171 articles · 6.1K karma · 12 friends · active 1 year, 10 months ago
After building models for over 40 years I quit in October, 2016. I have 284 models here at home with 300 awards. I have written several dozen model stories for 5 websites and 4 monthly newsletters.
My first F2G Corsair that I built in 1984/85 had a F4U-1A Cockpit and radial engine. I got smart and did some research then went to Mesa, Arizona/USA in 1986 to see the only remaining F2G Corsair at Doug Champlin's aircraft museum. I took [...]
I was new at scratch-building model parts back in the 1980's. As time went by I got better at it. Looking back on my model building career, I wonder why I didn't just stay in the "Out-of-the Box" category?
This Corsair project [...]
Another modeler took the first photo of me back in 2000 and "nick-named" me the "Trophy Hunter." From then until I quit modeling in November, 2016 I did my best not to disappoint Mike.
Cheers! RJW
My client sent me the side view photo of "Dallas Doll" and wanted to know if I could make the "Dallas-style" canopy? I wrote back and said yes I could, but in reality I had never done anything like this [...]
I acquired some cockpit and wheel well photo's, so I did my best to duplicate all of these items into this 1/32 scale model. I had to call upon my art talent to draw some logos that the pilot had someone paint on his airplane and/or apply [...]
I converted a 1/24 scale Airfix P-51D to a P-51B for a client. Gee-whiz, holy cow, I had no idea how much work was involved when I took on this project, however, day by day it all came together as I had no drawing's nor measurement's to [...]
I blew up the first photo of a P-51D Mustang that was taken in WW-II (1941-1945). With my art talent I drew the "duck" which was fashioned after Walt Disney's movie cartoon character then had a decal made, which was put on my 2nd [...]
These are the drawings I made for several "scratch-built" items I made for the 1/32 scale P-40E model. At age 15, (1946) I became a good "Architect" and was drawing house plans for my dad's construction company. All the [...]
This was a 1/32 scale "Revell" P-40E kit. I did something unusual by placing several hand made parts together then taking the photos. This was done because it cost money for film, film developing, postage. I had spent more than [...]
I bought the front section of this kit and made some revisions to it. I went "Gung-Ho" as we call it here in America and "hand crafted" several more parts. I had no plans, nor measurements so I just looked at a few [...]
