How long to finish building the kits in your stash (assuming you add no more)?

[Ade H]

@Bertie Psmith A genuine thank you for sharing that interesting and personal post above. I thought that I just had to acknowledge that.

[Bertie McBoatface]

'Sawright, @Ade H, I'm just a bit of a motormouth. 😁

 

But our unacknowledged needs and desires are fascinating stuff, and the things those advertising people use to drag us around by our noses.

[Tim R-T-C]

13 hours ago, LaurieS said:

Yes but Tim.

 

Does this mean you will never buy any more kits ? 🤣😿

 

Laurie

 

No..... Well maybe yes 😏

 

Actually I am in a very unusual position that a few months back I was able to purchase a very large collection of my preferred 1/144 scale models from a closing retailer - this, combined with my existing stash, means that I have every type currently available in scale, that I would like.

 

With relatively few new kits coming out each year in 144th there isn't too much on the horizon demanding my money either.

 

However, given many 144th releases are one-offs and limited runs, I generally do buy anything of interest as soon as it appears!

[LaurieS]

1 hour ago, Tim R-T-C said:

 

No..... Well maybe yes 😏

 

Actually I am in a very unusual position that a few months back I was able to purchase a very large collection of my preferred 1/144 scale models from a closing retailer - this, combined with my existing stash, means that I have every type currently available in scale, that I would like.

 

With relatively few new kits coming out each year in 144th there isn't too much on the horizon demanding my money either.

 

However, given many 144th releases are one-offs and limited runs, I generally do buy anything of interest as soon as it appears!

Wow Tim you sound like my wife. She loves negative affirmative.

 

Never tried 1/444. Strange how we each settle on a scale.

 

Laurie

 

 

 

[cngaero]

I think that given my build rate and the extent of the current stash, if I live until I'm 187, I should be in with a chance.

[Tojo72]

I only have about 40, it would probably take about 6-7 years at my current rate of building.

[Swamp Donkey]

Even if I was Yoda, my stash (which has been thinned down) would still outlive me

 

SD 

[IanHx]

Depends what you mean by finish....  although I suppose there is always the possibility of plastic kits being classified as crimes against the environment and being confiscated by Greta....

[BD757]

Fascinating topic.

 

I have circa 70 kits in the stash but the build rate has slowed significantly with having 2 kids to manage and not having a dedicated workspace. I tend to build in sprints but these are often dictated to by the ease of build so often a kit goes on the shelf of doom.  

 

I will be 75 at if i manage 2 kits a year until then. Of course, I will still buy more! I think i could perhaps get through them a bit quicker if I lowered my preferred level of finish.

[opus999]

On 10/22/2021 at 7:24 AM, Bertie Psmith said:

I've just read right through this thread and found it fascinating. We modellers vary so widely in our habits and attitudes and as individuals we vary over time too.

 

First let me answer the question.

 

I have eight kits in the stash at the moment and two in progress. the eight amount to less than a year's building (four of them are a single project) and the two in progress will be finished by Christmas this year. Assuming no major changes in my health etc, and that I don't buy any more, I will easily finish all of them by the end of 2022. 

 

I used to have a lot more than that but when I lost all interest in the hobby a couple of years ago, I sold a lot off. At that time I was rather disgusted at what I was as my greed in buying so many kits, far more than I could have completed in a reasonable lifetime. I still kept maybe fifty kits, the best of the bunch, the ones I 'couldn't bear' to part with even though I wasn't building anything or even looking at modelling websites. That's a bit strange, I think, and certainly not rational. There's an emotional side to this that you just can't work out with arithmetic.

 

After my mother died I really appreciated how little interest she had in material things. She was totally free of the collector's habit, and had very little of our routine materialism. Clearing her flat was simple. She had few things and they were all well used. She hadn't cleared out on purpose, she just lived that way all of her life. She disliked being given gifts that weren't edible because she'd have to look after them. 

 

Then I read about döstädning, which is the Swedish for death-cleaning and is what some Swedes do on retirement. It's decluttering with an attitude, designed to make life easy for the retired and their death easy for the survivors. 

 

I sold off the rest of the kits, just at the time that I was getting interested in restarting modelling. Ironic, but my regained interest was in figure modelling which was new to me anyway. I did soon drift back to tanks and 'planes but so far, I haven't bought more than a year's worth in advance. I also disposed of 90% of my books, anything which was not of immediate use. I have regretted a few items but I can't now tell you what most of those kits, books etc actually were. They were junk. 

 

So why did I buy them in the first  place? I don't deliberately collect anything other than kits and books. What is the common factor? Well, when I was very young, my parents ran a busy pub. They were always in the building but rarely 'present' in my life. They were preoccupied, tired, maybe a little drunk, and while I assume they loved me a lot, they expressed this by working really hard to buy me things. Things that would keep me occupied while they made more money to buy me more things. Guess what those things were? Kits and books. Solitary hobbies to occupy a solitary child. I loved them, the kits and books, both for the reading and the building and for the very fact of being given them. Just getting a kit/book meant that I was loved. 

 

I grew into an adult and learned to look after myself. Now I had the money, and when I was feeling low, or lonely, or happy or celebratory or any emotional state that seemed to call for a pat on the back, I'd buy a k/b for myself. Remember how bad I felt when I sold off the stash that first time? That was me as a little boy resenting me as a grown up taking the love away. 

 

However, when I sold off the remaining 50 and all the books, I was fine because by then I'd worked all this out and was able to reassure myself that I'd always be ably to buy one when I needed one. Now I don't often compulsively buy kits not to build and books not to read. Only when I'm enabled and encouraged by this lovely gang of modellers here. 😁 And by those fiends, the advertising industry. 

 

I like it this new way. I don't ever feel oppressed by a 'stash as task list'. I don't care if I miss out on the latest best thing in the plastic or publishing world because there will be a better one in a month. I can go where my interest leads me without feeling I 'have to' build/read all the other ones first. It works for me. 

 

So I think there's a lot we can find out about ourselves by examining our stashing habits and if this thread hadn't turned up on my search, I'd have started it myself.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bertie, I have to say you are fortunate to be able to have such an objective observation about the whys and wherefores of your "stashing".  Not many people are lucky enough to have that kind of insight.

 

For myself, aircraft fascinate me so much that putting a kit of a particular plane together is all part of the learning process because I can examine the little details and hold it in my hand to get a feel for what its size was in real life, and so on.  And I'm always learning!  So.... 🤔

[Bertie McBoatface]

1 hour ago, opus999 said:

Bertie, I have to say you are fortunate to be able to have such an objective observation about the whys and wherefores of your "stashing".  Not many people are lucky enough to have that kind of insight.

 

For myself, aircraft fascinate me so much that putting a kit of a particular plane together is all part of the learning process because I can examine the little details and hold it in my hand to get a feel for what its size was in real life, and so on.  And I'm always learning!  So.... 🤔

 

That is so true. I can look at a hundred photos of an aircraft or other machine type and still not get the shape of the thing clear in my mind, but build one kit and I understand it. 
 

I’m building a Mk V tank from WWI right now, with full interior and the experience has really enhanced my understanding of what it was like for the poor old Tommies who fought in them. There’s so little room in there for all the people!

 

 

[Caerbannog]

I will not - N.O.T. - figure out how many years it would take at my average build rate when I am actively building. I came to something like a full stop at the moment and so such a calculation is pointless for me anyway. But even with my best build rate from the past years, I suppose I could better calculate not if but how often my stash will outlive me...

Btw.: A 3D printer does not really help to make matters better but it helps to shift the stash from the shelfs onto your HD 😉  Can be helpfull if SWMBO stars looking with a strange face at the loft insulation...

[Tim R-T-C]

1 hour ago, Bertie Psmith said:

 

That is so true. I can look at a hundred photos of an aircraft or other machine type and still not get the shape of the thing clear in my mind, but build one kit and I understand it. 
 

I’m building a Mk V tank from WWI right now, with full interior and the experience has really enhanced my understanding of what it was like for the poor old Tommies who fought in them. There’s so little room in there for all the people!

 

 

 

I find building items in a consistent scale is a great way to visualise comparative sizes - the contrast between the early and pre-war aircraft, particularly Soviet types and the late war fighters like the P-47 is incredible but hard to visualise until you can place models side by side.

 

56 minutes ago, Caerbannog said:

Btw.: A 3D printer does not really help to make matters better but it helps to shift the stash from the shelfs onto your HD 😉  Can be helpfull if SWMBO stars looking with a strange face at the loft insulation...

 

I am determinedly trying to avoid getting into the 3d print game for that very reason. I imagine it will take up as much time and effort as modelling and turn a bench hobby into a screenbased one that I (and I'm sure many others) are trying to move away from!