Hi, folks...
Goodness, some of your comments take me back, and not just a few years... !
I have just turned 46 years old, and have been making kits since I was 9. My earliest recollection of model aircraft were those of my father, a Church of Scotland minister, and his passion, as he would say, were 'real' planes (two or more wings... !) and ideally those from WW1. We used to have two flights of stairs in the old house, with a small landing in between each level. There was a large stained-glass window with a ledge in front of it on the landing, and my dad put his model kits there. It was so frustrating for a four year old like me, when I knew they were there, but I wasn't tall enough to reach them, take them down and look at them, but if I went up the next flight of stairs, I could look down on them and see them all very clearly, but was out of reach... only in later years did I fully understand why my father chose that location... !
My paternal grandfather was a Clydeside shipbuilder, my dad made models, I make models, and my younger brother works for an international airline maintaining Jumbo jets etc, so I suppose construction of some description is in our family. My elder brother was always the academic, rather than the DIY... !
Yes, kits used to be so inexpensive, but everything goes up in price these days, so should we really be so surprised... ? Yes, Airfix and a few others were great in their day, but other companies came along and bettered their efforts and so prices invariably increased for that reason also. But we do have greater choice nowadays. The Eastern Bloc, once renowned for not very good kits, has disintegrated and some of the best stuff on the market now originates from the Czech Republic and the Ukraine, to name but two. New names to conjure with, Zvezda, Special Hobby, Condor, in addition to the stalwarts like Revell, Hasegawa and still available in model shops in some places, Airfix.
I think that there is still a healthy following for model-making, and in as much as my father made kits before me, I can also remember being fascinated by his wartime books, Aircraft of the Fighting Powers, volumes 1,2 and 4 - I never found volume 3... ! And of course, the mystery and intrigue of 'the enemy' aircraft was always the attraction for me. Fw 200, He177, Ar232 and other Teutonic wonders caught and fired my imagination, if for no other reason, because they were so damned difficult to see even in a museum... ! Modelling those aircraft was the only way one could really completely envisage what they looked like. And I've always found Luftwaffe WW2 colour schemes to be the ultimate challenge at the end of a protracted period of modelling... just when you think you've done all the hard bits, along comes a wave-pattern colour scheme, which has to be replicated on both upper
and undersurfaces...
One of the contributors here stated that now, there are more distractions for children, and another, that modelling is now 'easier' because of all the accessories that can be bought... paint masks, canopy masks, different types of filler and paint... does anyone else remember the triangular-shaped bottles that Airfix paint used to come in, or the orange-smelling glue they issued around the early 1970s... ? I have to admit that I think some of those paint masks defeat the purpose... whatever happened to learning how to paint freehand, either with a brush or a spraygun, as airbrushes were once called. Now,
that is what I call a challenge.
Model shops are fewer nowadays, and mainstream department stores and shopping chains either don't stock models at all, or only buy in the kits that they feel will sell, hence the restricted choice on the shelves. The few High Street models shops there are tend to cater for a particular type of client who knows exactly what they're after, and I can only think of two such shops in all of Scotland at present like that. On the other hand, if you have access to the internet, models can be obtained from any outlet selling them... one doesn't even have to leave the house to join the queue for a particular model. A bank account or credit card with sufficient funds is usually enough to secure the kit you desire.
Yes, my friends, changing times, increasing prices and being spoilt for choice are all part of the modellers' circumstances, but would we really have it any other way... ? I doubt it. Modelling is our passion, and we will continue, I think, to indulge in it, enjoy it and pass on our enthusiasm for it to a younger generation.