Iron Modeler

A quick one while I have a minute...or two...

I'm back...

I may as well start with the bad news.  My mother passed away on 26 February.  Her health never recovered from her two falls, and to be honest, it was more relief than sorrow to me when she crossed over.  She's with dad and the rest of the family that has gone before, and I like to think they're catching up on old times...

Funny thing, though--after the memorial service, my sister-in-law kept on saying that Mom was going to mess with her.  The family wanted to get together and do something after the memorial.  When we last were together in December, we went to Joe's Crab Shack (Mom loved her seafood), so we decided that we'd all go back there after the service.  There were 13 of us, but we told them 14.  First weird part of the story--we got the same exact table we had in December.  There were a few different faces this time, but those of us who had been there in December pretty much all sat where we had back then, and we left the seat Mom had been in back then vacant.  Next, it got really weird--those who wanted appetizers ordered them.  They arrived, and no sooner had the plates been cleaned, an order of mozzarella sticks arrived--an order that nobody had placed.  The server says, "This has been happening to me all day, sorry.  Enjoy them on the house."  I looked at my brother and sister-in-law and said "There's your sign."  See, one of mom's favorite appetizers was mozzarella sticks.  I imagine she and dad and everyone else up there got a good chuckle out of that one...

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Between the end of February and the service on 9 March, I had some time to go through some boxes of stuff I brought to the house when I last visited Mom.  Going through the photos, I found several years' worth of Christmas photos, and in most of them were pictures of our stacks of Christmas SWAG--and in most of those pictures, there were model kits.  I say it often, but it is true--back then (1970's-1980's), that's something kids did.  We had video games (Pong, Atari), but we also still built models.  I'll share some of those photos at some point in the future...

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My wife has a librarian friend who came upon several large boxes of modeling magazines.  Since her library had no use for them, she called my wife to see if she would like to have them.  My wife said yes, made a donation to the library, and hauled the collection home.  There was a mix of plastic and radio control modeling magazines, and among the boxes were some issues of "Scale Modeler", "Scale Aircraft Modeler" from the UK, and some early issues of "The Squadron", the magazine the Squadron Shops used to sell.  Interesting stuff, and I'll share those with you, too.

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While I was in Ft. Lauderdale dealing with Mom's estate, I found the time to stop by the IPMS/Flight 19 meeting.  While some of the faces have changed, and the venue had moved, the meetings were much the same as when I was General, President, Doctor, and Dictator-for-Life for about seven years between the early 1990's and about 2000.  They had just held their annual contest the previous weekend, and from what I heard they had quite a successful show, indeed.  I was happy to see that the Chapter was as healthy (healthier, actually) as it was when I ran the show.  One of the Old Guard had sent some books in so he wouldn't have to toss them.  Among the boxes I found Volume 1, Number 2 of "Scale Modeler".  An interesting observation--back in the day, they ran articles on all sorts of modeling, both static and operational (slot cars, radio control and free flight, model soldiers, etc.)--about the only thing they didn't cover was model railroading.  One piece that caught my eye was a two-page spread by some guy named Bill Koster on scale radio control airplanes.  If the name rings a bell, it should--Bill was a long time employee at Monogram Models, and has his own one-man cottage industry that makes vacuum form conversions and kits called Koster Aero Enterprises.  I've met the man several times--although I doubt he remembers--and he's always been a wealth of information, information he is not shy about sharing.  Back at the 2005 IPMS/USA Nationals, he sold my wife a 1/48 scale PB4Y Privateer conversion kit for the Monogram standard, and he spent nearly a half hour giving her tips on how to get the best end product out of the conversion, even examining the kit and replacing some parts that we wasn't happy with.  On the spot.  Bill Koster is an example of a true gentleman in every sense, and it was interesting to read his tips on scale radio control airplanes.

I also got to see some folks that I hadn't seen in a very long time.  It was a joy being able to catch up with so many old friends.  I'm only sorry that I didn't have enough time to spend with each and every one of them.  Next time, though...

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I think that about wraps this installment up.  Until next time, be good to one another.  I bid you Peace.

And then, things got hectic...

Yeah, yeah, I know...

See, its like this:  I finally had enough time to collect my meager thoughts.  The new car was running nicely (and still is), work was humming along, the family stuff was on an even keel...

I even got to take a vacation.  What happened after that?  See the title to this post...

We're a small shop at work--we do with five or six technicians what other shops won't touch unless they have at least ten people available to work the job.  We schedule things pretty tight, too--remember what I've said in the past about the empty hangar not making us any money?  With things packed nose to tail, everything has to pretty much run like a Rolex (by the way, did you see the Rolex 24?  More later...) or the whole schedule turns into a logjam.  Yep.  You guessed it.  Unforeseen problems with parts, unexpected findings, and some aircraft sales issues clogged the pipeline a bit.  As a result, we're trying to unburden ourselves from said pile of airplanes.  We have two in the hangar, two on the ramp, and two stashed in various hangars around the airport to keep them out of any inclement weather that might move in.  And, get this--we have two more on the way early next week.  So it kinda goes without saying that we're working overtime.  Lots of overtime.  As in seven day a week overtime.  The money's good, yes, but you have to be alive to enjoy it.  Fortunately, we're on schedule to deliver one by the close of business Monday, and another a day or so after that.  But we're still up to our eyeballs in aviation fun...

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To add to the array of spinning plates, my mother is again in poor health.  She was improving when we saw her in December, then she suffered a pretty significant setback, one which the family is dealing with.  Lots of issues there, not least of which is I'm going to have to carve away some time to visit.  Or clone myself.  Or both.

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All isn't gloom and doom, though.  I have actually tried to get back to the workbench and get some stuff done.  I broke my vow of not starting anything new until the backlog was done and started on the new Airfix 1/72 scale Folland Gnat T.1.  It has been a relatively quick build, and I hope to be able to get some color onto the model shortly.  There were a few minor issues.  The fit of the wing to the fuselage can be tricky--be careful once you get everything ready for the glue.  If you don't get a good, tight fit where the wings meet the inlets, work on it before you get out the glue brush--if you don't, you'll wind up with a slight gap that could set your wing askew.  I'm speaking from experience, here.  Also, watch the part numbers when you build the slipper tanks--I didn't and got the left top on the right bottom and vice-versa.  By the time I noticed, the tanks were permanently fused.  I had to trim and shim to get them to fit.  I hope that those of you reading this take heed and learn from my ignorance.

I'm gonna build this one up using the kit decals.  I figured it would be a good slump-buster, and I was right--were it not for all the overtime and other things, I'd have it finished by now.

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Other things, you ask?  Well, in addition to the family stuff, the court date for the guy who caused the accident in November came up a few weeks ago.  I think I told you all at some point that the man is 82-years old.  Well, when I saw him enter the courtroom, it reinforced what I had been thinking--he's indeed 82, has two hearing aids, two canes, and glasses with lenses thicker than any I've seen on a pair of glasses.  How this man--a fine man, I'm sure--can hold a driver's license evades me.

Anyway, he wanted to speak with the judge.  The way traffic court works in South Carolina starts with your ticket.  If you pay it and take the points, your case is removed from the docket.  You also have the option of holding the court date and speaking with the law enforcement officer who cited you.  At that point, the two parties usually work out what amounts to a plea agreement with reduced fine, you pay the fine and take the reduced points, the case gets closed, and all is right with the world.  If you either don't want  to speak with the LEO or don't like what he or she is telling you, you appear before the judge.  This session was to start at 10AM.  The trooper was in a jury trial and was not going to be able to appear until just before the judge was ready to take the bench.  By the time the trooper showed, there were about five minutes left before the judge entered the court.  An interesting conversation took place:

"I want to talk to the judge.  I want my ticket throwed out."

"Sir, I doubt the judge will do that, especially since there are several witnesses to the case present in the courtroom today."

"I wasn't speedin'.  There was other cars passin' me like I was on flypaper."

"Sir, you weren't cited for speeding.  You were cited for driving too fast for conditions."

"But them folks wuz speeding!"

"Sir, I run traffic stops there all the time.  I understand what you're saying, but I didn't cite you for speeding.  We weren't running a speed stop that day, and while they may have been exceeding the speed limit, that's not what you got the ticket for.  Traffic was stopped, and by your actions, you damaged seven vehicles."

This went on for a while.  Then, he changes the subject:

"My van was totaled!  They gots to get one of them lit signs warning about congestion or sumpin' on the road.  I've been driving for seventy two years, and ain't never had anythin' like this..."

"Sir, I understand you vehicle was totaled--so were three others.  As for the signs, the judge here can't help you.  All he will want to hear from you is guilty or not guilty of the charge of driving too fast for conditions."

He pressed that issue for several minutes.  Then, another quick sidestep:

"My brakes musta failed or my foot musta slipped."

"Sir, we tested your van's brakes--even with all the damage, the system was intact and you had a firm pedal.  But that's also something the judge isn't interested in..."

The trooper had to explain this to the man at least three times before he switched tracks again:

"The hospital cut me loose and I wuz still hurtin'!"

"Sir, You'll need to take that up with the hospital.  This judge won't rule on that.  All he wants to hear is guilty or not guilty to the charge."

Then the guy's wife starts chiming in:

"Can't you reduce the fine?"

Ma'am, the fine is $81.88 and two points, the lowest traffic fine we are allowed to levy on this charge.  The judge will not reduce the fine lower than that."

"You really think not?  My husband's a Veteran and everthin'."

"Ma'am, even if the judge thought your husband was the finest man he'd ever met, he can't, by law, reduce the fine.  He could be a Saint, and the law still applies."

Finally, the couple decide that maybe it is best to pay their fine, take the points, and move on.  Much to my delight and to the delight of the other witness.  Of course, by the time they decided this, the judge entered the courtroom.  We did the polite thing and sat until the trooper and judge dismissed us.

There's several hours of my life I'm never gonna see again.  But if he made his appearance with no witnesses present, the case would have likely been dismissed.  So, I did my good deed for the day, and got a few hours away from work on top of it all.  Sometimes life is like that...

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During one of the lulls in the action, my wife and I paid a visit to one of the smaller hobby shops in the area, one that we hadn't been to in quite a while.  When I say small, I mean it in size, mainly--what the shop lacks in size is usually offset by some of the stuff held within it's walls.  We poked through the stacks, and I noted that the owner must have bought parts of a collection.  One man's trash (or SIDNA) is another man's treasure (or future SIDNA, depending on how the stars align):  I snagged a Fujimi 1/72 scale HSS-2B Sea King in JASDF markings for $12 and a Hasegawa 1/72 scale F-111F for about $20 and some change.  Not bad, considering Hasegawa is pricing the kits of the Pig that they do re-release at nearly double that.  I also noticed some HO scale/gauge Proto2000 Atlantic Coast and Florida East Coast locomotives priced nicely--I didn't get them yet, but will soon do so.  It pays to shop local, doesn't it?

The Fujimi Sea King is a nice kit that can be difficult to find.  It had most of the detail differences included (sponsons, short and long horizontal stabilizer, ice shield) in the box.  I'd like to have some fun and maybe build this one as one of the CH-3B's that the U. S. Air Force used to resupply the Texas Tower radar sites or to recover drones.  Eventually, I will build a Navy version or three, but the Air Force titles on an engine gray and orange helo intrigue me...

As for the -111, I may again break my vow in order to do something I've meant to do for years.  Stay tuned.

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On our trip to Florida, we stopped by the usual haunts and came up with a few hits.  I bought the wife a copy of the new Kinetic T-45 Goshawk.  It is a nice kit--she has already finished the model, and it looks quite nice.  I also managed to snag a Revell Germany issue of the 1/72 scale MPM A-20G kit.  Just as nice at half the price.  Really.

She found one of the new Academy 1/48 scale F-4B Phantom II kits, which she promptly wrapped and gave to me on Christmas.  Personally, I think it is a superb kit regardless of the hubbub on the 'net.  Mine is destined to wear the Top Hat of VF-14...

She also was directed towards a Zvesda 747-8 kit that I had spied for an oh-so-nice price.  So she's got that going for her...

Before we left on the trip, she had pre-ordered a couple of the new Meng 1/72 scale F-102A kits.  All I can say is that if you are a Century Series fan, get one.  Or two.  Or a half-dozen.  Yes, they are that nice...

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The 51st running of the Rolex 24 at Daytona is history.  Scott Pruett won for the fifth time, tying Hurley Haywood in the most wins in "Daytona's twice 'round the clock classic" department.  Let's say that I'm not Scott's biggest fan, but I do appreciate the achievement.  Winning once is a lifetime goal of so many people, so to win it five times is truly remarkable.  And I'm glad that Charlie Kimball was on the team for this race--Charlie races in the IndyCar series even though he has Type 1 diabetes--he carries a Novo Nordic FlexPen in the car with him, and he's done quite well for himself on the track.  He's also a nice guy, and I'm happy that he now can say he was on a winning team in Daytona.  Wayne Taylor Racing and their new partner Velocity Worldwide was on the second step of the podium this year.  The BMW's were the class of the field, so Wayne's Corvette DP just didn't have the muscle to keep pace, even with Max Angelelli, Ryan Hunter-Reay, and Wayne's son Jordan sharing the duty.  Last year's winner, Michael Shank Racing's #60 car, finished third but was later fined and stripped of all the winnings and most of the points because of a rules infraction.  Part of the fines go to Camp Boggy Creek...

In the GT ranks, Audi and Ferrari came to play, and play they did.  Audi Sport/AJR took first, AudiSport/APR took second, and AIM Autosport/FXDD took theird in their Ferrari 458.  And, the new GX class had mixed results--the three top finishers were all Porsche Caymans.  Three Mazda6 GX entries met with misfortune early on, all of them dropping out due to engine and mechanical problems after 50 laps.

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So there you are.  We covered a lot of ground this time--some work woes, some family woes, some interesting disorder in the court, some plastic tales, and some racing.  I hope that holds you for a while. 

And I hope to be back sooner.  Can't make any promises, but I'll do my best to fill your head with useless trivia, questionable knowledge, and goofy tales from back in the day.

Until then, thanks for reading.  Be good to one another, and I bid you Peace.

The Fit is GO...

I'm back!  I trust all of my American friends had a safe and enjoyable Thanksgiving...

Remember how I was telling you of the kerfluffle I was involved in Wednesday before Thanksgiving?  Well, I took the truck to the collision shop for evaluation, and, no surprise, the insurance company declared it a total loss (our state requires that when the damage exceeds 75% of the vehicle's book value).  It was a bit funny--when the adjuster told me, he acted like it would come as a great shock to me, and was fumbling a bit.  He then was saying that "all we need to do now is figure out what we're going to pay out..."  Without missing a beat, I said "Oh, how about thirty thousand dollars?"  He fumbled some more--until he realized what I said.  "We're not that rich!"  I told him I was kidding, and once the business was done I wound up getting towards the high average of the value of a 1999 Toyota Tacoma V6 SR5 PreRunner Access Cab in good condition.  As I said last time, I will miss that little truck--it served me for 13 years and 375,159 miles without fail.  I only hope whatever becomes of it helps other people as much as it did me.

So, there I am Wednesday afternoon, check in hand at the credit union.  I deposited the check, and the teller asks me of it is okay if there is a three day hold on the check.  As if I had any say in that matter.  I explained that I would be needing funds, but I could temporarily transfer some money from my savings account.  I told her why I needed the money, and she reminded me that they did vehicle loans.  Well, prior experience tells me that while they certainly do those types of loans, I'll be better off using other financing...I was right, more on that later...

I had been researching and sneaking test drives for a while, and I had originally wanted to go with a Kia or Hyundai.  One nagging thing kept me from going back--their smaller cars use an electrically boosted steering, and on both drives I was constantly making steering corrections.  Now, I live out in the sticks on narrow country roads, and during the winter my drive to and from work is done in the dark--the last thing I need to add to the drive is bump steering a vehicle.  So, I took a pass on the Korean subcompacts.

I also thought I'd better look at the Ford Fiesta and Ford Focus--of the Big Three American automakers, Ford is the one that seems to have their act together.  Well, I'll say thins--I'm sure they are fine automobiles, but by the time I found something equipped the way I wanted it, I was looking at the other side of $24K.  Too rich for my Scot blood, especially for a subcompact car.

I researched the Chevy Sonic, too.  Now, the Sonic isn't truly a Chevrolet, it is a badge engineered Daewoo product.  It was put in the Chevy lineup to replace the truly horrid Aveo--but from what I read, it isn't much better.  Add to that my previous experience with General Motors, and it was also ruled out.

Mitsubishi and Suzuki?  Try to find a dealership here.  Nope.

Mini?  And pay BMW prices for the privilege?  Hardly...

The VW Jetta seems like a good car--I drove one while I was in Tucson.  But with that VW badge comes VW maintenance prices.  If I'm going to pay those prices to maintain a car built in Germany, I'll take a Porsche or Audi, thanks!

Dodge?  No way I'll look at a Dodge product.  I'm a MOPAR fan from way back, but that was a very different Chrysler Corporation.  Nope, they tied their fate to Fiat and it may kill both.  That's also why I dismissed the Fiat 500.

What about Toyota, you say?  True, my Tacoma was a solid vehicle.  Problem is that Toyota got a bit full of themselves somewhere around 2003/2004.  Most of their lineup hasn't seen a major restyle since then.  Toyota seems to want to sell either various iterations of the Prius or warmed over Corollas and Camrys. 

Just for giggles, I looked at the "Boxes"--the Scion vB, the Nissan Cube, and the Kia Soul.  While I appreciate the funky styling, none of them was "me". 

Speaking of Nissan, I did consider the Versa.  We drove one last year when we were in Grand Junction on that pop-up trip for work.  It isn't a bad little car, but Nissans don't hold their value as well as other makes.

So that leaves Honda.  (Well, Honda and Subaru--and Subaru's pricing is like Ford's--good cars, no doubt, but too rich for me.)  My family is no stranger to Honda--my brother had an Accord and a Civic, and my mother's current car is also a Civic.  Since I wanted a hatchback, I looked at the Honda Fit (Jazz to those of you in Europe who may be reading).  I did some research, and most of the complaints seemed minor.  I went to the local dealer's website and requested a price quote.  About an hour later, I got one--and it was lower than I thought it would be.  It was below TrueCar's average, so that piqued my interest.  Last Friday I managed to get out of work early, so I went to the dealership and did the test drive.  The car drives very nicely, and better yet, I was able to climb in--creaky joints and all--with no problem at all.  The salesman is about as tall as my wife, and he had plenty of leg- and headroom, which answered another question.  And the inside of this car is cavernous.  Depending on how you configure the seats (Magic Seats, Honda calls them), you have enough space to haul just about anything that will fit through the hatch...reminds me of a car I used to own.  Once the drive was done, I told the salesman that I'd contact him when I got home.

I had already done some math, and was ready to buy.  I called the salesman and set up an appointment for the next day, and he told me to go ahead and submit a credit app through their website.  For those of you who "know how to buy a car", let me tell you this--I was in and out in two hours.  My credit app was sent to them Friday night, they had my credit score waiting.  The only questions they had were "How much are you going to put down?" and "How long will you be financing the balance?"  Well, that and "Do you want an extended service contract?"--I wasn't going to at first, but in the end I bought one.  I had to remind myself that this wasn't a dirt-simple 1999 pickup truck, and the kicker was when the F&I guy held up a tire pressure sensor and told me how much it cost, both the part and labor to change.  Sold...I guess he did his job.

Anyway, the whole thing was done in two hours and with little fuss.  So, now I have a new car...a 2013 Honda Fit Sport:

 And yes, it is blue.  Vortex Blue Pearl, to be exact.  I have had enough brown/tan/silver/gray/white cars in my life, I wanted something with a little color...I guess I got what I wanted.

Thanks for reading.  Be good to one another, and I bid you Peace.

Time for some time...

Been a while, hasn't it?  Yeah, I know.  I promised to spend more time with you.  I promised to finish more stuff and show it to you.  Well, life got in the way.  In order to pay the bills, I have a job.  And in order to keep said job, I have to work some pretty wierd hours--but you know that already, don't you? 

One of the bits of fallout from working all those hours is that I finally got a day off.  Not the way I'd like, no, because I spent a good part of the day at the doctor's office and then at the hospital.  Nothing serious, but I've been hobbling about for a week or so on a bum knee--when things didn't settle down as usual, the other knee started to hurt, too, so I decided it was high time I had them looked at by a professional (unlike my boss, who, like an eager coach, tells me to "walk it off").  The bottom line is that age is catching up with me--neither knee has been 100% for a long time, and between that, spending a great deal of the day kneeling on a hard aluminum floor (and when I'm not, I'm walking on a hard concrete floor), and arthritis that I've known about for 15 years or so, well, you get the picture.  The doctor suspects some inflammation of the soft tissue, but the insurance company wants to have an X-ray before they'll approve an MRI.  In the meantime, NSAIDs and rest it is--and in the words of John Astin playing Buddy Ryan (Harry Stone's father on Night Court, not the football coach), "But I'm feeling much better now..."

I finally finished a project!  The Operation Cool Snow Hog '82 model in 1/48th scale, in all her glory:

That's Monogram's kit as reissued by Revell.  It builds up into the nicest (in my opinion, anyway) 1/48th scale A-10A.  I still feel, however, that the world still needs a state-of-the-art A-10A in all scales--the newer kits out there leave a great deal to be desired.  A simple base from the craft store, a printed ID card, and a quick protective box made from foam core board, and she is now int he hands of her rightful owner.  I'll build another for my collection, using what I learned on this build...like how to get that camoflauge scheme done right and look the part.  What you see is the result of at least three attempts and one complete strip and repaint.  I still see things that make me cringe on this one.  The engine covers hide some particularly nasty intake and exhaust issues with the kit that I didn't care to fix.  Lazy?  Yep.  Next time, I'll get some resin intakes that will eliminate the issues...

Oh, and remember that little waif cat who adopted us last year?  Here he is, inspecting the work:

He learned from his big brother, here checking out a Hasegawa 1/72 scale F-16D Barak in 2004:

That's all I have from around these here parts.  I'm working diligently to have some progress made on the StuG IV, which will be the subject of an airbrushing demo for the local AMPS Chapter meeting in October.

Thanks for stopping by.  As always, be good to one another, and I bid you Peace.

 

So here we are....

I'd like to first offer a load of thanks to my lovely and talented wife, who did a lot of the behind-the-scenes stuff for this blog and wrapped it up as a Christmas gift for me.

A few things you need to know about me.  I am a geek.  Specifically, I am a history geek.  I am also a nerd, one who builds little plastic models of things I find interesting.  And I find a lot of things interesting--from planes and ships, to historic events, motor sports (that's racin' to y'all what live in the South), people, places and things from various eras in my own life, books, music, guns and ammo, fishing and cooking (baking, specifically--in another life I'm convinced that I must have been a pastry chef). 

Professionally, I've done a little bit of this and a little bit of that: I've worked retail sales (including two stints at hobby shops, which is somewhat akin to putting the fox in charge of the hen house), sold and delivered HVAC parts in a wholesale warehouse, been a go-fer at a Country Club, and spent my college summers as an A-V geek and library clerk.  I've spent the last 20-plus years chasing sparks and stringing wires on airplanes as an Avionics Technician, fueled by knowledge gained while earning two degrees from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, "The Harvard of the Sky", in Daytona Beach, Florida.  I've been living out in the sticks in South Carolina since 2001, in what we like to call the Greater Upper Midlands Co-Prosperity Sphere, with the aforementioned spouse and our only dependant--a 15-pound Mackerel Tabby cat who insists that he's a fierce, ferocious, and mighty Tennessee Waking Tiger.  Prior to that, I grew up and lived from almost exactly 30 years in a sleepy little suburb of Ft. Lauderdale, Florida after my folks decided we needed a break from southern New Jersey.  I won't delve into the 18 months we spent in Massachusetts other than to say it was, without a doubt, the coldest 18 months in my life.

So, why "Iron Modeler"?  Well, I was going to call it "Stuff and Junk", but when the wife and I open our strip mall, that's what we want to call the 5 and dime.  We may introduce you to a few of the stores we plan on putting into our mythical strip mall some day...but that's another story for another day.

Geek alert:  I'm also a fan of the Fuji TV cooking show "Iron Chef" (the original, not the cheesy American "go for the throat" competition show).  Those guys can cook, plus the campy atmosphere leads to some unintentionally funny moments.  The chefs--all of them, not just the Iron Chefs--are well-versed in many different cooking styles.  Like the Iron Chefs' skills, my interests are quite eclectic and varied, hence Iron Modeler.  One day, I may reflect on a moment in history.  Another day may see me sharing a bit on my latest project, and the next day may be a nostalgic look back at the way things were when I was a kid.  You never know what any given day will bring, and so it will be with the blog.

I'll see you again real soon...