TonyW

Put a bubbletop on a Heller Citroen DS, fair over the wheel arches and you would have that car! Thread drift, I'll give you thread drift!

There's something happening here. What it is aint exactly clear.... Stephen Stills got it right, odd stuff happens. Take the recent car saga that crept into @Mjwomack's thread on his Shell Welder build. Somehow the thread drifted into American Muscle cars, via Ford Cortinas. Of course it would, the connection is obvious I said I couldn't contribute anything FROG car related to the GB as I had nothing in the stash. Fast forward to yesterday. At an auction not far from me, look what made me bid on it... It's karma man. Not so much When the pupil is ready, the teacher will appear, more like When the builder is ready, the Cortina will appear. It's part started, with the seats glued in and painted. Nothing else has been done to it. I'll take a closer look at it to see if a white car with red side flashes sitting lowered, on steels, is in my future.

If it's already got cracking showing it's probably too late for anything to help. If the sheet looks OK under close scrutiny a couple of coats of clear might hold things together long enough to get them on the model. I wouldn't trust the decals on their own.

A 1300 porridgemobile, in hearing aid beige. Also available in grey. Knitted tissue box cover optional. A Dodge Charger. Hemi head V8 optional. I rest my case M'lud. .

Here's an advert for the FROG Penguin P51 Mustang, released just after the war in 1946. A quick read of the text shows that the Trade Descriptions Act was some way in the future. It's not the most accurate of models but would build easily enough as long as the parts hadn't warped, as they were very prone to. Here's a built one, sat alongside the first Airfix version. It manages to make the Airfix kit look good, and that's no mean feat. Plastic models have come a long way since then.

A beautiful model of a quite beautiful aeroplane. Those wheel spats give it a very art deco look.

Nicely steered back to the original subject.

I'm not disputing that there was an aftermarket prior to the internet Graham, far from it. It's a matter of scale. The opening up of a world wide market has enabled the smaller manufacturers to reach a wide enough market to make them far more viable than before. It can also weed out the less than proficient either by peer review or pricing. Readers letters are no match for internet forums when a new kit is either praised or dammed. The reverse side of the coin is that the small firms can be overwhelmed by success. All problems and advantages that existed before, but on a more immediate and larger scale. On balance, I think things are doing just fine at the moment. 3D printing could be the start of a major shift in the modelling world, much like the arrival of plastic kits in the days of carve your own modelling. The modelling press at the time was scathing in it's criticism of the new media but soon had to change its tune.

Here's the Haswgawa/FROG Rita. Not one of my builds, other than a bit of added weathering and the base, but too nice not to include here. I've got an orange one buried in the loft somewhere. If I come across it I'll edit this post to include it.

And we're off! A bit of parts cleanup and some priming started this morning. The sun making a welcome appearance helped with the light in the shed and a bit of picture taking happened.

The internet has saved the hobby, as well as helping to kill off the model shops we all miss with our rose tinted memories. It's fact and can't be changed. No shop can hold stock of everything out there but my computer screen can. That's two conflicting takes on the subject but I'm happier with the way things are than the way things were. I can remember trawling from model shop to model shop when they were far more common, looking for specific items and failing to find what I wanted. An awful lot of stuff just didn't exist! I miss the shops but memories can be very misleading. A big part of me thinks the wider internet is the end of times but I can't deny it has its uses as far as my interests go. I would be typing to myself without it! Tony.

Another from me, the 1959 Typhoon, cat. no. 389P, in all its simple glory. A rake though my box scale kits turned up a duplicate Typhoon. It's all there bar the instructions. I should be able to manage without them, but if needed, I can use the sheet from the other kit! I'm hoping for a quick build while the Comet builds are underway. Close enough period references have been dug out in the form of a copy of the July '66 Aero Modeller. More for the cover to use as a photo prop but the plans inside might come in handy. The kit ran for years and was still in production when the magazine came out so the two could have been united for a build back in the day. Things look very close indeed. The fuselage is a bit short but the wings and prop are an exact match. The cannon holes on the leading edge match the plan to perfection. I can't see me going for broke here but at the very least I'll fill the void where the radiator should be and add a basic cockpit as there's nothing in there at all. If it were not for the engraved markings the kit could pass for a much later one due to its very well done engraved panel lines. More later...

We are straying away from VC10's here, but it is the chat section of the Forum so we might get away with it. There can't be much doubt about us living through the Golden Age of modelling. There's hardly a niche that isn't provided for now. The internet has opened up the collectors world to reveal Aladdins Cave. Kit's I've never heard of, yet alone seen, are now available from all over the world. A search and a click or two and they are on the way! What was staggeringly rare and hard to find is now almost commonplace. Builders have never had it so good either. The wave keeps rolling along. Airfix keep releasing well designed and highly detailed kits. The aftermarket is huge and 3D printing is gathering a heady pace as I type. Things will change in kitworld, that's the nature of life in general. However, for every minus at the moment, there are a dozen pluses. Tony, glass quite full thank you.

It's going to be a long wait. They are a gap in the collection. The FROG cars have never hit the right buttons with me, being a bit britdull. An 1100 four wheeled porridge mobile, or a '68 Dodge Charger? I know what I would rather build. The Mk1 Cortina is the only one that I might show a flicker of interest in, but they tend to be a bit expensive when they turn up. Cars will get a look in from me in the Baby Boomer and Airfix GB's. I think 1/130 is a good indicator, I'm sure somewhere in the chat thread is mention of a Frog aircraft where the difference between the wingspan scale and fuselage scale are radically different. Can't remember which kit, might have been one of @AdrianMF because he seems to like the really hard builds! It was the FROG whittle jet that has the odd dimensions, wings vs fuselage.

So would I. What usually happens is that a new release that fits all the current buyer trends lowers the price of the old, and thus far only, option. For instance, the market for FROGs HP Victor changed once Matchbox and Airfix introduced their take on the subject in the now accepted 1.72 scale. Builders previously only went for the FROG kit as there was no alternative short of scratch building.. Collectors are a different market altogether. As a collector, I can get exited by period artwork, wrong colours and working features that would have a builder gnashing his teeth. It's all part of the history of the hobby. 1.2mm out on the wingspan or too many/too few rivets have the same effect on me. My building reflects that as well. FROG collectors in general are getting on a bit now, I'm 67 and probably an average age for the subject. Once we start to vanish, the market for the kits we desired may well collapse altogether. Who knows?

That's a very smart looking build. The plane itself looks more like a furniture van to me, but that's no reflection on the flawless finish on yours.

Monogram tried 1.24 metal bodies briefly in the seventies. The did a '53 Corvette, XK120 and MG TD They were not too successful and reverted to plastic for the same cars in the eighties. The shapes looked good. The chassis and other parts were injection plastic. I always thought it odd they did a metal Corvette.

The Airfix VC10 came in three slightly different BOAC markings. The box was updated each time BOAC refinished the stripes. Airfix were shifting so many kits at the time they could well afford the updates. Roy Cross was probably more than happy to help.

I've added a bit of background info to the thread mentioned in the initial post right up top of the page. I didn't want to derail this thread.

Scales took a while to sort out in the kit market with Airfix probably leading the way in the UK just by sales volume alone, a bit like Tamiya overwhelming 1.32 scale for their 1.35 preference. FROG may well have preferred to stay with 1.96 to keep continuity with the other big airliners in their range but the pressure from Airfix and the box size required for a 1.96 VC10 probably swung things. Shape wise, it's of its time. There's a bit more finesse to the parts when set against the earlier 1.96 planes but there is still a certain chunky feel to the parts. The tail looks a bit big to me. I don't have my unbuilt kit to hand but here's a couple of shots of unrestored early builds. None have the light setup fitted. I don't know how accurate the models are but they look like a VC10 to me and would have been acceptable for most buyers when new. They are getting on a bit now. The one below has the rare East African Airlines markings applied. The broken down kit above has EAA markings hand painted on. Somebody wanted this hard to find scheme for their collection and got stuck in with a fine paintbrush!

I've enough unbuilt kits left over from that one to hit the ground running in Heller GB2

That's a fine looking kit Rob. Matchbox took a bit of flak back in the day but they got a whole lot of people into kit building that might not have done so otherwise. Selling through the established Matchbox toy network got the kits into newsagents and other stores that might not have otherwise held kit stocks. I built a 262 in the Matchbox GB a while ago. I had to improvise decals, but 100% accuracy wasn't on the agenda that day...

I'm looking forward to the show, cold or not. Dress accordingly would seem to be mandatory. I must admit to not noticing the cold really. Now, if you ask me what I've come home with kit shopping wise, how long have you got?

I would think the £120 asking price was the starting point for a bit of arm wrestling. It's a fair starting point. Were the box to be perfect and the contents complete and as they left the factory, the wrestling would be in the sellers favor. The price starts to drop as wear and tear, parts missing, work started etc. come into play. How much do you want it has a bearing as well. If it's a whim buy it's easier to pass. If you have been after one for years, less so. Had the contents of the box been properly checked and found to contain East African Airways decals as well as the BOAC ones, the asking price would have been a bargain. As a builder, a NOVO rebox or an Airfix kit would be cheaper and possibly a better bet although the Airfix kit has a collector following and the Novo kit would need decals added at the very least. To build or not to build? Completely up to the owner really. You will always get a decent sum back for a good unbuilt model, so ownership could be thought of as free or even profitable. You probably won't get your money back if you build it, you could be surprised though. A well built FROG kit, with working lights would be an interesting proposition if offered for sale. It would be very rare indeed for a start. It would compliment an unbuilt model in a collection in no uncertain terms. Offered with its box and paperwork as a complete Collectors display item it would interest quite a few different collector markets. FROG collectors, BOAC collectors, working model buffs, general airliner fans, there's quite a potential market out there. An interesting, if untested thought.

Gonna need a bigger plane...