Oh the Humanity! Threw Some Built Kits Away

[Christa]

Thirty five years ago, just before leaving UK for a job overseas, a model shop took a couple of my built aircraft models, friends' children received others and half a dozen were sold at our local primary school's summer fair - proceeds to the school.

 

Three of those built models, different Airfix 1/24 Merlin engined fighters, had individual glass display cases made for me by an aquarium maker. The rest lived on open shelves. Now I have a large display cabinet with two storage drawers beneath. I think of those drawers as 'rest hangars'. With the single exception of an Airfix 1/24 Hawker Typhoon, my aircraft models, made and unmade, are 1/32 scale. I'll never have sufficient display space for half of my unbuilt kits.

 

I like OBG's idea of putting completed models out for spontaneous adoption.

[ScottsGT]

Check with local high school ROTC classes and VFW posts.  Sometimes they like military models to look at or discuss in class. 
 

I tossed a few of my older, ugly or broken builds when we moved 20 months back.  One day I’ll hit the wall with storing built kits.  Highly doubt if anyone will take the time to find homes for them after I’m gone.  Fortunately for my wife the county dumpster is at the end of my neighborhood street. 

[Stokey Pete]

An intriguing question, one I’ve pondered over myself of late. I’m lucky enough to have a large wall display dedicated to my LSP builds, but I’m now in a place where my remaining kits will fill the spaces available in it, leaving me with nowhere to display anything new. I’m kind of torn between the potential for ‘retirement’ from modelling, or operating a 1 in 1 out build basis. 
I’ve had my enjoyment from the kits during the building and finishing phases, the display is just that, a display. I’m not overly fussed about standing there staring at my works like an art gallery. 
I guess I could revisit a few of my older subjects to see how my techniques and finishing quality has changed over the years. Most of the junked builds will probably go to modelling heaven, or be used for entertaining kids. 

[MikeC]

5 hours ago, Oldbaldguy said:

 I think the donation-to-museums idea is a bit trite and unrealistic - museums have enough junk already and people pay good money to ogle the real thing, not a pile of plastic that most equate to something their kids built.

Sorry  I have to disagree to some extent. I can quote you at least two examples where someone from the museum has approached me and said kind things about a model online: I said "You can have it if you want it ", and they said "yes please". Admittedly both were Mighty Eighth models, and we're very much in M8th country where I live.

 

The idea of leaving models out to be taken is interesting.

[BiggTim]

Good subject! I am about to finish a SoD project, a 1/16 Sopwith Camel skeleton kit that I decide was either getting done, or going away. I Have nowhere to put it when it's done, so I've been thinking about who to give it to.

[Stevepd]

I remember as a kid having a clear out and seeing kids up and down the street playing and destroying them. My parents were aghast at the decision. I vaguely remember it as it was in the 70’s. I haven’t come to the point of a clear out yet but I’ve been lucky enough to display my specialised subjects in a local museum (on long term loan). Those not on display are on a shelf display in the garage. My modelling to do pile (7 1/32 kits) all have a purpose already and I know in my mind how they’ll be. Equally I have the room for them, but my normal build rate is around 8-9 months and mainly over the autumn/winter months so I have plenty of time for “room for manoeuvre” before I’m full. So I’m planning on not having to be in a position to cull them.

 

Great thread by the way

[ScottsGT]

1 hour ago, BiggTim said:

Good subject! I am about to finish a SoD project, a 1/16 Sopwith Camel skeleton kit that I decide was either getting done, or going away. I Have nowhere to put it when it's done, so I've been thinking about who to give it to.

Wish we were closer!  I’d find a home for it. 

[Confusionreigns178]

I remember having a look at some "professionally-built" models on E-Bay a couple of years ago. All I can say is.... the seller's perception of "professional" and mine were enormously different.

 

One of them looked like it had been painted with a six-inch decorator's brush. Just dreadful! The other had several small parts getting ready to drop off. 

 

Cheers. 

 

Chris.  

[John Stambaugh]

 In the event of my passing I have instructed my wife to offer my stash to sell on this site. All of the kits have a price list showing my estimated value including any AM within box. 

 As I would want these kits to go to good homes, Julie understands that LSP members are preferred and receive better than market prices. 

 As far as completed models, I would hope that close friends and family would give some a home. 

Enough of my mellow drama, HAPPY MODELING!

[LSP_K2]

Interesting topic, for sure. In the last 8 years that I've been living in my new space, I've actually finished but two 1:32 kits, both Hasegawa Japanese fighters. The N1K already went to the dumpster a few months ago, and the Ki-61 will undoubtedly soon follow.

 

I have to agree with the notion that the joy is in the building, and in my case, competitions, but keeping them afterwards is not really a big deal, as long as I take a lot of photos of them before they go.

[John Stambaugh]

Yes indeed, a photo album with both finished and WIP pics for posterity.

 

[Gazzas]

I sold my first built model a couple months ago.  Hasegawa Bf109F in 1/32.  It was a really refreshing experience!  I put it up on one day, and on the next, it was sold.  Satisfying!

 

I didn't ask for any amount that might compensate me for the time I spent building it.  Just enough to pay for the cost of the kit and the shipping and packaging.  I used a video from this site to help me package it, and it arrived with one of the wheels broken off.  I was expecting/sweating/dreading more.  Yet, the guy was very happy with it.  Even gave me lovely feedback on EBay.

 

I've thrown away heaps.  If I'm going to sell them, they have to be sharp.  I don't spend a lot of time looking at them once they are built.  Building is the most important part.

[Dpgsbody55]

If I'd kept all the models I've built, I'd need five houses to "display" them.  Think of the cleaning bill!!  I'm certainly not doing it.   

 

Mind you, I feel the same way about some of the cars I've owned.  Some I'd have love to have kept, but a few I was happy to see receding in my new car's rear mirror.

 

The reality is that they're all likely to end up in the bin.  I've moved home too many times to have been able to keep them.  Everything got dumped when we left England in 1967.  There's only one that still survives from my 1972 move from Sydney to Perth, and that is a 1/24 Airfix Spitfire MkIa that a very dear but now deceased friend gave me.  He worked in a hobby shop in central Sydney and gave me this shop soiled kit for $2, at a time when they cost $12.  I packed it very carefully when we moved and the "professionals" packed the others.  Guess which survived intact.  There's been a couple of other moves in the subsequent decade, but I've been in my present home since 1982 and still only that Spitfire survives.  I keep it only for sentimental reasons, but in reality it's a dusty piece of crap compared to what I can build now. 

 

May late friend also put a Revell 1/32 Hurricane on display in his shop in 1971.  It was certainly the best model I'd built ever, but we can take a guess as to where that one is now.  That was the only one I've ever built that got put on display somewhere.  Everything else was for my own pleasure and the pleasure is almost entirely in the building.  I like displaying them for some years, but new stuff comes along and so takes the place of the oldest crappiest models, which I break for parts and chuck the rest.  That is the least favourite part of the hobby, but it has yielded some useful parts for later builds.

 

I would like to think that some will survive me, but since I build purely for my own pleasure, I'm not holding my breath. At least the later ones have been photographed for some sort of posterity.

 

 

Cheers,

Michael

[Greif8]

19 hours ago, geedubelyer said:

Hi Ernest, quite a thought provoking topic. 

 

Is there no military/air museum local to you that you could donate your models to?

 

Sadly no.  The Technik Museum in Sinsheim, Germany is only 2.5 hours away, but they were not interested in displaying any models when I asked them a year or so ago.  The museum had a lot of actual aircraft of all types on display, as well as a good many armor vehicles and a very eclectic collection of autos from F1 to normal street cars.  Given that, I can understand why they don't see the need to display models.  

 

Ernest

[Greif8]

On 12/3/2022 at 1:55 PM, mozart said:

We were having lunch in a local pub yesterday with some friends and the conversation had turned to hobbies. The other couple know that I’m a painter and modeller, but I nearly choked on my lasagne and knocked over my pint of Doom Bar when my wife described my recent Gauntlet as “beautiful”……she wouldn’t know a Sopwith Camel from an Airbus 380 by the way. Just goes to show Ernest, our better halves do take notice! 

 

Knocking over a good pint, or here in Germany a half liter, is nearly as tragic as dropping a freshly completed model.  I hear you  about our wives!  Mine actually has expressed a bit of interest from time to time and has shown off some of my work to her friends when they have come to the house for coffee.  

 

Ernest

Edited December 4, 2022 by Greif8
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