Your first aircraft model ?

[IanC]

14 minutes ago, Sandeha Lynch said:

Boulton-Paul Defiant, Dakota, Ju 52, and a Fairey Gannet were among the early ones, but I can only guess that an Airfix Hurricane was likely the first. 

 

And still a preferred shape compared to other similar aircraft (no names) of the period. There has been a very long gap, but I now have one in the queue.

 

The old Airfix Hurricane IV was one of my first  too, circa 1970. I built it for my grandad who helped build them at Langley during the war.  

 

It lasted for decades - sometimes repaired with sellotape - and was still there when he died.

[RichG]

I was just looking at a thread on a completed Airfix Westland Scout and memories came flooding back of getting this kit when in first came out (1966) and being absolutely mesmerised by the kit artwork - an army Scout flying low over a Centurion tank. I think it because it was clearly a modern (ahem...) scene of British forces - as opposed to something from WWII - that was normal fare.

 

Then I got to thinking this was the time I started building models (I was 6 at the time) and trying hard to remember what kit was my first attempt. It was definitely Airfix. I checked out their catalogue list for 1966 and some familiar friends there! At the time my father was stationed at RAF Seletar in Singapore and there was a little shop on the camp that sold kits and series 1 kits were within my pocket money scope (c. 12.5p) so I was a frequent customer. So of course loads of Series 1 kits in little polythene bags. Still not certain which was first but I'm pretty certain it may have been a Japanese Zero. Which is ironic in that I understand the 381st Kōkūtai equipped with A6M Zeros were based on the airfield only half a mile away during the war (at the time only just over 20 years before)  - not that I expect I knew that at the time!

 

Rich

[AliGauld]

My Mum bought me my first kit from Woolies in Dingwall in 1966 after I had nearly turned my toes up after getting the Smallpox Vaccine and had rather a bad reaction to it.

It was an Airfix 1/72 English Electric Lightning along with some Weldtite Cement and a bottle of Airfix Green Gloss enamel paint.

It was a horrid mess when finished. Streaky green paint everywhere, gluey fingerprints and the canopy was very clouded as I recall.

I loved it and it hung on my bedroom ceiling for many years until we moved house.

 

Cheers,

Alistair

[kiseca]

Quite a mix, and it seems in so many cases to be the memories that go with them that make that first model memorable rather than the model itself.

 

I can't remember what my first one was. The first one I actually remember building would have been some time between 1986 and 1989 I guess, and that was Freddie Spencer's Tamiya Honda NS500. It's long gone, as are all my childhood kits, but I have a replacement in the stash.

 

There were a few 1/72 Spitfires, Hurricanes and a P-51D in the mix too, and a Vickers Wellington, none of which saw a lick of paint at all, but while I remember having them, I don't remember building them, and some became cannon fodder when I acquired a BB rifle. The Freddie Spencer bike was painted, I remember that, but I cannot remember if I built that one before or after all the unpainted ones. After that I got a few that I actually remember painting but I can't even fully remember all the models I had never mind the order I built them in. Every now and again one pops up and it rings a bell! Then there's a long break from when I was about 18 - 19 until two years ago when I didn't indulge the hobby at all.

 

My memories aren't linked to the models so much (there are a few memorable ones for me) but more to the room I built them in. My brother had a room that was outside the main house and when he left home to go to the army his room became my modelling space. The Honda was, I am pretty sure, the first model I built in there. Maybe the others had been built in my bedroom before, which is why I don't remember them.

Edited September 6, 2021 by kiseca

[LaurieS]

One memory is for certain. My first model was a close as a whisker to being the last & it was the whisky that saved the day.

 

Laurie

[RainierHooker]

My first was one of the three Monogram SnapTite models I received for Christmas one year, a B-25, an F-14, and an F/A-18. Can’t remember which was first but all were hanging from my bedroom ceiling in short order.

I tracked down an identical 1970s boxing of the B-25 and gave it to my kid last Christmas. It was the first model he built without help from dad…

[Model Monkey]

1968.  I was 5 years old.  Revell Martin B-57B.  Bought it from a local gas station.  Yes, in those days, you could buy a model from a gas station. I clearly remember the kit on the shelf and how excited I was when my parents said yes.  They later bought me a bike from that gas station.  Yep, you could buy bikes from gas stations, too.

 

Here's the boxart: https://www.scalemates.com/kits/revell-h-132-100-martin-b-57b-intruder--936184

[Slater]

An old Aurora FW-190 in 1/48 (IIRC). This would have been around 1969 or 1970 (just after the Earth cooled). One of the most basic kits you could get, but it generally looked like an FW-190.

[David Hadland]

Strangely my first kit was a Tiger Tank in 1/76 I think I was either 8 or 9 at the time, I think my first Aircraft was either a Spitfire or Hurricane, I'd built up quite a collection by the time my family moved house and much to my horror my models and paints etc, all got chucked in the bin, then I got into comics in a big way and modelling fell by the way side until the lockdown where I got back into it. 

[MikeC]

An Airfix Bristol 192 was my first solo effort, one Christmas in the mid-60s.  I asked my Mother, who had been in the WAAF during the War, which way round the fin flashes should go (albeit straight onto the unpainted plastic) - so I can honestly say I did research from a primary source for my very first model. 🙂

[BD757]

A particularly wet summer holiday led to my cousin and I getting a model each in a Scottish newsagents. My cousin chose a Spitfire but I went for an Airfix 1/72 Messerschmitt Me110. It was a disaster of a build, but I was hooked. Before the holiday was over, I had added an Airfix SAAB Draken to my collection.

 

Managed to get hold of the Draken boxing on ebay recently and am doing it with my 7 yo son! Happy days! 

[John B (Sc)]

Almost certainly an Airfix kit in a bag, 1/11d from Woolies. Maybe a Spitfire (yawn) or a Hurricane from their first mouldings - I certainly made both of those.

 

The first I really remember and treasured for years was the 1/48th scale Revell S-55 helicopter on floats, with opening clamshell doors and an engine.  Mt father helped me with that. 

[Ade H]

On 06/09/2021 at 14:34, LaurieS said:

it was the whisky that saved the day

Interesting weathering technique. 😁

 

Anyway, noticing this discussion today inspired me to take a quick shot of my first ever aircraft model (completed at least; one preceded it which is best forgotten) but it was only made in 2017, so I can't match any of those personal stories of childhood.

I still like having it around, because it just about came good (a few rookie errors aside) and there aren't many other aircraft to keep it company yet. It had some scratchbuilt corrections to make a Martlet III in N. Africa (crossover interest for me); but I've always shied away from rigging the aerial... so maybe I shouldn't count it as finished! 😄

 

 

[LaurieS]

9 hours ago, Ade H said:

Interesting weathering technique. 😁

 

Anyway, noticing this discussion today inspired me to take a quick shot of my first ever aircraft model (completed at least; one preceded it which is best forgotten) but it was only made in 2017, so I can't match any of those personal stories of childhood.

I still like having it around, because it just about came good (a few rookie errors aside) and there aren't many other aircraft to keep it company yet. It had some scratchbuilt corrections to make a Martlet III in N. Africa (crossover interest for me); but I've always shied away from rigging the aerial... so maybe I shouldn't count it as finished! 😄

 

 

Oh no you have to rig the aerial Ade. Makes a model.

 

Dead easy. Lightly sand the two ends to be connected.

 

Touch the end of the thread (in activator first) in C/A place up to the first point . With a steady supported hand keep there for 15 secs.

 

Same other end. Little more difficult as the thread has to be stretched.. Finished. But I using a mid grey slightly paint in patches the thread.

 

OK Thread I use Crystal Strong on eBay. Variety of differing sizes.

 

https://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p2334524.m570.l1313&_nkw=super+glue+%26+primer&_sacat=0&LH_TitleDesc=0&_odkw=super+glue+%26+primer&_osacat=0

 

C/A & most important the activator. Dab activator on the two plastic end which will not be applied with glue. Let dry. The activator will give very quick adhesion & very strong.

 

Try a sample to get the technique first. Really worth the trouble on such a very nice model.

 

Laurie