Greetings all;

Various types of aircraft kits require various steps. What is your favorite step or part of building?

Don't deal with the "wingy things" too much. More of a treadhead myself, but my favorite part is when I finally put the completed kit on the bookshelf and put a new one on the work bench! (Doesn't happen often, but it does happen )

Jesse

Different parts have different levels of satisfaction, but to be honest, if I could, I would skip the building and get on to the painting. My particular satisfaction at the moment is removing my paint masks to see perfectly painted markings I have started 4 models in the this last 2 weeks purely to use my masks
One day, soon, I'll be rigging a bi plane, which I'm looking forward to

Mal

I hate to admit it but I actually prefer the initial steps: opening the box, preparing the parts, cutting, gluing, filling, sanding, etc. (come to think of it, researching a topic is probably one of the biggest attractions). I'm not a big fan of photo-etch but sometimes the extra details add a lot. The ultimate goal, of course, is to have a "finished" (painted, decaled) aircraft, after all, that a big part of what motivates the choice of what kit to build, but I find myself dreading those final steps. Painting isn't too bad but setting up before and cleaning up after takes more time than the actual painting. And all to often once I do get a kit painted, the finish is ruined by silvered decals etc. Perhaps if I actually finished a few more kits I'd get better at decaling and actually start to enjoy it.

(The spell checker seems to think that "decal" cannot be used as a verb.)

Hi all!

The best part of a build for me is the decalling!

It´s here the model comes alive and gets an identity!

Cheers!

Stefan E

I would say that painting and decaling are the best part of model building. Bringing your aircraft to life with a unique paint job and as the person said before me, giving your model an identity by decaling.

From the time you place the model on the shelf you gain great satisfaction looking at it. Soon, though your mind turns to the next project and regaining those feelings you had before with the previous model kit. Thanks. Russell

Excellent question!

For me it is planing the paint scheme followed by building the cockpit, I just love Eduard cockpit zooms. Especially now that I can work with the seat belts. But flinging paint is the best!

-Derek

Definately the painting part for me, but airbrush painting- i'm not as fond of brush painting.

I still enjoy the building stages, just not as much as painting. That's probably why i only ocasionally use aftermarket detail sets or scratcbuilding. It delays getting to the paint.

It's not part of building i suppose, but even after all these years i still get the same feeling when i first take the shrink wrap off a new kit and look inside...it hasn't changed since i was a kid opening Matchbox kits.

Andrew

This is indeed an interesting question and made me stop and think for minute. There are certain parts I consider "chores", like painting tires or props or fuselage interiors. Overall I think the part I like best is finding the solution for a problem, like filling a difficult recess, or trying to think of a way to achieve a certain effect, or creat a certain detail I've never done before. How do I do that? Is there something in my wife's sewing box that can be made to look like that? What about my junk parts box in the garage? Or the drawer in my desk that's full of 'junk'?

I also enjoy finding 'things' that I can use to add detail that I might never have considered using. This also applys to tools and equipment. I told my wife to always save the caps from bottles of household 'stuff' that I use for mixing small amounts of paint. Saves cleanup - I just chuck them when I'm finished.

I also enjoy looking at my stash and trying to envision how they'll look when all 120+ of the are finished - yeh, right.

Id have to say the decalling, when the bare camouflaged fusalage gains its identity.
Apart from that though,my favourite part of the build is when I finally get home and Im able to actually do some!
Mal,,its about time you got your rigging head on
Nige