WardEss

Yes, that's a good one, too! (I have a "real paper" copy, myself.) Someone scanned it in, apparently ... it's available over here: https://rclibrary.co.uk/download_title.asp?ID=1216

> The stash MIGHT start quaking in fear a bit IF > I could stop buying/acquiring new kits...... seems > I get as many as I build each year and the stash > just doesn't shrink much if any. I think I'm beginning to understand that feeling, at least where Vacu-Formed kits go. My "secret" to obtaining lots of Vac Kits to practice on, and to learn from, now that I'm playing with Vac's, is basically to try to look up "lot" sales on eBay -- while not caring much at all what the model's actual subject matter is. Price and quantity are mainly what I'm aiming at! Finding myself something to work on that is sort of "airplane shaped" is (not always, but often enough) fun and relatively easy, if I don't care what company the kit was made by; what type it is (military versus civilian); what era (pick a decade in the 1990s, for instance) or if a model is large or small ... that sort of thing. Some of the kits I picked up recently were less than four dollars US per kit, when bought in a "lot". Not like I know of anyone who is willing to sell me kits made from resin (or high-end injection kits) that are that cheap?! And it matters to me that Vac Kits are more fun, right now, since I'm not used to them yet. Figuring out what to do, with kits I'm not used to working on, makes for a very good "dollars spent per hobby hour" goal!

(quotes ON) Just finished my 10th for the year. (quotes OFF) I'm guessing that means the rest of your kit stash is quaking in it's boots, since it knows it can't escape, and it's just a matter of time? (Heehee. Good for you, Mr. Gil, sir!)

To me, this whole build thread is just impressive as heck! Definitely not what I'm used to seeing, in terms of subject matter. (Single vehicles of some type, usually; with no added "context" or "world" for those scale models to be seen in.) Very cool!

I also would (politely, and in a well-meaning way) question the term "average" in this context. Nicely done, all around!

Thanks much goes to Gil Hodges: he passed his copy on to me! I've been reading it, for several hours now, and WOW does it have some cool info in there! Would the average person on the street love a book like this one? Nope! But I love it! Thanks again, Gil!

Nicely done, Chris!

Thanks bunches, Mister Gil, sir! Yes, I would definitely like to have that book you showed an image of, above! I sent you an email, as you requested, at the email address you listed above ...

Hi all. I'm looking for another specific old scale modeling book, about vacuum-formed kits. This book is by a UK author named Hugh Markham. The book is called "Scale Model Aircraft from Vac-Form Kits" I've never seen this particular book, in person, but I understand it is a lot more common in places like the UK; rather than the USA, where I live. I doubt that I could easily afford postage from the UK, on this book (?) so I'm hoping someone in the USA has a copy they would part with. My understanding is that the book is only about 50 or 60 pages long, and it's probably all in black-and-white, as far as photos or drawings go. (Whoo-hoo for going full-blown "Old School" with a portion of my scale modeling library!?) I looked the book up on Amazon dot com ... https://www.amazon.com/dp/0905418344/ ... and they acknowledge / realize that the book exists, but they almost never have a copy of that 1978-ish book for sale. At least when I was looking, they didn't have any spare copies to offer. Amazon says the ISBN information for this book is: ISBN-10: 0905418344 ISBN-13: 978-0905418346 I had also tried the "Inter-Library Loan" process, via my local public library. No luck. Lots of copies available in the UK, but none in these United States, that any library here in the USA (at least that I am aware of) would agree to lending out. To put this request in more context -- I already have a lot of individual articles about the subject (assembling and detailing vacuum-formed kits) in old magazine back issues (FSM / FineScale Modeler, and others such as Scale Models) and I also have a copy of the book (at roughly the same length as Markham's) called "Building and Improving Vacuum-Formed Model Aircraft" by Kalmbach and author Richard "E. R." Staszak. I like that cool old book, and the info in places like that looks useful ... and I just got in another cool old book from this era, too ("Making Model Aircraft" by Bryan Philpott) ... but I find I want more than I already have. I'm getting more and more interested in "VacForm" kits and I love to read how-to information, so it's pretty natural for someone like me to want all of the books I can get, on subjects like this one. Even if it's sort of the same information, over and over, that's okay. (As long as the price of any new book or magazine back issue is something I can afford.) I'm just liking the "Old School Vibes" of how things were done back in the 1970's and 1980's, hence looking for more books from that era. This is kind of a time machine, for me: I can go back and find / build kits, now, that were once way out of my childhood "league" as a kit builder. If anyone here has a copy of "Scale Model Aircraft From Vac-Form Kits" that they would not mind parting with, and would sell to me for non-collector's prices -- (please!) -- just send me a PM (private message) on these forums, and I'll get back to you. Thanks much! -- Ward Shrake --

Hi all. I'm looking for an old book. I've never seen the book itself. I recently saw a reference to the book in the Oct 1986 issue of FineScale Modeler magazine, on page 57. It was at the top of the section called "FSM Book Briefs". Here's the full review that FSM gave that book: (quotes on) Book Title: "In Plastic: Vacuum-Formed Kits" John W. Burns is well known as the editor and publisher of Kit Collector's Clearinghouse, a bimonthly newsletter for plastic kit collectors. His new book is divided into two major sections. First is a list of all known published references to vacuum-form modeling and how-to-do-it articles on specific kits. Burns then provides a list of vacuum-formed kits known to exist or to have been announced by the end of 1985; their manufacturers (including addresses); and details such as scale, availability, and market value. There is an index arranged by company. This 84-page, 8.5 inch by 11 inch soft-cover book sells for $15.00" (quotes off) Does anyone here have a copy they want to sell? Or give away, to a good home? I'm just now getting into kits of that kind, and I'm finding that the challenge of it, and the mindset of building VacForms, is quite interesting to me. I would love to find out more about the people who used to make that kind of kits, and the companies they once ran. I have always loved to read Old School style articles from the 1970's and/or 1980's (or later, if possible) on any scale modeling topic, so when the quotes above said that then-new book includes, "a list of all known published references to vacuum-form modeling and how-to-do-it articles on specific kits," that's all it took for me to want a copy of it! It won't matter a bit to me that the price guide portion of that book is four decades out of date! Does anyone out there have a copy they don't mind selling? Send me a PM, please, if you have a copy of that book you would part with! Thanks much!

It puts a smile on my face to see kits being worked on that, how shall we say it, "aren't known to give too many people good first impressions, when they initially opened the kit's box". Nice to see that despite fit problems and the like, that these are being built!

Since I'm still getting re-acquainted with how IPMS does things, I didn't even know that such a category existed, but yeah ... this (really nicely done!) build-up looks perfectly suited for a class with that name. Kudos to the builder / painter / writer! Thanks for posting those pics and that story! Personally, I'm glad to see Monogram's older kits "getting some love" and attention. I look at it this way: if those kits from that company and that era were good enough for Shep Paine to do his magic on, back when I was a kid in the 1970s, then I can't personally fault those kits, all that much. And even if I could, why would I want to? (Those "Diorama Tip Sheets" still resonate with me, all these years / decades later.) But then again, hey, what do I know -- I'm starting to like playing with old VacForm kits, too!

Thanks for that info, Noel!

Thanks again, for the kind words you're throwing my way; and for you guy's Warm Welcome to these forums! Coolness, about those other forums. I signed up for that place, almost as soon as I knew it existed; but that was only a short time ago. And I haven't posted anything over there, yet. But down the road, when I get more organized, etc., I'll see about posting some stuff. It will likely be a while before that happens, but that's the plan.

Thanks much for that reply, Gil -- and for supplying that much detail. Much appreciated, Mr. Hodges! I'll have to check out that Smooth-On product. Sounds interesting! (And I already use their resin and RTV rubber, and I like those, for what little mold-making or casting I end up doing. Which for me is mostly small sub-assemblies for projects I'm scratch-building.) I don't want to pull your thread off into Tangent Land, too much, but I'm going to (gently) assume -- based on what you had said, a day or two ago, over on my "intro" page -- that you would be okay with it, if I chimed in / talked about some of my personal favorites (or about products I have used) where things like epoxy putties go? Let me know if I'm over-stepping, by chiming in with such things. Probably my all-time favorite of the two-part epoxy putties is Magic Sculpt; but I also use Apoxie Sculpt at times, too. And Milliput -- especially their "Black" and "Super Fine White" products. I like how those two mix together, to make a nice grey colored putty. I have used "Green Stuff," at times -- which some folks may call "Duro"; or by various other names. Lately, for some tasks, I've been mixing a little bit of Green Stuff into Magic Sculpt (mixing them like normal, first; MS with MS, like it was all I was going to use; and GS with GS; also separately, like it was all I was going to use -- and then, mixing MS with GS: varying the proportions of mixed MS and mixed GS "on the fly," by color or by how it's feeling, as I'm kneading / mixing it) and I like some of the properties that hybrid mixture gives me. (But mostly that's for things like "deliberate practice" when I'm trying to teach myself how to sculpt things.) Which product I end up using, largely depends on what "substrate" I'm trying to alter (plastic, wood, metal, MDF, etc.) and what size I'm working at; what the end goal is on the project, and some other factors, as to which one I end up using, on any given project. And shelf life -- I've found that I can keep big tubs of Magic Sculpt or Apoxie Sculpt around, for years, and it'll still be use-able. To me, Magic Sculpt smooths easier with a wet finger, or a rag or something, than most of the others; including Apoxie Sculpt. And I like that the color ends up being (or so it seems to me) a bit more uniform, after it's mixed. But I use both -- it "just depends" on if I'm running out of one or the other, and what mood I'm in, and so on. Another thing I like about it Magic Sculpt is that, because it is so much easier than most products, to smooth it with just slightly damp fingers, or barely wet rags or towels, is that I could get away with stuff like filling big gaps I had forgotten about, that I should have dealt with, before a kit's paint job went on. For instance, I had almost completely forgotten about the transparent resin wind screen part, when I was working on my version of the resin "Hornethopter" kit -- and had the paint job, and all sorts of nifty little details, all sitting the way I wanted them ... and then, remembered to look in the box, to see if I had left any parts off. I was kicking myself, on that, big-time, for a while -- but "Magic Sculpt to the rescue". I got the windscreen added in, and blended, in minutes. I was thinking I had majorly screwed up; and with epoxy putties that "like" to use a solvent for smoothing, maybe it would have been a minor disaster. (Especially with a deadline looming, on that build-up!) Apologies to all, if I'm "butting in" and/or end up "talking too much". I realize I tend to be rather wordy, by most people's standards! Gil, I think I'm going to send you a private message. There's some other (way off-topic) things / ideas I want to kick around with you -- some of which are things like Deal's Wheels kits, which doesn't feel even remotely appropriate for this particular message thread!) -- Ward Shrake --

Thanks for posting this thread, Ron! I had a memory (vague) of having built one or two of those, back in the 1970s or so, but I could never remember what the brand was; and I didn't really remember anything specific about them other than how much flash they had on them (that required way too much patience, from a Kid's Mindset) and how heavy (and large!) they were. Good memories, sir! I don't think I ever got around to painting any of mine? So it's double cool to see that someone out there went that extra mile!

Questions for you -- I'm wondering which of the epoxy putties are your favorites? I try to keep several of them in stock, and use whichever one seems right for the task at hand ... or whichever one isn't way past the "use by" date, when I try to use it. Ditto for auto body fillers or putties: I'm curious which ones you like, and use often ... that sort of thing. (Thanks!)

Thanks much! Awesomeness that you're interested in both the "fun stuff" out there, as well as the "serious" stuff. For what it is worth, one of the first things I'd done, over on these forums (Behind the Scenes) was to compliment Ron Bell for his nicely done article in the Mar / Apr 2025 IPMS USA Journal, where he showed a vacu-formed aircraft being put together. He in turn told me your name, as one of the folks around here that he respects, and whom he felt I should keep an eye on, projects-wise. And I've been trying to do that, to some degree. I'm behind, on reading the web -- but I've actually been looking through my collection of old magazines and the like. I've been searching for (and found) some of your aircraft-related "in print, and on paper" articles in places like FineScale Modeler, and Aerospace Modeler. You wouldn't happen to have a list of what places you've been in print, would you, Mr. Hodges, sir? (And no, I'm not yanking your chain on that, either!) EDITS -- You ought to consider joining the "Car-Toons" forums, if you're that into the old 'toon vehicular kits. I'm sure they'd love to see pics like that, over there. It's a fun bunch of folks, even if it's kind of a small-ish group. ALSO -- Since I know you're into vacu-forming, and I'm fairly (well, very!) new to these forums, can I ask if there is a good place (thread, etc.) to throw some possible "tips" or "techniques" out there? Stuff that other folks who work on vacu-formed kits might like to see; and try for themselves? I don't have a ton of such tips, yet, but I do have at least one that "feels good" to me. It's simply this: I was wracking my brains, earlier today, trying to think of ways to get a normal-sized straight edge onto the sheet of vac'd parts, without squishing or otherwise damaging anything; so that I could make some preliminary score lines, before trimming closer to the actual parts. As it turned out, the solution was just sitting there, on my crowded work bench / areas ... it's a cut-off section from a Windshield Wiper Blade Assembly. I usually use it as a stir stick, for paint bottles. To see what I'm talking about, here's a link to the "Shiflett Brothers Sculpting forums" where I posted some ideas for the springy, thin, stainless steel "flat wires" that sometimes come as part of Wiper Blade Assemblies. Besides all of the cool things I was already using that metal for, now I'm finding it's useful for yet another cool trick! https://www.facebook.com/groups/1114208771968434/permalink/6402358806486711/ I'm mainly linking to that post, because of the image I had included over there, of what to look for, on used wiper blade assemblies. The little "silver stripes" vary in sizes (length, side-to-side width, and thickness) and some sizes / types are more immediately useful than other ones. But as a small straight edge that can get in-between the parts on the 1:72 scale "test pieces" I was playing with, today ... the idea has some potential.

While I pretty much ignore social media, almost entirely, and while I haven't had much of a consistent presence on most hobby-related / scale modeling forums, over the years, there's a few online places I like to hang out on, from time to time. From time to time I do "lurk" on more hobby forums than I'm listing, here ... the ones below are just online places where I have posted info, at times. But yeah, I do look at aircraft-centered places like HyperScale ... and/or some online places where Mak / SF3D builders hang out ... and/or model car places. There's lots of interesting eye candy, and excellent how-to information, out there on the web!) = = = = There's a small forum on Pro Boards called "Car-Toons" for modelers who like seeing or building humorous vehicular subjects: mostly cars, but also the occasional aircraft or boat. Over there, my user name is "Wardster". Here's their home page: https://car-toons.proboards.com/ = = = = Or here's the group (linked to, above) where the admins ever so kindly let me post those page scans, showing the projects I had worked on, during my time as a writer for the printed publications under the banner of "Sci-Fi & Fantasy Modeller": https://www.facebook.com/groups/2043682082594379/ The link above is to a Facebook group, called "Sci Fi/Fantasy Scratchbuild and kitbash modeler". (No connection to SF&FM, other than similar names and likes -- but from what I can tell, the admins over there have long been big fans of both of that publication's two incarnations, over time.) = = = = The next one is called the "Shiflett Brothers Sculpting Forums". It's another Facebook group. They have LOTS of members! Over there, when I post (which isn't very often) it's mostly posts related to a person making their own sculpting tools. I'm "Ward Ess" over there. Here's my member page for those forums: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1114208771968434/user/100068411671599 And here's that group's main or home page: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1114208771968434 = = = = If I think of any others where I posted content, over time, I'll try to add them in, via replies below (or whatever). But off-hand, I think that's the main ones? And of course, I read a lot of printed publications. I've loved doing that, for multiple decades now! EDIT # 01 -- Since this is an introduction, I'll also add that while I don't personally sculpt or paint gaming minis, I love to see it when other folks do stuff like that! When I buy figures of that type, I tend to mostly admire the sculpting work, and the casting work, on such small gems! I've liked seeing things like gaming minis since the days when Grenadier had released their "Comedy Lords" (I think that was the set of miniature's name?) or some other (glorious) smart alecks were releasing now-classic minis like "Dwarf With No Name". Reaper and lots of other cool companies make interesting products, these days. I buy up DVDs when I can, from places like Dark Sword: showing the top-of-the-line figure painters, explaining how they do awesome paint jobs. I also like the many (many!) videos that a person can download, from the Miniature Mentors web site. And I've read lots of other figure magazines, over the years -- (including "Amazing Figure Modeler") -- and enjoyed them. Figure Mentors is another cool publication I like reading. There's oodles of good books on those topics, too. Shep Paine's books about figure modeling, and one by Bill Horan ... yeah, that's very interesting stuff, to me! EDIT # 02 -- I'm also picking up, retro-actively as it were, an interest in things like vacuum-formed scale models. I have some vacu-formed aircraft kits on order (mostly in 1:72 scale; with maybe some others in 1:48 scale) that I bought without caring too much what the subject matter was. I wanted them for practice! I went through my magazine collection, and my aircraft books, and found some cool articles in places like FineScale Modeler, or Aerospace Modeler, and various of Osprey's and Kalmbach's books about scale modeling. It's kind of nice knowing that those kits were made in a "Garage Kit" kind of a way, by individual human beings who were just really passionate about the subject matter; and who wanted to release kits that were unlikely to ever pick up enough paying customers to justify the costs of cutting all-new, steel, big-$$ injection molds.

Hi all. I recently re-joined the IPMS group, and I am busy happily starting to check things out, on these forums and in the printed journals. Twenty years or so ago (around the late 1990s and/or the early 2000s) I had been an IPMS member. I had lived in Southern California, USA at the time and I had hung out with the IPMS chapter called the "Planes of Fame" club. I've lived in New Mexico, USA since approx 2003. Ever since my father introduced me to the scale modeling hobby in the early 1970s, and I saw what the grown-ups could do, model-wise, I had always wanted to be able to "do what the big kids could do" so I had, over time, steadily kept reading books and magazines (in all sorts of scale modeling genres: military vehicles, civilian vehicles, ships, figures) and over time I learned a lot more about various skills and tools and the like. I eventually started writing for Internet Modeler at some point. That lasted until approx 2008 or so. Some of my most-fond articles I had written with them are these ones: Article title: "Cheap, Simple, Portable Vacu-forming Rig" https://www.internetmodeler.com/2008/february/how-to/vacformer.php = = = = Article title: "Ward's Magic Seam Powder -- Part 1 of 2 parts -- Filling seams, gaps and holes" https://www.internetmodeler.com/2007/november/how-to/magic-powder1.php = = = = Article title: "Ward's Magic Seam Powder -- Part 2 of 2 parts -- Filling seams, gaps and holes" https://www.internetmodeler.com/2007/december/how-to/magic-powder1.php = = = = Article title -- "Scratchbuilding a caricature car body -- Sometimes, the best thing to do is something." https://www.internetmodeler.com/2007/october/autos/cartoon_car.php = = = = I doubt that many of you folks reading this would have a reason to know what I used to do, in the past (via the links above or below, I mean) but since this is an introduction post ... I was also one of the recurring writers for a publication out of England called "Sci-Fi & Fantasy Modeller". (That being their Second Incarnation -- not the earlier B&W "magazine" format; but I had loved their earlier stuff, as a reader!) I would have to look up the exact dates (these comments about SF&FM are from memory) but between roughly 2008 or 2009 through about 2015 or 2016, I wrote a total of (I think?) fifteen articles with or for those folks. After they closed down, around 2017-ish, I had asked for permission from the editor (Andy) and the publisher (Mike) and they were both okay with me scanning in my own articles, a page at a time, and posting most of them online. I believe eleven out of the fifteen total articles I had done with SF&FM can be found by scrolling through the link, below. (The only other articles by me, for SF&FM, that are missing were the four I had done that are all in their "Horror" special issue.) https://www.facebook.com/groups/2043682082594379/user/100068411671599/ As a bonus, there are several (three, at present?) other write-ups I had done over time, that were only ever released online. They were never "published articles" but still, they could potentially interest some folks here. They were about various techniques and "how to" information. This one is about "Trash Bashing" some Gaming Vehicles, using Deodorant Containers. It was for an online contest that happened around 2011. https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=oa.534922627535179&type=3 = = = = The next two are about using a concoction called "Plaster and Vermiculite" to make shapes; scratch-building items, using some stuff that Ed "Big Daddy" Roth used to use in the 1960s, when he made multiple famous cars, using that material. Using P&V to make a bubble top "canopy" shape for use on a model car: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=oa.1825095630991863&type=3 = = = = Next up: making the shape of a "turret" for making something like Revell did in the 1970s, in their "Deal's Wheels" series of caricature vehicles. They had stuck a made-up turret on a cartoon Dune Buggy body, and called the resulting model a "Swine Hunt" kit. To my knowledge, the kit never was reissued (which, to hopeless nerds like me, was a major shame!) so I made something similar ... except theirs was WWII German based (well, loosely) and mine is loosely based on the Russian side of WWII; just so that real Swine Hunt kits could have something to fight against, I suppose. The big thing with this project was coming up with a three-part RTV rubber mold that let me make a hollow cast "turret" that was one-piece; but larger on the inside than on the outside. For me, that was a pretty complicated mold! https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=oa.172118558270737&type=3 = = = = There's probably other stuff I forgot about having done, over time. I tend to be so fixated on learning more about techniques, and ways to do things, that once I figure it out, if I don't document what I did, in some way, chances are I'm going to forget at least some of it ... because I tend to then assign myself some other task, involving figuring out how to do some silliness that most people wouldn't attempt in the first place. (Let alone figuring out increasingly difficult ways to come up with things like caricatures of vehicles, or the like.) Anyway ... seems like a nice place, here! I'm glad I re-joined the club! -- Ward Shrake -- (AKA: "Ward Ess" on some other hobby-related forums) EDIT -- Another publication I had some articles in was "Seaways' Ships In Scale". I had done three articles with them, on the subject of one of (to me) the most interesting early ironclads of the American Civil War. It began as a Northern utility style boat with a fast hull shape, and it went through various (by our standards as scale modelers, poorly-documented) upgrades and changes, over it's short life as a naval combatant. I loved the idea of that boat mainly because it was all happening in a technological period where change was absolutely the norm; and no one at that point really knew, with any precision, what was "coming next" for Naval Vessels. To me, the "CSS Manassas" was almost like a "lost" step in the evolutionary process, between all-wooden vessels with tall sailing masts, and "wooden walls," and all-iron vessels of (for the time) very radical design. It had much the same appeal, in my eyes, as a scale modeling subject, as some folks look at WWI biplanes and tri-planes, etc. in that everyone was "trying to figure things out" and pretty much the only way to test new ideas was to build them, and see what happened. As far as other hobby things that I once wrote, that got published over the years, in printed magazines -- I also did a couple of short kit reviews for "AFM" ("Amazing Figure Modeler") but thus far, I've not done any full-blown articles with them.