RGronovius

I love this Revell line; I've bought and built just about every one of them for my 7 yr old. He plays rather rough with them, but he has fun.

Mark, how are you painting them? The Jeeps' paint jobs, especially in the 4th photo, looks very thick. Are you using an airbrush, paint brush or spray can? I haven't picked up a Dragon Jeep kit to see the level of detail, so I don't know if the paint just pooled in the rear corner of the front fender or if the detail of the kit is soft in that area.

Good job on the ships, I really like this dio. Any green Martian head hiding behind a rock somehwere? ;)

Impressive work, some of the salvaged photos look like they could have been screen grabs from the actual show!

Hard to tell the box size, but if it is one of those tiny boxes (like 4" or 5" long), those were 1/1200 scale battleships and space-borne "aircraft carriers".

Thanks Mike, I thought it might be something along those lines.

In the journal, on page 26 is a checker tailed P-47 with some line or arrow like markings on the wings. Were these for a reason or just personalized markings?

Nice to see an M4A4 in US markings instead of British Commonwealth. Very well done.

Ron, it looks great, those old Nitto 1/76 scale kits can be a bear to build. There is a 1/72 scale Achilles out there. It is an Eduard/ExtraTech kit that came out with their series of M4/M10/M36 kits. I've bought most of the kits from this line and thought they were pretty decent. http://www.172shermans.com/kitreviews/Extratech/Achillesprev.htm

My Squadron Signal walk around 38t book does not list North Africa as an area the tank was deployed. The book also covers the pre- and post war usage and there is a blurb on a version made for Peru and Persia, but mainly focuses on Swiss' tanks.

I wonder how much they will cost. I cringe when I replace older Testors Model Master paints with newer bottles and note the difference in price. And they're made in the USA.

I have several of them in the various boxings. I've never had trouble finding one on the shelves, but admittedly, I have not looked in several years. Off the top of my head, I have an old Testors M109A2 that's been in my possession for a couple of decades, an M108 that I bought when stationed in Germany in the late 80s, a short barreled M109 bought at the same time, and an M109A6 Paladin I got when they came out. I did have the Revell rebox of the M109A3GA1 that I got rid of recently. I think I have another different boxing kicking around somewhere.

The werewolf hunting vampire chick from the Underworld series, Kate Beckinsale (sp?).

Best of luck to you on that kit. It's the only model ever produced that the decals are probably worth more than the plastic. It is a shame that there aren't other kits to stick those nice decals on. Heck, I think even those green sandbox plastic tanks sold at Walmart are probably better than that old ITC/Ringo re-pop by Glencoe.

I think Dragon's Shermans are really nice kits. Eduard/ExtraTech came out with those high-priced ones that basically sucked. Then Dragon showed up with their line. Twice as good and a third the price.

Looks good. This was the only one of the kits I didn't build, but bought on eBay several years ago. I still have Maximillian that I built around the age of 14 or 15.

I've got one too, but held off because of all the posts regarding difficulty back in the day. Figured my meager aircraft skills were not strong enough Kung Fu to tackle the kit.

I know, but it is hard to replicate the colors without the kits looking like they are cartoons. They are so bright with all the primary colors.

Nice, I like the way the colors are bright without being too "cartoonish".

I've only pre-ordered a few of things in my life. The first one was the Trumpeter 1/32 scale A-10A from Nostalgic Plastic. The next one was a "have to have" 1/72 scale Fine Molds X-Wing fighter from hobby Link Japan. At the time, I got two of them (one to build gear up and gear down) for $34 delivered and they arrived right about 30 days from date of order. In the states, I would have paid double that for one when they first came out. Recently, I just pre-ordered the new CyberHobby/Dragon Ka-Mi with pontoons. Most CH kits pop up and then vanish. I figured I'd get one while I could. I do not visit my local hobby shop often enough to be lucky and get one while it's there. Besides, my LHS is a little more than a 100 miles round trip. Considering my Outback gets about 30 mpg, it costs me a little over $10 in gas alone. I'll get a club discount of 10% which wipes the sales tax and a few cents more. Ordering online is often cheaper than driving to the store. I still buy paint and supplies and grab the occasional kit on sale when I see one, but eBay and the buy/sell/trade forums have become my source for the most part.

I know it's out there and where to look for it, but I've never seen it in the flesh (or plastic). It isn't a subject that appeals to me and towed artillery always begs for a diorama, and I'm just not a diorama guy. I've seen the Greif all over the place, but again, it isn't a subject I am interested in. I think I got my Humber (also a non-interest subject) in a trade for a few aircraft kits for some armor kits. It looks like a decent kit, but I haven't really inspected it (nor do I know if it is complete).

Yes, I'd be interested in the commander figure. It'll at least give me the option of leaving the hatches open. The Crusader kit isn't a Peerless Max kit. It is an original Airfix kit. I have several original Airfix armor kits in 1:32 including two M3 Lees, two M3 Grants*, Monty's Humber and this Crusader. I do not have the Greif and have never seen the 17 pdr. Airfix supplemented their 1:32 scale line with a few 1:35 scale kits made by Peerless Max. They included Patton's WC Staff Car and several others most of us commonly see in Italeri boxes. *One of the M3 Grants I have is boxed by Lodela of Mexico. It is identical to the Airfix Grant, but is molded in green versus the tan plastic Airfix used. Plus the box is twice as big. I think Airfix's M3 Grant/Lee is still a solid kit. I even think it is better than the more recent Academy kit in overall shape and look. Of course the Academy kit has better detail and a lot of aftermarket geared towards it, but OOB the Airfix kit is probably more accurate.

Here is a kit I purchased this at a hobby shop in Methuen, Massachusetts in 2003. He had a pile of kits he got from an estate sale. I paid $5 for the kit because it had some pieces missing and many parts off of the sprue (common with Airfix kits), rattling around inside the box. After a careful examination, I found it was only missing three pieces; the tank commander figure and both of his arms (parts 169-171). Since every piece is individually numbered, the kit contained 177 parts including the missing figure, so in my mind it was just as good as a complete kit. Not bad for $5. The box art advertises this kit as new and the hull has the date 1975 on it, making this an original issue that is 36 years old. The kit was part of a short lived 1:32 scale series of Airfix armor kits that began with the poorly selling Monty's Humber, and included the excellent M3 Grant, M3 Lee, Rommel's halftrack "Greif" and ending with a towed 17 pdr anti-tank gun (extremely rare). The line also included a few kits from the Japanese company Max, but their kits were 1:35 scale. The Max kits exist today in Italeri's line. The Crusader kit was recently reissued for the first time along with a set of the popular Multi-pose British 8th Army Desert Rats and German Afrika Korps. The reissue goes for around $35-40. This is not the same kit as the Testors/Italeri Crusader models. The decal sheet includes markings for just about any tank that rode around in the desert. Painting only gives an olive green tank in Tunisia or a black/buff tank from the Western Desert. The only construction option is the turret hatches open or closed. Since I do not have the commander figure and there is no interior, I will most likely close the hatches. Interestingly, this kit uses separate hatches for the open configuration and shut hatches molded together for the closed option (it is pictured in front of the turret). The overall kit is very solid, with thick pieces, but does not look clunky like most kits from that era. I think it will build nicely.

I love it. That kit had a lot of "playability" when I was younger. It's one I wouldn't mind stumbling across at a flea market or yard sale for small money and building it again.

Just noticed an other vehicle that includes that gun sprue, the Dukes of Hazzard police car. Saw one at Hobby Lobby today and they have the sprue layout on the backside of the box and it shows the shotgun, tommy gun, carbine, M16, etc.