Nostalgia!

[Jonny]

I recently acquired copies of Airfix Magazine published in 1973.  The cover price was 15 Pence.  The back cover had an advert by BMW , in Wimbledon.  A 1/32 Revell F4J Phantom cost £1:95, a 1/72 scale Airfix Lysander cost 19 Pence ... Inside there are adverts by Ernest Berwick (Badger 20 airbrush for £15:00, Airfix Wasa model for £1:95., and Modeltoys offering decal sheets from 28 Pence, with postage for up to 3 sets for 6 Pence and a Revell 1/32 Boeing F4B-4 for £2;25.

 

Articles include a visit to the 'NEW RAF Museum'.  Some scratch build articles (a Pak 38 and Phoenician bireme).   Awful poor quality B&W photos all round.

 

I can't remember what £1;00 bought in those days - I started work about that time, in a (very) well paid job in the IT industry but comparing 1973 prices with today's  rather shook me.  I can't recall any other Modelling magazines in the high street shops but there might have been a few.  Now we're spoilt by high quality kits - albeit expensive sometimes,, aftermarket components and decals, Internet forums and magazines galore

 

Nice to be old and able to look back!!!

 

Jonny

 

 

 

 

[Rob G]

From Hansard (results for April 1973), the average male wage was £38.10 (gross)/week. That 2 quid Phantom was quite a chunk of a week's pay.

 

https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/written-answers/1974/jan/28/average-wage

[Nigel Bunker]

Ah, nostalgia's not what it was.

[Alfisti]

There were other mags about at the time.Military Modelling @15p per issue.Modelworld by Almark(short lived mag,only went on for approx. 2 years!) @25p per issue.Scale Models @15p per issue.My wage at the time was roughly £35 pw as a truck driver,but one of my problems was at that time was that I delivered to a lot of the model shops advertising and so never had any money lol!

[stevej60]

1973 was the peak of my first spell of modelling it was strictly Airfix bagged and series one Revell every fortnight or so, I had a good earner doing

Saturday afternoon paper round's so a couple of friend's could go to the Match which led to a round of my own which meant Saturday morning's

I bought a kit every week and moved up the price scale too!

[roys]

I was into flying models and always remember a copy of Aeromodeller magazine with "Power Crisis Issue! "added to the cover, from the early seventies.

Might still have it!

 

 

[Britman]

On Monday, July 30, 2018 at 9:50 AM, stevej60 said:

1973 was the peak of my first spell of modelling it was strictly Airfix bagged and series one Revell every fortnight or so, I had a good earner doing

Saturday afternoon paper round's so a couple of friend's could go to the Match which led to a round of my own which meant Saturday morning's

I bought a kit every week and moved up the price scale too!

Sounds familiar.

Keith.

[Mr T]

I still have a few issues of Scale Models and Airfix Magazine from around then. I was a second year law student in 1973 and only bought the odd kit as I had neither the time, money or space to do much, but I did buy the odd mag. I didn't smoke and drank very little and saved money from holiday jobs so this was my indulgence. Really started modelling again after my 1st marriage broke down in 79 and not really stopped since. 

[cocky05d]

I remember being given some Airfix mags in 1975 ,don't remember much ,there was a review of the Tamiya T34  ,a bit about a future 1/48 release -might have been the Tamiya Lancaster .

Also some one scratch building a long John Silver figure ,complete with Sprue parrot ,and finally someone altering a Gannet.

[Des]

My local Newsagents were not too good for modelling and aviation mags back then but from 1971/73 used to travel a lot  through Edinburgh Waverley on my way south and back on courses for the TA and picked up the early copies of Scale Models and Air Enthusiast later renamed Air International which is still running from the big John Menzies booth that used to sit in the middle of the station.      Kept copies of what I think were the first three issues of Scale Models with articles on the F-4K/M and USN/USMC Phantoms for years and came across scans of them the other day , cutting edge stuff on the original Airfix F-4 at the time.

[Eric Mc]

Last week I picked a bound set of Airfix magazines covering all of 1978 and some of 1979. The wealth of detail and original research material contained within is mind boggling.