago that's going to have a hard enough time surviving in the future without getting into squabbles among its own kind. We don't have enough blood left overall to get into bloodletting among ourselves. If we want the kids growing up today to get interested in model building, then we had all take a very tolerant view of what anyone of ourselves is doing in anything as far as model building. Back when I was a kid, I read a article on how to do wear on aircraft via the use of "Rub-N-Buff" metalizer wax in Scale Modeler Magazine. I didn't have any silver Rub-N-Buff, but my mother had some gold Rub-N-Buff... so a 1/48th scale Monogram Stuka got wear on it via gold Rub-N-Buff. This would have worked great if Junkers had replaced sheet Dural with sheet brass for skinning their dive bombers. ;-) So it wasn't accurate, but I got better over the years. Before everyone starts going after everyone else, we all might want to consider that there's a very real possibility that plastic scale modeling might go the way of carving models out of wood, like the old Strombecker kits of the late1940's-early 1950's... particularly when you see those mass-produced, pre-painted, and pre-assembled aircraft and tanks from Century 21 Toys that you can buy at knock-down prices at your local WalMart. Could you do one that well when you were twelve years old? I sure as hell couldn't. So why not save yourself the trouble? Don't build it, buy it. And if there aren't kids sticking gold wear on their planes at age twelve, then the whole hobby gets cut off at the roots. There aren't going to be any old model builders in the future if there aren't any young ones today. This may well be the end of our hobby; but there's no reason to speed that day by squabbling among ourselves.

Pat

he's in western ma? fitchburg or around there?

Maybe like Speed Racer's Mach 5. Add some saw blades in front, a flying bird out of the hood, and Chim Chim and Spridle in the trunk.

Craig

I think so, somewhere in southwestern New England.

i know it's ma. i just don't remember which town. fitchburg would make sense for cheap industrial space and central location for shipping. easy to reach boston, nyc, albany or philly. that's where the old school furniture makers located.

And some of us do know, and build the 'wrong' version anyway. Because it looks cool, or to explore alternate history or maybe a project that only ever existed on paper. The craftsmanship involved is the same, so why the 'toys vs. models' dig?

For most of us, the object is to have fun. When a model is meant to be displayed in a museum or at a modeling contest, then you get to gripe about historical inaccuracies.

I'm an engineer, and for me building scale models is an antidote to the no-risk, follow-the-recipe-precisely world of my day job.

(snip)

Kids can't legally buy paint or glue in most cities in the U.S. unless they have a parent standing next to them to give the okay. That right there would have sunk my modeling when I was a kid.

This is a hobby of middle-aged men and it's going away. The kit manufacturers would like to believe otherwise, though. I always get a kick out of those weird Revell Germany ads (Build Your Dream!) with some gal building a model. Sure she is....

So we might as well get along.

this one seems like a fart in a wind storm. not worth all the whoop de la do. it was a minor thing done without malice. i know rufus a bit and he's a right honaerable guy, so if both parties will kiss and make up, we can get back to the worthwhile stuff. this internecine squabbling s*it is wearing me out.