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First WWII Airplane kit you built


waistgunner

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Easily remembered... my first WW2 aircraft was the Revell Hawker Hurricane Mk1 (1/144), including the peculiar glue bubble supplied with the kit. It was even painted green/brown/blue... the aircraft itself is long gone, but the cut-out picture of the box should be still around in the childhood's treasures box.

This particular kit also shares the distinction of being my first ever kit with the Aurora F-104 (http://www.internetmodeler.com/2005/october/columns/kitcorner.php). Can't remember, which one was first, but it was one of them. The F-104 actually is still around including glue stains, fingerprints and other marks, waiting to be restored with Alclad... need to find the stand for it, though.

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  • 7 months later...

Boringly predictable, first kit was an Airfix 1/72 Spitfire like below - bought from the local 'paper-shop' where there was a rotating Airfix stand like you see for post-cards...
It was probably bought around 1963 and I think it cost about 2/-
Goodness knows how much pleading it took on my part to get it (I was ten), but I think that I was probably only successful because dad wanted it too :D
It was constructed wheels-up without paint but with decals and would 'fly' quite well underwater in the bath if the nose was weighted with Plasticine.

vintage-airfix-spitfire-ix-c.1950-s-60-s

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I have no way of remembering for sure but the image of a Monogram P-38 keeps popping up. It would've that or a B-25 Mitchell. Definitely 1/72. That would've been probably the late 1980s, so I couldn't have been more than 9. I usually got them together alright, other than always destroying the canopies with cement fumes, but they were rarely painted and rarely got decals. Most of them met an inauspicious demise propped in a tree while I plugged away at them with my Red Ryder BB gun.

I'm laughing at the other gent's comment about not having seen an Airfix kit until 1975 when he was 13. I can't remember seeing an Airfix kit at all during my entire childhood! The first Airfix kit I ever bought was the current tooling 1/48 Bf-109E1/3/4 back in December 2014! :lol: I still haven't finished one completely, but I've got piles of 1/72 Airfix kits now. Very, very glad I came back to the hobby, and a big part of that is the wonderful community here at BM!

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Mine was undoubtedly a Matchbox kit, either the Hurricane IId or the Mustang, finished as Dooleybird, which was one of the kit options, built sans paint sometime around '78 or '79. Britfix 77 (with plenty of stringing), gluey fingerprints, wonky markings and all. I also recall flying them both around the house, as you do, proud as anything of my creation.

Bits of both (and many other other Matchbox kits) are still hanging around in the parts box, despite teenage shenanigans, marriage, house moves, divorce, house moves, job changes and hospital visits.

Edited by Rob G
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One thing that I'm finding interesting is the differences between the countries and the age groups represented here. It appears that those from Britain and the Commonwealth had mostly 1/72 kits, often received as gifts at no small sacrifice to the family budget, and the resultant assembled model was treasured. Those from the countries less economically affected by the war, or who started after the 80s turned, seem to have started with larger scales, and seem to be a lot more prone to causing damage to the finished article.

Or maybe I'm reading too much into whats been written.

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Mine was a 1/72 FW-190A strangely, no idea what company but it would have been late 80's as I was around 8. I remember enjoying slapping it haphazardly together very much. I also put a classy 'crashed backwards' bending effect on the prop by in my eagerness trying to dry the glue in front of the gas fire to speed things along. Guess theres weight to 80's kids and damage as mentioned above?? I blame the lead in petrol!

Kits 2, 3, 4 etc i have no idea. I do remember enjoying the 1/24 spitfire and hurricane a year or 2 later though!

Edited by Phil32
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First kit was the predictable Airfix Spitfire IX about 1970-71, with my Grandfather , I was in awe of Spitfires after watching the Battle of Britain, but then my Grandfather told me for Australia the Kittyhawk was more important the Spit was a good aircraft but the range was too short for the Pacific, and the Mustang was the fighter we strived for , he worked overhauling engines in Brisbane during the war , 1830's from B-24's, C-47, Boomerangs, Beauforts etc. This got me onto Pacific aircraft rather than European and continues today , I have probably build less than half a dozen European aircraft that weren't from RAAF Sqn's or Australian crews, to several hundred Pacific , RAAF, RNZAF and US aircraft.

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I've reached an age where I honestly can't remember the very first one! Started building models at age 6, mostly cars then as with most of my small-town east Tennessee contemporaries, then about age 10 fell in love with a friend's model airplane collection and to this day have not recovered.

My first loves were the 1/72 Revell kits with the great Brian Knight box art, but rare and coveted treats were Monogram 1/48 kits. The Fw 190, Ki 43 Oscar, and Wildcat were great favorite Revells, also the seemingly huge Monogram Hurricane with its slick operating landing gear and vast weapons assortment. Also had a long spell doing most of the Aurora WWI kits. The local dime stores usually had those kits; exotic fare like Airfix, FROG, or Japanese kits required a sojourn to an actual hobby shop in Knoxville or similarly exotic locales.

For most of my formative years, single-engined 1/72 stuff cost about 50 cents, 1/72 twins around 69 cents, Auroras about 79 cents, the Monograms a whole dollar, and about once a year I'd manage to save $1.50 for one of the big Monogram Navy birds with folding wings...Avenger, Helldiver, etc. I remember paying $2.00 for a Revell Fw 200 which was at that time the biggest purchase of my life...had that "O wot have I DONE!" feeling in the pit of my stomach for days afterwards, LOL...

Edited by MDriskill
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Crown (Japanese) 1/144 A26. In 1964 as an 8 year old. Painted with water colour green on top and grey below. It looked quite good until I tried to put on the transfers (they weren't decals then), then the paint ran terribly.

It ended up being tested to destruction with a penny banger on Guy Fawkes Night.

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My first was the Monogram Spitfire IX, in "quarter inch scale", now commonly known as 1/48 scale. Assembled and painted with a metallic green paint. At the time I thought it looked precisely like what was portrayed on the box art. In retrospect, I am sure the imagination of an eight year old was extremely significant in that perception.

 

31667559738_69f3d4636a_o.jpg

Edited by Vonbraun
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My first kit was the "quarter inch scale" Monogram Helldiver, I'm guessing it was 1967 or so? I remember painting the undersides white with ordinary house paint, the plastic itself was a dark blue so no need to paint that of course.. I couldn't understand why the rivets and panel lines disappeared. I think it had an opening bomb bay with a sway brace.

That Monogram Spitfire IX was my second model, I still get a warm feeling seeing that box art. I might try to find one on eBay just to keep as a reminder. I had progressed to Testor's model paint by then. I still remember painting it gloss grey on the undersides and using a reddish brown for the disruptive pattern. Looked great to me then.

Richard

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The first I remember making was a Spit. I would have been around eight or nine at the time so it would have been around 1964. I can remember asking my Dad (who was making a tank of some description at the same table) to do the propellor/fuselage bit as it was a bit too much of a mind blower to me at the time.

However; I also clearly remember being in an isolation hospital with scarlet fever when I was five and my Dad turning up with a kit of an Albatross and flying it around the room in his hand saying that when I got better he would build it with me.

I can't remember anytime in my life when I wasn't obsessed with aircraft and flying.

The last kit I remember building before joining the RAF (which oddly enough saw an end to my model making until very recently) was the Airfix Hercules, I suppose that would have been around 1973.

Edit: I now have a nine year old grandson who lives around the corner who likes to use the airbrush...I can see me in him as a nine year old. You have to be a grandad to get that.

Edited by Dave Wilson
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  • 3 years later...
On 6/26/2014 at 8:36 PM, perdu said:

Nostalgia time is fun isn't it

nineteen fifty blob

The first WWll aeroplane model I ever built

(this was my second actual kit, the first was Golden Hind painted with Reeves Water colours - not well - obviously)

Was the oldest Airfix Spitfire

I think it was blue plastic and it didn't land well enough to get painted :(

One thing I THINK I remember about it was a pair of small bombs on each wing

I don't remember anyone else ever mentioning them so I may be wrong

I AM old after all

As this pair of brilliant mouldings started me off you have Airfix to blame for me being here

 

 

Your memory is correct! The first Airfix Spitfire, the famous BTK one, did have four tiny bombs under the wings. It was a direct copy of the 1.48 scale Aurora kit, even the instruction sheet was copied by Airfix.

 

Here's two header variants, an unpainted blue plastic built kit and a painted version. The cammo one sits on an original Aitfix stand, also directly copied from the Aurora original.

 

 

IMG-0161-zpsb78f1ca9.jpg

 

And here's the original, with the young upstart sat next to it!

 

Frog-Penguins160-zpsd781c937.jpg

 

Edited by TonyW
picture added
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Oh yes,I remember that well

 

Not too keen on yours though, totally unauthentic

 

You didn't manage to destroy the inside of the canopy with blobbed out glue

 

😊😊😊😊😊

😉

 

A great little display, takes me back such a long way

 

Thanks

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On 6/23/2014 at 8:04 PM, Radpoe Spitfire said:

First kit, was the Airfix 1/72 Spitfire Mk IX, Johnnie Johnson's aircraft. It was over 40 years ago, painted in green & Bronze- I knew Spitfires were green and Dk earth, but the bronze was the only brown in the shop.

For those old enough to remember Airfix had their own paints in little glass jars & adhesive which you had to put a dressmakers pin in the end to stop it setting.

Ohh those were the days.

 

 

Here's a few of those paints, sat alongside an Airfix Zero. The colour scheme was copied from a Commando Comic, so I know I got it right.

 

IMG-5292.jpg

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For the life of me, I can't remember the first WWII kit I built. The first kit I built unaided was the Airfix P1127 back in the early sixties. My Dad was impressed that I got the undercarriage right!

 

A WWII kit I didn't build was the Airfix SM79, back when it was first released. I left the nearly done plane by the front room fire while we had dinner one weekend. On my return to it I was greeted with a somewhat droopy looking part melted disaster. Sometimes the wrong memories stay with you!

 

I finally finished one recently, for the Classic Airfix Group Build here. I even managed to not melt it this time around.

 

 

IMG-6228.jpg

 

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My first WWII kit was my actually my first ever kit and it was the 1/72 Airfix Heinkel 111 which I built in 1962. A pretty adventurous build on my part, especially given that I was only 6 at the time! It wasn’t painted, the propellers didn’t rotate, the decals were anyhow and it had plenty of ‘Britfix 77’ finger prints on the canopy, but I loved it! My father bought it for me as he had memories of seeing a He.111 crashing at Sutton park near B’ham when he was a youth and I think it made quite an impact on him. I don’t think he was too impressed with my modelling skills though! 🤣

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