Adventures in modern model making

It all started when…

…as a kid in the mid-to-late sixties, insulated from the drug culture by over-protective parents, I started building models as a way to stay busy. I liked the formality of it…instructions to follow, lines to color inside of and since WW2 was only a few decades back, I romanticized the fighter planes of that war…the P-47, the P-51, the dreaded BF-109 and the plane we loved to make fun of its name…the FW 190…and I built models of them. Over and over again. I hung them from the ceilings, I had them on my cabinets, I had them stuffed in the closets…and after a while and they got dusty and broken, I burned them and blew them up w/firecrackers in the back yard imagining B-17’s getting shot down in flames.

I loved being a kid building models

Then, like all of us, I got really busy…real life intervened. College, the Army and flight school and marriage and kids and bills and jobs and moving and all the other things you do when being a responsible adult. I’ve seen the world, done things I never thought I’d do…from jumping out of perfectly good airplanes, flying attack helicopters, standing on top of Pikes Peak watching my wife run up the mountain…but I missed model making. The feeling of building something with your hands. I really did miss it.

I wanted that sense of accomplishment, that “I made that!” feeling.

In early 2019 I started watching YouTube vids and figured it would be a good time to start modeling again and it was a shock. The model making world had changed since the days of Aurora, Revell, and Monogram and all the other model makers of the day. I've never used an airbrush. I didn’t know what “PE” meant or “out of the box”.

I was stunned

It didn’t take long to figure out the Internet has made all this possible. The talent coming out of Eastern Europe and Britain and around the world building and supporting models has brought together the entire planet. I recently figured out I’ve bought parts in 15 countries around the world, from China to Budapest to London, to Ohio, to Hawaii, Japan, and others.

I spent about $1,000 to get started and figured I'd start with the 1/32 Tamiya Mosquito. The last model I actually made w/my kids 30 years or so ago was a 1/48 scale Monogram Mosquito and I wanted this revival to start out with a bang. After getting my new tools in and starting to work the kit, I quickly realized I was in over my head...WAY over. Over the moon over. So I did the next best thing and bought a "starter" model...the 1/48 Tamiya Spitfire MK1.

The Mossie still sits in my stash…because I’m not ready to tackle it.

This blog details my return to modeling and what that was like. What it is like. What I think it will be like. I really know nothing about this hobby compared to those of you who have been toiling away for years and years and I have miles to go before I’m comfortable building models again…but you have to start somewhere.

So here are my build logs (among other musings)…warts and all. Enjoy.

Wes Shull 8/20/20