Man working

Listening to 'Urban Hymns'-The Verve. Can't believe this album is now nine years old.....

Just got home from Murphy's Irish Bar in Petone after having completely banjoed all opposition at the quiz night. I'm not sure of the final score, but ours was 92 or 93 out of a possible 110. Got the ponderous 2nd round for nine points, round scores were something like 10, 10, 9, 10, 7, 6, 9, 8.
Crazy.

I thought I'd show you all around my modelling workbench, otherwise known as the dining table. I've captioned it to help with the explanation. I'm working on two major projects at the moment, another 1/72 scale Skyhawk (the one mentioned in the Geekiness post), and a 1/24 model of my car. Observe the chaos at the top of the page.

Anyway, the explanation.
At left we have sandpaper of various grades. Since not all seams between are perfect, and real world objects generally don't have huge join lines running down them, ever finer grades of sandpaper are required, along with filler to make things nice and smooth. The finest grades of sandpaper can be used to sand clear plastic to remove flaws, which is a trick I've heard about, but never actally tried.
As the sand paper is 'wet and dry', a dish of water accompanies it (the water removes sanded material from the paper, maintaining its sanding ability.
Above the dish is the box the Skyhawk is in, with the assembled, sanded and primered rear fuselage sticking out. On the box is some painting instructions, and plastic sheet. Plastic sheet, as the name implies, is a thin sheet of the same plastic the models are made out of, and you use it to scratchbuild (make your own) parts if they are not in the kit.
Just below the water dish is plastic cement (glue), for plastic-plastic joins.
Below and around the glue are various MX-5 (car) sub assemblies. The under body has the suspension, engine, exhaust and stuff. It has been painted appropriately, and then sprayed with a tan colour like the tyres above to simulate road dirt (a process known in the hobby as 'weathering'. Making stuff look like it has been used, and thus more realistic). I made the floormats from plastic sheet, and they roughly match the ones in my 1/1 MX-5 parked outside, including the diamond plate. The kit I have of the MX-5 represents an earlier model than mine, and I have been doing a lot of scrtachbuilding to make it match. So far I have built the stereo, floormats and stiffening bar (the grey bit with white ends), and put in fake carpet. Still have to do the mudguards and seatbelts.
The Mcdonalds stirrer is incredibly handy for stirring paint, applying putty, or attaching small parts to for painting. Various restaurant and airline strirrers are scattered all over the table.
The steel ruler is essential for measuring and cutting things. Steel doesn't wear like a plastic or wooden ruler would, so it maintains a straight edge at all times.
The knife is the modellers multitool. Many, many uses, not least of which is cutting stuff, like plastic and fingers.
A cutting board is essential to protect the surface below your knife, and the grid helps with measuring and aligning. Visible above and to the right of the cutting board are the assembly instructions for the MX-5. These can often be treated as mere guidelines. Following these to the letter can actually work against you at times.
Next to the cutting board is another modellers friend, yesterdays news paper. Primarily there to soak up paint/glue spills before they reach something expensive.
At the top of the paper is gum glue for paper/plastic joins, and other stuff where plastic glue is inappropriate, like the fake carpet (which is fine fibre scattered onto a glue covered surface).
Since I use acrylic paints mostly, I have water for washing my brushes.
The tape has a multitude of uses. Masking things you dont want to paint, holding things together while glue dries etc.
Various paints are next to the tape.
Below the tape, a Skyhawk drop tank (right underneath the word 'tank') has been attached to a Mcdonalds stirrer, painted silver, then then masked with tape for another colour to be applied. Called a drop tank as it can be discarded from its aircraft in flight if need be.
Below the tank is a saw. For sawing things that would be too difficult or messy to cut with a knife. Next to the saw is a pencil, for marking where you want to cut stuff, or where you want to paint stuff, or for labelling similar looking bits so they aren't mixed up.
Super glue is used for plastic/metal, plastic/rubber, plastic/resin, or difficult plastic/plastic joins.
Tweezers are for delicate stuff, where fingers are too big or clumsy.
Sprue is what the parts come attached to. Molten plastic is injected into a mould along the 'framework' that is visible (this sprue has had most of its parts removed, the pointy bits show where they were), and goes on to fill the mould to form the kit parts. Hence the term 'injection moulding'.
The old cutting board is my familys old breadboard that is probably older than I am.
The marker pen is also used for marking cutting lines.
I have a range of brushes, from very broad to very fine, not all shown here. For applying paint obviously. Paint can also be sprayed on via an airbrush, or the spray cans visible at top right.
The scriber is used as a cutting aid, since it makes nice neat lines in the plastic, and removes its own debris so it doesn't jam itself like a knife blade does. Mainly used to reapply moulded detail you may have removed during sanding.
The grip is used to loosen the lids of paint jars if necessary.
Files are for, well, filing. Shaping stuff, finishing stuff, doing hardcore stuff that would either take ages or be impossible with sandpaper.

Caution: Man working here