Scale Model Construction Suggestions by James Pate Williams, Jr.

  1. After opening the box and making sure all pieces are on their numbered tree (sprue), read and study all the instructions.
  2. I like to paint the pieces while the part is on its tree.
  3. Make notes by grouping the pieces by color.
  4. I like to use acrylic paints nowadays (way back when I used enamel and enamel aerosol spray cans). Acrylic paint is easy to clean up and cures (completely dries) faster than enamel paint.
  5. Do subassemblies according to the instructions. Sometimes it is good to look ahead and make sure the assembly is facile.
  6. Do not wait until the model is finished to apply decals.
  7. Not everyone will have the artistic talent  to create a museum worthy model. Be satisfied with your current modeling ability. Happy scale modeling!

I took up plastic scale modeling again in about 2017 at the age of around 64. Here is a list of my models and some notes about their construction. All of my relatively modern models are by Revell:

  1. USS Arizona – To accurately build the hull tape off the armor belt and apply black paint. This model was painted with Testors enamel paint.
  2. USAAF B-17G Flying Fortress heavy bomber 1:48 scale. Use rubber bands and clothes pins to make sure the fuselage halves seal nicely.
  3. USN or USMC Vought F4U Corsair 1:48 scale. Be careful with the undercarriage. The landing gear is especially tricky to get correct.
  4. USAF Fairchild Republic A-10 Thunderbolt II “Warthog” 1:48 scale. I have not applied the plethora of decals. Please counterweights in the nose so the tricycle landing gear is accurate.
  5. McDonnell Douglas USMC or USN F/A-18 Hornet. Tricky landing gear assembly.
  6. Kriegsmarine Bismarck 1:350 scale. Many very small parts.
  7. Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird 1:48 scale. Lots of rather small decals. You can build different “Articles” (CIA lingo for the A-12 Archangel [Oxcart, Cygnus] and SR-71). The red no step decals are especially tricky to apply. Uses a lot of black paint.
  8. Apollo 11 Saturn V with the command module and lunar excursion module (LEM) 1:144 scale. Comes with three to scale engineers.
  9. USAAF Northup P-61 Black Widow 1:48 scale. The model comes in black plastic, so I did not paint the exterior. The radar in the nose is hard to get correctly seated.
  10. North American B-25J Mitchell medium bomber 1:48 scale. I am still working on this model.

If you have plenty of cash and patience, you can use spray paint. I prefer the somewhat inexpensive brush painting.

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Author: jamespatewilliamsjr

My whole legal name is James Pate Williams, Jr. I was born in LaGrange, Georgia approximately 70 years ago. I barely graduated from LaGrange High School with low marks in June 1971. Later in June 1979, I graduated from LaGrange College with a Bachelor of Arts in Chemistry with a little over a 3 out 4 Grade Point Average (GPA). In the Spring Quarter of 1978, I taught myself how to program a Texas Instruments desktop programmable calculator and in the Summer Quarter of 1978 I taught myself Dayton BASIC (Beginner's All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) on LaGrange College's Data General Eclipse minicomputer. I took courses in BASIC in the Fall Quarter of 1978 and FORTRAN IV (Formula Translator IV) in the Winter Quarter of 1979. Professor Kenneth Cooper, a genius poly-scientist taught me a course in the Intel 8085 microprocessor architecture and assembly and machine language. We would hand assemble our programs and insert the resulting machine code into our crude wooden box computer which was designed and built by Professor Cooper. From 1990 to 1994 I earned a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science from LaGrange College. I had a 4 out of 4 GPA in the period 1990 to 1994. I took courses in C, COBOL, and Pascal during my BS work. After graduating from LaGrange College a second time in May 1994, I taught myself C++. In December 1995, I started using the Internet and taught myself client-server programming. I created a website in 1997 which had C and C# implementations of algorithms from the "Handbook of Applied Cryptography" by Alfred J. Menezes, et. al., and some other cryptography and number theory textbooks and treatises.

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