Not quite fifty

Prompted by a facebook conversation, a quick audit of my paint stash reveals only 31 shades of grey (there are a couple more I found when I put the paints back).

I do know all of them by sight though (along with probably a dozen more at least). Modelling camouflaged things tends to warp your colour palette descriptions a bit.

2011 Model Expo and Nats

So a couple of weekends ago it was showtime for the 2011 IPMS National competition and Model Expo held in Lower Hutt, basically the biggest model show in the country. Being a member of the hosting club I volunteered at the show both days, helping setup and packdown, and minding a table to answer questions and make sure nothing got broken. Some find table minding can be a bit tedious but I kind of enjoy it. I like seeing people react and talk to each other about what's on the table, and I enjoy asking questions about it. And seeing people take a particular interest in one of my models has a certain buzz to it.

Also creating a slight buzz this year was having someone-who-is-kind-of-a-big-deal in the hobby attending (having a standard setting kit producer based here helps). He did a show report on his site here, which was a buzz for me since he showcased two of my models (taking better pics of them than I did). I also know both the guys in the cheesy-for-effect "be spontaneously wowed at this awesome new release" shot.

He also did a video report which you can see here, which is a bit, um, interesting to watch. I'm glimpsed in the ticket booth near the start, but am stuck in the background from about 4:24, knowing he's filming, trying to look anywhere but at the camera, but unable to move due to the guys judging to my left blocking me in behind the table.

The show itself was in two parts, the annual IPMS New Zealand National competition for IPMS members, and the Model Expo for the general public and club members who didn't want to enter the national comp.

My best result this time was getting third in the national competition for a box-stock (no added bits or modifications) Stuka. It's a minor category, but any result at this level is cool. In terms of skill it really is playing with the big kids stuff. It might not be the biggest show in the world, but the quality of the workmanship is second to none anywhere.
My B-58 also picked up a second in one of the Expo classes, having placed second in the National equivalent two years ago (a model that has placed at a previous nationals can't be entered into the nationals again).
Rounding out my placings was a first in class for my Skyhawk group, but that doesn't really count since they were the only thing in the class :).
In terms of other stuff I took but didn't place, my tiny 1/100 Zero and 1/106 Shinden made the show.
And my 1/72 Thunderbolt:
And my 1/72 F-111, here in company with another build of the same kit by a friend.
And my 1/72 Canberra.
I quite like how the Zero turned out, even if I didn't notice I missed painting a spot before getting it to the show.
Not mine, but something I will be doing soon is a "what-if" RNZAF F-16. More of a "what was planned" in our case, since they were actually signed and sealed before the delivered bit was cancelled by a change of government.
There was stuff other than aircraft at the show, but I was only taking pics of the things I was particularly interested in. One of my favourite models at the show was this 1/48 Buccaneer:
The junior section of the local club did this cool RNZAF Pacific WWII diorama.
Cool Air America UH-1. Air America was the CIA front airline in southeast Asia during the Vietnam war era, and the model depicts one of the last helicopters flown out at the fall of Saigon in 1975.
This awesome 1/72 Harvard was built by a father and son. The picture doesn't really show how tidy a build it is, practically flawless.
Not the usual ship in a bottle
Dominating their table were these two radio controlled flying models, a Spitfire IX, and F-15 Eagle.
The F-15 is jet powered, has a full set of lights, and coolest of all, LED afterburners.

Pigging Out

Listening to: Riot Act - Pearl Jam (2002). Like a lot of their latter work, this album is a grower for me, that gets better every time I listen to it. Especially songs like this one. I haven't listened to it for a while but have had it on high rotate for the last few days.

Not much time for regular type blogging at the moment, due to the big model expo and national competition being two weeks away, and spending a lot of evening time that isn't sport or family working on the stuff I want to put on a table there.

Like turning this:
into this:
Via a bit of this:

And a bit of that:


I am the blu-tack sausage king.

Pig Bop*

*Possibly obscure reference to this possibly obscure song that I quite like.

Revisiting the F-111 post because I think I got some okay pics of the jet that day. I say 'okay', because given the same opportunity now I would get better ones. Since the last F-111's (said "F-one-eleven" for the record) were retired at the end of last year never to fly again I'll just have to be happy with these.

Unusually the F-111 was never given a formal name (like 'Tomcat' or 'Raptor') while it was in service. It was officially christened the 'Aardvark' (the hitherto unofficial nickname) only on the day it was retired from the USAF in 1996. The only country outside the US to use the F-111 was Australia, and they universally referred to theirs as 'Pigs', affectionately rather than insultingly.

The Pig may not have been the prettiest or the most agile airshow performer, but it made up for it by simply being spectacular, particularly toward the end of it's career as the crews tried to make the final displays of a 37 year operational life the most memorable ones. I got to see a high speed pass and dump and burn one night in 2003. During the day these were memorable enough, but at night they were something else. With all lights off, the jet sped in at around 200ft altitude, and only became visible when the pilot lit the afterburners, two bright yellow/purple spearheads speeding across the sky in front of us, just ahead of the noise they produced. It was awesome.








The Pig on the brain at the moment isn't entirely without reason, as I have one on the workbench at the moment.

Build your own stealth helicopter!

Listening to: The Crossing - Big Country (1983).

Found the other day. Less than 8 weeks after it's unplanned revelation, Hong Kong based model company Dragon is releasing a kit of the Stealth Black Hawk (probably) variant used on the Bin Laden raid (link).

Although since all they reliably have to base it on is the one piece of intact wreckage (posted about here), and a few educated but speculative drawings (the people who really do know what it looks like aren't telling) it's accuracy is hopeful at best and possibly why it is only being released in the teeny 1/144 scale so far rather than anything bigger which would require more investment.

If it is anything like what happened when the first model kits of the F-117 were produced in the late 80's, it will make for amusing comparisons if/when the real thing is revealed some time in the future. And the guys that designed those kits had an actual image of the entire aircraft to work from:

That was the first officially released image of the original 'Stealth Fighter' back in 1988 (I posted about it a few years ago here). And probably deliberately, the image both obscures in plain sight some details, and exaggerates a couple of others. This caused a bunch of errors in interpretation, usually tending toward making the aircraft look shorter and fatter than it really was, resulting in a brief generation of weirdness as publishers and kit makers rushed to get definitive versions of something that had been rumoured for years into the marketplace without realising their mistakes. It took a few years for accurately shaped drawings and models to emerge.

Only time will tell what Dragon has got right :).

Zeroes and Magnificent Lightning

Listening to: Foo Fighters - Wasting Light (2011).

Apparently this blog needs to be a bit more manly. So in an effort to up the manly-ness, here is a picture of Manly Beach, Sydney for y'all.
Bebe still not here yet. Will be a week overdue by this time tomorrow. Have now been in "anytime now" quick-reaction mode for long enough that any nervousness will be overshadowed by "Finally!" when things start happening. Fi is naturally a bit over it. Charlotte is ever more aware that something is up, but still hasn't figured out she will shortly be sharing her world.

In the meantime I have been getting some modelling done. To get back into the groove, I'm revisiting a couple of kits from my childhood, the little known (if web presence is anything to go by) small scale Hasegawa Shinden ('Magnificent Lightning') and Zero (erm, 'Zero'). These were part of a range of small snap-together kits Hasegawa produced in the early 80's (at least, I have no idea when they were originally created), aimed at the young beginner market. They were cheap (hence the 'buy by coin' logo on the box) and didn't need any glue to be assembled.

I got one of each back in 1984 or so, and they were assembled and re-fighting the Pacific War in no time. In this hobby revisiting models you built as a kid can be fun, so on a whim a while ago I found some online from a secondhand retailer in the UK, at a cost of slightly more than 75p.
As can be seen by the parts layout, they are somewhat more basic than what I usually build these days, although nicely moulded for what they are (kits intended to be built in the space of an afternoon or less). The Zero is 1/100 scale which is reasonably common standard scale, but the Shinden is an oddball at the uncommon 1/106. Wierd scales like this are often known as 'Box Scale', in that the size of the model was determined by the size of the box it was going to be sold in.
The original Zero I built in the 80's is still mostly intact, complete with inappropriate French Air Force roundels that were applied in the mid 80's after the original Japanese decals had worn off, and experimental camouflage prompted by trying to hide where the brush slipped when I was painting the undersides and got grey on the top instead of the bottom.
It is interesting from a modeller's viewpoint comparing two examples of the same kit from slightly different production runs. I have no idea of the relative ages of the two (other than 'old') but there are definite differences, even though they are in theory identical. The newer one had sink marks in spots where the plastic hadn't filled out the mould properly, while the original one has a warped wing (and always has).

The original Shinden on the other hand has aged so well. It survived into the late 80's at least reasonably intact, but theses are the only parts a recent search turned up.
I might re-use the spinner that covers the propeller hub on the new Shinden (actually it is the only piece intact enough to be able to re-use), to incorporate some old with the new.

Now being that I am not 7 anymore, and not going from in the box to flying around the room in an hour or so, I thought it only proper that I build these retreads properly.

Given the cockpit and pilot in both models was represented only by a ball of plastic in a stick, and almost any change would be an improvement, I cut open both cockpits and built my own out of plastic sheet and rod. They are best described as 'representative' rather than accurate, but still better than not doing anything.
I'm guessing there are thousands of these things that have been built, but I'm betting not many with this amount of effort.

Did I mention how small these models are? If you embiggen the image you can see the seat belts I made up from tape. I have no idea how visible they will be on the finished item.
Since these two are taking approximately a thousand times longer to build than their predecessors, having been carefully glued, filled and sanded, they are only now getting painted.

Only two real Shindens were ever built, and never actually got into service, so the Shinden paint is fairly neat and tidy and straightforward and not needing to be weathered. Zeroes on the other hand were ubiquitous, and in common with other Japanese aircraft notorious for shedding paint in the late war period this model depicts. So to try and simulate that it has been undercoated with aluminum paint topped under the camouflage green, the idea being when the topcoat is done you can remove bits of it to look like chipping.
I still haven't quite figured out how that is going to work out on something this small, or which way to do it is best. Watch this space.

Back to the bench

I often take breaks of varying lengths between active model building periods like now, not having built anything since December. But with summer evening sports finished, winter closing in and the national competition returning to Wellington in a little over four months, it is time to tidy up the bench and get back into things. As a general rule I build for fun not to compete, but the competition and show provides a good motivational deadline to get stuff done. I am trying to start now so as to avoid the power building madness that accompanied my last encounter with the nationals two years ago. I also have a few things I want to try and get out of boxes and on display by then:

It is ambitious given how slowly I build stuff, but I am going for an 'aim for the stars' vibe. It will be interesting to see how far I get by August.

Canberra completed

One of the last things I did in 2010 was complete the Canberra* model started here, and updated a little here. The build took a lot longer than planned, mainly due to some fundamental quality issues with the markings. Still, I got it done just before new years, and duly presented it to my father in a custom bought case. He spent a lot of time around the real things during his Air Force career, and is quite pleased with his new lounge ornament. My mother is a little less enthused though :)

The model is about a foot long if you want an idea of size:

* The British manufactured English Electric Canberra B(I).12 (the B(I) stands for Bomber (Interdictor)) was used by the RNZAF as a bomber / attack aircraft from 1959 to 1970, and were replaced by the Skyhawks that ultimately served until 2001. The model represents a Canberra as they looked from around 1964.

Incidentally, the Canberra itself is one of the outstanding designs in aviation. One of the first jet powered bombers to enter service, the first one flew in 1949. The last British operated Canberra's left RAF service in 2006. Wiki history of the Canberra here.