Here’s a silly thought…I think 50 or so likes on here are worth perhaps 150 on X. Yeah I know it’s not supposed to be a numbers game on here but it still is…even a little bit 🤭❤️

My thoughts on religion are basically…yup if you like it get on with it but stop shouting at & killing each other because you don’t like the the other competing brands that are available…I mean ffs…🤷‍♂️

Car modellers….I’m reading this book set in 1942 and a car called a Snipe (Humber?) features…it’s driven by a policeman…I have looked it up and found a few options…any informed thoughts on what it’s likely to be…like this perhaps…?

Well this is bloody crap news…🤦‍♂️ www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

I’ve co-authored numerous scientific papers…I‘m now out of that game (old). However, I’m quite dismayed by the way scientific publishing has gone…journals asking for publication fees from authors who then seem to often publish crap with little or no peer scrutiny…is it the same in other fields? 🤔🥃

This is a massive gun barrel & it has one hell of a ‘join seam’ or whatever it’s called so it‘s the first place I have gone to in the build as I know it could become a right PITA to fix…this just gives me time to hopefully sort it. More positive news is that the rifling looks quite nice…

Tracks finally built and painted…

…and some more details for the new HY van…

A bit of digging has revealed some more details….

Time for a new pinned post I guess…here are some photos of my last four diorama efforts…they are deliberately (provocatively?) not the usual stuff you may see but that’s the point maybe…I don’t know…I just try & build what I like as well as I can…🤷‍♂️😊

I‘ve made efforts at ‘commercial vehicle’ decals but to be frank it’s a PITA and they don’t look that good. I would love for someone like MiniArt or AK to make the ’commercial vehicle decals’ from their kits available for purchase as sheets…or for the decal world to produce more of them perhaps

Confession o’clock…I haven’t been into a physical/real model shop for well over 40 years…but I have at least built a fair few kits over the last five years…nearly a hundred…🤔🥃

A couple of new publications of the history/travel genre I guess…I always love books like this & Tim Parks writing about Italy is always a pleasure…I have failed to find a tribe on here that feels similarly but will keep on trying…🙄👍🥃

Primed with an SMS sand lacquer paint to help the Tamiya rubber black stay put and sprayed with the latter. Will leave them to dry overnight and then add the ‘rubber pads’ to the tracks…

I asked Google why military modelling was so popular and this is what it said…I reckon there is room for so much more than tanks and warfare in the hobby…and yeah I am building a ‘big mobile gun’ at the moment…🤷‍♂️🙄🤦‍♂️

Reckon I may have a Type HY van ‘onsession’…I just ordered AKs 3D printed wheel set to try because I don‘t really like the complicated ‘MiniArtesque’ wheels in the kits…🙄😊

So….I primed the tracks in SMS jet black & then painted them in SMS steel. Meanwhile I’ve cleaned up the rubber pads and stuck them down to masking tape for priming and then painting with Tamiya rubber black…this is a lengthy process for sure…😊👍

…🤯🙄…🍻👍…😊

For me AK are currently the most exciting manufacturer of kits…no one is near them in terms of the stuff they are producing in the civilian kit arena...I’ve built all of these and they are lovely kits..and there seems to be many more to come…just fantastic work from them…🤷‍♂️

So…now pre-ordered…my Rowan Atkinson Maigret (ish) influenced diorama set in the 50/60s rather than a bit earlier (like the books) is now at least not just a pipe dream…🥳😊

Pertaining to my last post about the new release of the HY van…seems I may be in luck…

Anyone know what the alleged four new decal sets in this forthcoming new release of the Type HY van are…I am hoping for a French police version…🤔? I have built an earlier version already…

Wouldn’t it be nice if social media was more full of folks who just made stuff with their hands rather than shouted shit at each other…🤷‍♂️🙄…😊?

Just watched this…if you have TNT Sports it is so worth a go…very emotional on so many fronts and brilliantly made too…

Back on an even keel with my reading…this had got off to a brilliant start…set in 1942 in and around Cambridge…Jim Kelly is always good value…

Got one set of tracks together. The plan is to prime them with SMS jet black then paint them SMS steel. I’ll then prime the rubber pads and paint them Tamiya rubber black before adding them to the steel painted tracks…then weather them as a unit. But I need to build the other track first…👍

I’m convinced that building ‘scenery’ is somehow good for the soul…no idea why but I just like doing it…

I have given up…this old bookshelf photo contains at least four books about Waterloo that I really enjoyed reading…I think it is all down to reader incompetence with this latest one…and as mentioned by someone earlier Les Miserables is quite entertaining on it…

Up next for me…usual approach i.e. radio/podcast on and disappear for several hours…at least they are not metal tracks…which have resulted in painful fingers in the past…🙄😊…I have quite a cool book to help with the build too…don’t know why the L & R sides have different numbers of tracks?

So…this is hard work…I’m about half way through and will keep going…it’s very academic and relies on the reader being very familiar with the battle…I’ve only read about 3 books on it so am not…keeping on keeping on for now…😊

Finished with this for now…lots wrong with it but some things worked out OK. My biggest issue is finding the figures that I want that also have good detailing…this one doesn’t really…ho hum…happy Easter all…😊👍

Not my ‘bag’ at all but this 75 mm resin figure with accompanying parrot looks fabulous…I know nothing about it or the manufacturer…it is simply plucked from Scalemates but wow..

A change of heart about my next build. I’ve had this for a couple of years so I think it needs to be built now…I’ll replace the rubber band kit tracks with these workable ones…😊👍

Wild Peaks was, as expected, marvellous. Next up is this book about the 52nd Foot at Waterloo…👍😊

Love The Cure & enjoyed this a lot…have a vague recollection of seeing them at Glastonbury in the mid 80s…a marvellous band responsible for some of the best 12” singles ever released…”A Forest” being top of that file perhaps…

…started Gone Fishing again & that, combined with the new series of Race Across The World….is only partially why the BBC is ‘a good thing’…🤷‍♂️👍😊

The older you get the more you have to confront illness, death & the inevitable loss of friends & family. Over the last several years this has been increasingly my experience...& I was so naively unprepared for it…it seem to me that we are missing something here…it’s ‘under discussed’ perhaps?

I always find the last 5-10% of any vignette or diorama massively difficult to actually get done…so my sole Easter weekend target is to finally get this over the line…it always makes me feel like a rubbish modeller but ho hum…🙄🤦‍♂️

There are many folks that I used to see post on here that have juat disappeared in the last six months or so…where have they all gone…it’s beginning to feel like a staging post to somewhere else…which is a shame because, for me, it’s reasonably comfy here…🤷‍♂️?

I will persist with my travel literature (and in this case interesting history as well) book suggestions. Allegedly out this month sometime but Tim is a brilliant writer and has wonderful ‘previous’ in Italy too…

I don’t do an awful lot of dry brushing & hear from ’the podcasts’ that it went out of fashion but is now on the return…I wouldn’t know…I think it’s a useful technique but that some smaller ‘dry brushing brushes’ (ffs) are too stiff/harsh…have these coming tomorrow to see if they are any good…£17🤷‍♂️

I admit, like most of us I suspect, that figure painting is a dark art that I will never master but dioramas/vignettes are diminished without little people & I refuse to hide their little faces too…🤷‍♂️. So, still a WIP but edging towards ‘it will have to do’…🙄. I’ve also included my ‘workings’…

WIP clearly…but this is a tough gig…a tiny figure to stand on top of the pile of luggage…hope to finish it in a day or so…🤔🤷‍♂️🫣

Not judging…but this AI background thing for scale models…I don’t think I like it much. More because I‘m not liking ‘big tech’ much (or whatever they are called) than anything else…call me a tech Luddite but it’s a no from me…a plain background is fine…and it kind of just shows what ‘you‘ made too…😊

An interesting new set of 1/24 figures for those who prefer a larger scale…some fun to be had here with the right vehicle perhaps…🤷‍♂️😊

Pre-ordered from Jadlam! First kit order of 2026…well I nearly made it to April…

Oh AK…this is a massive ‘want’ from me just for the potential decals alone…brilliant looking add ons to an already nice kit…

Next job is to finally get this tiny figure painted (👍😊). In other news…root canal work finally completed…ffs…that was all a bit of a bore…🦷🙄🥃

Just replaced the 0.2 mm nozzle on my ‘main’ paint airbrush…the differences between the old & new one are pretty clear from all angles…

This is bloody marvellous thus far…love it…