hello all.......it's been a while since I've posted anything worthwhile......a lot has happened since. My modeling has gone on undeterred, rest assured, which has caused me to come to some conclusions concerning the history of model kits. Think back to your younger days, when you'd go to the store and purchase that model kit that you've had your eye on for some time. once you got home, it was the mad dash to build it. I recall such times.......makes me peckish every time I think of the more interesting subjects I chose.
Models of the day were primitive....something I have come to realize, having built a few in the NOW world. It goes even deeper........it delves into the companies and the molds they created to make these wonderful kits. Back then, you had Pyro, Lindberg Line, MPC, AMT, and a long list of other model companies that later generations haven't heard of. As with history, there's time.......and time has a way of changing demographics.......older companies go under........and new companies pop up from the ashes.
In my day, the later companies were my choices, along with Revell, Monogram, and Aurora. I hardly dabbled in the foreign model companies....Heller bubbles up from the memory banks for some reason, but I forget when they actually started up. Foreign companies would produce for the American consumer, importing their products. Oldmodelkits.com is a great place for articles on this subject.....the history they they talk of is very interesting. They also talk about the origins of injection molding....model making in general...how it came to be, who started doing it first, and how it changed the model kit.
It starts with a mold, and then the process for making the parts for the model. There is quite a bit to it........the tooling........the research.....measurements to pertain to a particular scale. They were simple in design.......they featured a low parts count, which meant that the aspects like engines, drivetrains, exhaust, and suspensions, were molded as detail.....there wasn't much to them. Only a few companies monopolized on this, with the idea of getting an edge on their competitors. Models you could build in an afternoon was the sales pitch, which started the hobby. As model making evolved, that sale pitch was rallied less and less..........modelers began to expect more. The evolution spanned over many years, and it still does today........this of course raised the parts count in a model kit, and even expanded other avenues.
As early as the '50's, companies and a few stand alone start up companies, began producing accessory and upgrade kits for existing kits and older ones. Some didn't go over too good....mainly due to the cost of the kit, or the kit it was designed for. The pocket book and the desire to modify kits was another reason this didn't take off. It is surprising, considering the fact that the earliest form of modeling was scratch building. To be clear.......the hobby isn't new........man {and woman} always had this urge to build something with their hands...creativity was always a form of enjoyment. When the model kit came to be, they were embraced with open arms. Wood modeling was another form of the medium....the main root of modeling in general; ships being the main subject. There was also model trains..........these folks followed an open form of scaling, which made it hard for them to sell their models, if some wished to purchase one. The off set of scale made it impossible that one man's model would fit on another train enthusiast's track. This didn't find a remedy, until the classification of scale was established. The train medium was reluctant to get on board, being the last to do so.
Pardon if I digressed, but the beginnings of the modeling hobby is important. Most modeling historians put the start of the hobby around the 30's or 40's........I believe it began sooner than that, dating it as far back as the late 1800's {hand carvings}. but.....back to the subject at hand. Some molds were retooled to add detail that wasn't known at the time.........some molds were even expanded to multiple molds to make the parts for a single model kit. but there's still a good number of molds that saw no changes what so ever. As companies went out of business, the molds were bought up by other companies, and their production continued under a new name. I have built Revell kits that were first produced by Aurora. All molds have a stamping on them as to when they were made.......it can be found most times in an inconspicuous place on a part. Companies who buy these molds will sometimes change the stamping over to their logo........some do not. I like to find these stampings to find out when the molds were created......they are date stamped as well. A good example is the Monogram M48A2 Patton Tank I just built......even though the instructions were revised in 2011, and the kit was dated 2018, the molds for the model was produced in 1966!
Another trick that model companies do to boost choices and sales, is to clone other kits from a single set of molds. Different subjects, but the same model subject.......a B17 can be six different subject choices, but they are all done with the same kit molds. I found this out with the 1:96 series of Revell ships. The Thermopylae was cloned from the Cutty Sark kit.......the C.S.S. Alabama was cloned from the HMS Kearsarge kit.......the U.S.S. United States was cloned from the U.S.S. Constitution kit {this one was interesting, because a few extra parts had to be added to the United States kit because of the modified stern}. An avid modeler has probably figured this out.......really......how many Revell pro stock race cars can one build without seeing the similarities. They become old hat after a while.
Two main companies have emerged within the past few years.......Round 2 and Atlantis. These two companies have bought up quite a few of the original molds for the older models. ........and without any retooling at all, they are producing these models. Now this isn't a bad thing.......nostalgia folks like myself enjoy dabbling with the old kits........but they tend to create challenges revealing the mistakes that were born into these kits. One was the Revell B24 'Buffalo Bill'. Firstly, there was no such thing as a B24 named Buffalo Bill, and the biggest shortcoming of the kit was the landing gear. The way the model was molded, the landing gear was totally unconceivable, nor believable. I was doing a collection of captured wartime aircraft at this point in time, getting reference information from a book called "Luftwaffe KG 200" by Geoffrey Thomas and Barry Ketley.........from the book, I dubbed the plane "Sunshine", the second B24 to have been captured by the Germans in WW2. Revell produced this model back in the 60's.....they later produced the Pacific Raiders kit in the mid 60's {I have this kit}. Atlantis reproduced the Buffalo Bill kit from the original molds, right down to the decals. It wasn't too hard to find the decals for Sunshine. The modification to the landing gear to make it look functional wasn't too hard to do. To begin with, there are no gear doors...they are molded to the underside of the wings. The gears themselves were eliminated, but I use the tire shafts to fill in the holes in the tire, to simulate hub caps. The tires were sanded down to half their thickness and cemented in the round impressions that were molded for them. .....and yes, there are pictures!
These are the kit box art. They show the landing gear in the down position......in flight, they would be retracted. yes....I suppose they could be coming in for a landing....the camel could be a give away, but my thoughts didn't go in that direction. But you see what I mean....Atlantis didn't even change the box art. The model inside was no exception.......but it did build into a nice model.
The tire are nestled neatly under the wing....looks more normal! Atlantis also reproduced the Pacific Raiders kit as well.
Same story here.......no changes. Don't get me wrong.......they are still nice kits, but these molds are not spring chickens. With age, the molds do deteriorate and flash is a result. I had to do a lot of clean up with these kits. I also have the Atlantis B25 kit....I've yet to do any research on the history, but as a hint......it is part of the same series of models. Models are produced in this manner......usually in a series that could consist of three to ten kits.......depending on the subjects, some could be even larger.
I started out as a plastic modeler....god knows how many models I've built. In 2009, I started to build wooden ships, and I've found a lot fun building them, but since the last couple of years, I've seem to slid back towards plastic models. I've seen that wood kits are no different really.......they have their fictitious subjects and mistakes, just like the plastic kits. My scratch building skills are pretty good, but it's still hard to say which medium is easier to work with......correcting mistakes and adding extra detail. I tend to think that it's up to the modeler......especially if he or she can think quick for solution to remedy problems. Coupled with these two abilities, the modeler should have no problem with older kits. Old kits are out there.......whether they are reproduced by companies or from attics and basements. Round 2 is the next subject......I have a model in the post at the moment. When I get it, it will kick off the next installment on this subject. so.........until then...........
