What a bunch of B.S.! Just to buy a Pellet Pistol (air gun). I have had guns all my life, from my first Red Rider BB gun to competition guns. Over the years I have sold off my gun collection and recently wanted to do some tin can plinking with a pellet pistol. So I went to one of my favorite sites Beamen's and Air Gun Depot. At AGD, I found a nice single pump 177 cal. pellet gun used made by Ruger. Now the problem started. Can't ship gun to Michigan! Michigan has so many rules regarding pistols that it's almost impossible to buy one legally. To do so, required going to the Sheriff's Department, waiting till your turn is called, fill out this questioner, pay five dollars to have it notarized then go to a Gun shop that has a gun you wish to purchase. the permit is only good for 10 days. So you must have the gun and the location ready when you get the permit. Now comes the next problem! Do to all these laws most gun shops don't carry air pistols any longer. I found a gun, not the one I wanted, but it will do. So now comes, three pages of forms to fill out for the State Police and the FBI. Everything must match right done to the dot above the (i) or its rejected by the State Police. This takes about three hours and by the way, you must also purchase a gun lock! I was however lucky having been given one by the dealer. But you cannot leave without either your own or one that you purchased. Lastly, once all this is done, the remaining parts of the gun permit must be taken back to the Sheriff's office within the 10 day period or you are subject to a fine of $250.00. UNBELIEVABLE!
What ever happened to going into a gun shop looking over several different guns, pick one that you want; purchase it; take it home and shoot with it. I was told this came about after 911 and when a group of kids or a gang went around shooting out car windows a few years ago.
Saturday, April 7, 2012
Sunday, March 11, 2012
Running out of Room
I've been busy building so many models these past two years that I find I am running out of room to display them; so I did the only thing I could. I hung them from the ceiling so I can enjoy them and have room for more. All are 1/48 Scale. Please enjoy viewing some my hangings so to speak!
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| Monogram/Revell Kingfisher |
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| Italeri T-6 Texan |
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| Academy Bf-109 |
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| Monogram/Revell Spitfire Vb |
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| S2F Stuff |
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| Eduard Mig-21 |
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| Trumpeter Mig-3 |
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| Eduard Bf-108 |
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
Revell/Monogram Spitfire Vb
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| I built this with an open canopy |
An old kit, re-issued for Christmas sales at the Big Box Stores, this is an old Spitfire from Monogram of the 1960's. It still makes a fair model now that it has an up-dated cockpit and canopy that can be assembled in either open or closed position. The packaging is the typical white box with Revell clearly printed in the upper left corner. I purchased it for $4.99 at the Christmas Clearance aisle in our local store.
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| Still not a bad looking model considering the kits age. |
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Italeri Junker's Ju-87 B2 in 1/48 Scale
Well it's the beginning of a new year and I just finished up this JU-87 that I started and sprayed with Future Wax then set it aside for at least four weeks before applying the decals.
This is a great departure in modeling for me in many aspects. First, I built and painted the fuselage, wings, and smaller parts without attaching these parts into a completed model. Once the wing was complete with most of the small parts attached, (most being the key word here) I masked and sprayed the three colors necessary for this aircraft. Likewise, I did the same with the fuselage. As this aircraft is a low wing aircraft, meaning the wings are attached to the bottom of the fuselage it becomes much easier to finish the model as separate pieces before attaching all the parts into a complete model.
Next I sprayed these parts with several coats of Future Floor Wax until a nice smooth coat could be felt over the surfaces of the model. Then it was set aside on the shelf for almost four weeks before I even looked at it again.
Finally, I started applying the decals on Saturday and Sunday. As I found out, the background film is almost eliminated. The other secret is to dab some decal set on the surface where the decal is to be applied first. This seems to totally eliminate the background film. There were a few small decals where I missed the mark, but one has to scan the model carefully to find these.
As to the kit, it is an Italeri kit with several different markings available. The kit was on sale at our local hobby shop and also comes with a small PE set comprising of seat belts and windscreen shield and a detailed engine should you want to leave the cowls off. The part fit is right on and it was truly a joy to assemble.
What surprised me was the fact that our Grumman Hellcat is a more robust airplane for it's size compared to the Ju-87. I have seen real Hellcat's close up, but never a JU-87 and the Hellcat seems larger in stature. Here are some photos of my completed Ju-87. Enjoy.
This is a great departure in modeling for me in many aspects. First, I built and painted the fuselage, wings, and smaller parts without attaching these parts into a completed model. Once the wing was complete with most of the small parts attached, (most being the key word here) I masked and sprayed the three colors necessary for this aircraft. Likewise, I did the same with the fuselage. As this aircraft is a low wing aircraft, meaning the wings are attached to the bottom of the fuselage it becomes much easier to finish the model as separate pieces before attaching all the parts into a complete model.
Next I sprayed these parts with several coats of Future Floor Wax until a nice smooth coat could be felt over the surfaces of the model. Then it was set aside on the shelf for almost four weeks before I even looked at it again.
Finally, I started applying the decals on Saturday and Sunday. As I found out, the background film is almost eliminated. The other secret is to dab some decal set on the surface where the decal is to be applied first. This seems to totally eliminate the background film. There were a few small decals where I missed the mark, but one has to scan the model carefully to find these.
As to the kit, it is an Italeri kit with several different markings available. The kit was on sale at our local hobby shop and also comes with a small PE set comprising of seat belts and windscreen shield and a detailed engine should you want to leave the cowls off. The part fit is right on and it was truly a joy to assemble.
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| The wing walks are also photo etch parts |
Sunday, January 1, 2012
Happy New Year 2012 - LCAC Hovercraft
Christmas brought a 1/350 scale model of the Navy's LCAC Hovercraft by MRC. It is a small but cute little model. The entire model composes of 18 parts and measures less then three inches in length with two kits per blister package.
Total building time was about nine hours spread over five days including the diorama that the model now sets on. Most challenging was painting the top surfaces of both side superstructures. The diorama was constructed of a small piece heavy board stock given to me from a friend. It came out of the zipper type garment bags used to store clothes. The wood frame was cut from a wood paint stirring paddle thanks to Home Depot. Water was from a small piece of Triang plastic sea from their 1/1200 scale waterline ship models. This material has not been available in over forty years. Even today it is hard to find something suitable to serve as water without going into a large modeling project such a Woodland Scenics.
Total building time was about nine hours spread over five days including the diorama that the model now sets on. Most challenging was painting the top surfaces of both side superstructures. The diorama was constructed of a small piece heavy board stock given to me from a friend. It came out of the zipper type garment bags used to store clothes. The wood frame was cut from a wood paint stirring paddle thanks to Home Depot. Water was from a small piece of Triang plastic sea from their 1/1200 scale waterline ship models. This material has not been available in over forty years. Even today it is hard to find something suitable to serve as water without going into a large modeling project such a Woodland Scenics.
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| Completed model on the package it came in |
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| The tan piece represents the beach which the hovercraft is about to come ashore on. |
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| Here is the stern view with it's two large fan power plants. |
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
Eduard Models Follow-Up
After finishing the blog from the other day, I finished Eduard's P-39Q Aircorba. This is an earlier model in the Eduard range purchased from eBay. This model, like others in this range is excellent with the fit on almost every part right on. I finished mind in the sand color with blue under surfaces.
Currently I am trying to find a few more so I can do some other P-39's with different markings. One thing I really liked about this model is the included weight in the kit. designed to fit where the engine would normally go on most aircraft, it gives just enough weight to allow it to sit on the tricycle landing gear.
Friday, October 14, 2011
Eduard Models
Recently I have been busy building plastic models almost as fast as I can get the cement to dry on the parts. Wheather it's just time on my hands or a renewed interest in plastic kits I cannot say; suffice to add I've enjoyed every minute of the time I have spent.
Perhaps it's the fact that I have discovered the Eduard line of kits from the Czech Republic. Eduard makes a number of kits in all scales from 1/144 to 1/32. They maintain a web site, blog and can be found on Facebook. Perhaps their gain to fame are the photo etch parts they produce for a number of other manufactures kits. The most recent being a number of photo etch parts for Tamiya's 1/32 scale P-51 Mustang.
On this blog, I would like to show a few photos of two Eduard Russian airplanes I've completed in the past few weeks. Each model is a 1/48 scale "Weekend Edition".
Usually Eduard produces several different versions of the same model. The Limited Edition, ProfiPack, Combo and Weekend. The weekend edition has the same plastic trees as does each other version, only different options are less. As an example a Limited Edition may have several photo etch parts, maybe some epoxy parts, canopy masks, several different marking sets and something special for the collector. The ProfiPack will be the same, but no special something for the collector and different markings. The Combo may be two or three different versions of the same aircraft with all the photo etch, and different markings. The last and least expensive version is the Weekend version. Same plastic parts, no photo etch, no canopy mask, one or two different markings and in some cases a plain black and white instruction pages while the box contains the color art of the model inside.
As for recommending the Eduard kits, I place them on an equal or better level as the Hasegawa and Tamiya kits. As we know today, Eduard sometimes uses dies from other manufactures as does Tamiya and several other companies. Only real problem I have encountered is the availability to get them from U.S. distributors. Both Stevens and MND never seem to have the models in stock. I have ordered several different models in the past few months and only was able to get one out of six different models ordered. So I have turned to Ebay as a source.
If you have not built an Eduard kit, please give them a try, I'm sure you will find them well worth the money spent. Here is the web address. http://www.eduard.com/store/index.php?cur=2&
Perhaps it's the fact that I have discovered the Eduard line of kits from the Czech Republic. Eduard makes a number of kits in all scales from 1/144 to 1/32. They maintain a web site, blog and can be found on Facebook. Perhaps their gain to fame are the photo etch parts they produce for a number of other manufactures kits. The most recent being a number of photo etch parts for Tamiya's 1/32 scale P-51 Mustang.
On this blog, I would like to show a few photos of two Eduard Russian airplanes I've completed in the past few weeks. Each model is a 1/48 scale "Weekend Edition".
As for recommending the Eduard kits, I place them on an equal or better level as the Hasegawa and Tamiya kits. As we know today, Eduard sometimes uses dies from other manufactures as does Tamiya and several other companies. Only real problem I have encountered is the availability to get them from U.S. distributors. Both Stevens and MND never seem to have the models in stock. I have ordered several different models in the past few months and only was able to get one out of six different models ordered. So I have turned to Ebay as a source.
If you have not built an Eduard kit, please give them a try, I'm sure you will find them well worth the money spent. Here is the web address. http://www.eduard.com/store/index.php?cur=2&
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