Leaning_Dog

As I have gotten older, my interests have diversified, and the time and energy I am able to devote to building models has noticeably declined. We have also been through the painful and cumbersome estate liquidation process with a family member who passed away a while back with a huge collection of carpentry and woodworking tools and related paraphernalia. As such, I am systematically going through my stash and setting aside the modest number kits that I truly think I will build with the time I have left. Everything else has been going on Ebay. I recall reading a post from a very clever modeler on this site, in which he had determined that any kit that he desired to build was available online through various sources, either new or used, so why not let somebody else store it. Epiphany! And in fact, for me, the problem of what to do with a closet full of unbuilt kits should I meet an untimely end is now becoming a non-issue. Your results may vary. Cheers! John.

Spectacular build! Your paint looks flawless, and the color scheme is absolutely brilliant. I love Tamiya car kits as much as their plane kits - clever design and everything just fits. Thanks for sharing. Cheers! John.

Spectacular build of a superb, yet challenging kit! Thanks for sharing. Cheers! John.

Awesome build! Cheers! John.

First issued by Revell in 1957, and reissued several times over the years, the tooling was recently acquired by Atlantis Models. I've always wanted to build this one, so I ordered the kit when it was released last spring. Atlantis has retained the original box artwork which I really like. I did a quick search online for period photographs and didn't see any marked up quite like this, so elected to only apply the U.S. Army decals. There's a lot of nice detail on the launcher that begs to be noticed, so after priming with Tamiya fine surface primer, then spraying Tamiya TS-5 Olive Drab right from the rattle can, I applied a little Tamiya black panel line wash, followed by some dry-brushing with Tamiya XF-60 dark yellow. I didn't get too worked up over some of the seams and sink marks. With some careful sanding, filing, and fitting, the mechanism to raise and lower the missile does in fact work. (cue appropriate hydraulic pump noises...) I did spend some time sanding off all the large rivets on the missile. Then I gently scribed over the "panel" lines to sharpen them up a bit. From the historic photos it looked like these were kept spotless so no weathering at all. The white sections of the missile were primed with Tamiya fine surface primer, then given a coat of Future floor polish to get a bit of shine like the real ones had. The "U.S. Army" markings were the only decals used, and they were excellent. After all, you want to be sure everybody knows who shot this thing when it rockets past at 2,700 mph. The booster section was sprayed with Tamiya TS-5 Olive Drab right out of the can. The only fiddly bit of the entire build was getting the three sections of the missile to line up - it had serious 'banana' tendencies. Don't know if that was self-induced, or just part of the fun of working with a vintage kit. Either way, it was easy to fix. I liked this build a lot. It was an easy, no-stress build that looks great in the cabinet. Sorry for the cluttered bench photos - I had hoped to take some pics outside but its currently snowing and it could be a while before the next sunny afternoon. Cheers! John.

I've been looking for an "affordable" one of these old Hobby Craft Sea Fury kits for quite a while - this one popped up on Ebay for $80 which seemed a little expensive, until I noticed that it included Paul Fisher's Cockpit Up-grade set, brand new, in the box, never even opened. Just had to jump on it! And yes, that Fisher cockpit up-grade set (with correct canopy) is spectacular. Now I need to find Paul's up-grade sets for the spinner/prop and wheels... Cheers! John.

Hi Iain - That's brilliant stuff right here - thanks for sharing your work and taking us along for the journey. Cheers! John.

Hi Dan - Everything about this one is just brilliant. Thanks for sharing! Cheers! John.

Just awesome. Cheers! John.

Epic. Cheers! John

You, my friend, are an inspiration to us all. Thank you for sharing. Cheers! John

Beautiful build! I'm a bit burned out on aircraft and have started tinkering around with car models - high gloss finishes are a whole different ball game and you nailed this one. Thanks for sharing. Cheers! John.

There are some great ideas in this thread so far - and I won't let the fact that I have failed to complete every group build project I've ever started deter me from suggesting a couple more.... - Cheap Thrills: Any kit of any LSP subject so long as the all-in cost (kit, decals, resin bits, etc) is less than $50 USD (or whatever value is deemed appropriate). Could be an Ebay win, a swap meet find, hobby shop sale, or whatever. - Clear the Bench (SOD, Stalled prior GB project): Realizing this would probably violate the 25% GB rule - any project that is sitting there begging to be completed, regardless of how old it is, or how far along. Just get 'er done and into the display cabinet! Cheers! John.

Fantastic result! Thanks for sharing. Cheers! John.

Great job on a beautiful Ferrari! Those 20" wheels look great! Thanks for sharing. Cheers! John.

Incredible! Thank you for sharing! ... I'd say at this point you're definitely redefining the "L" in LSP ... Cheers! John.

Hi Dan - Absolutely brilliant work on this model - thank you for sharing. As for Model Master FS enamel paint - not all of the colors have been discontinued. I pulled up the current Testors website and FS 16473 is one of the paints shown as still available, should you wish to go that route. https://www.testors.com/product-catalog/testors-brands/model-master/american-fs-enamel/bottles Cheers! John.

Awesome!! Cheers! John.

Awesome! Cheers! John.

I love these old Revell kits. Building what comes in the box is low stress, and great fun. Cheers! John.

Lovely build! Thanks for sharing the journey. Cheers! John.

Nice! Cheers! John.

Hi Guys - Thanks for the kind words. It really was a fun little build. A little testy here and there to be sure, but only enough to keep things interesting. And yes, Ben, standing track-side that deafening, ground-shaking, engine noise was something special. Cheers! John.

A while back I stumbled across a YouTube channel by a guy who paints his model cars using spray cans from the local hardware store - specifically Rustoleum 2X brand. The results were amazingly good, so I decided to give it a try. Wanting to keep my experiment as inexpensive as possible, I grabbed this kit at our local Hobby Lobby - with the 40%-off coupon I was out the door for just over $16 US. A stop at the local Home Depot to source the paints for roughly $5 each and I was good to go. Having seen (...and HEARD, well more like felt) these Corvettes run at Laguna Seca, this one was an obvious choice. I took this photo in May 2015. The kit is by the US division of Revell, hence the scale 1/25. Revell Germany car kits are all 1/24, which seems to be the scale the rest of the planet uses for race car kits. Not a lot of parts, and there is some very nice detail. The decal sheet looks good on paper, but proved problematic due to transparency - the underlying paint colors showed through. When I do another one of these, I'll order a set of decals from Indycals. The trim on the clear piece comes pre-painted. Nice touch, although I'm pretty sure I could do a better job masking and painting it myself. It's very yellow - I cheated a little bit and used a can of Tamiya spray paint that I had left over from another project. The kit includes a nice interior and motor - it looks good to me right out of the box, but there is plenty of opportunity for super-detail work. Fit was actually pretty good to this point. Here you can see the yellow bleeding through the white decal on the door, and the red bleeding through on the rear wing, resulting in an unacceptable pink lettering instead of white. So back to Hobby Lobby with another 40%-off coupon, and a second kit was acquired. I then doubled up the decal and it looks much better now. As a bonus, I have a second kit that I will probably build as one of the Le Mans cars using the excellent Indycals decals. So here it is with all the stickers applied, and a panel-line oil wash. I'm done with it at this point, but may come back later and spray on a final gloss clear coat. Race cars are shiny, but not like your car in the garage. And they suffer a lot of wear and tear over the course of a racing season, so based on my own photographs from the track, the degree of shine on this one looks about right. A couple of warnings if you decide to build one - that pre-painted one-piece clear windshield bit does not fit into the body. It's not even close. In order to get it to fit I cut the rear window from the rest of the piece, filed and sanded, and was finally able to get the glass to line up. Second, the headlight glass doesn't fit either - I ended up cutting off and filing down the mounting pins on the inside of the bumper which then allowed for enough wiggle room to get them into position. It was a quick, fun build, let down somewhat by the transparency of the decals. However, those Rustoleum rattle cans are the real deal - I'll definitely be using them in my builds going forward.

Second vote for Tamiya Extra Thin. Cheers! John.