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Its confession
time Being away on holiday is always a
perfect opportunity to write something for FSW. Right now I'm in
the land of Europe's finest modellers, Italy. Part of my time is
spent reading Michael Oliver's marvellous history of the Lotus 49.
This book really is a modeller's dream for all you ever wondered
about in the 49's history is there: every modification and lots
of detail pictures never seen before. Besides, it's a marvellous
read and I hope Michael Oliver will come up with something similar
about the Lotus 72. In FSW 5-2000 the editor wondered if it wasn't
about time we, builders, confessed. Were models becoming too complicated
to build without builders being prepared to admit it? Well, I'll
pick up the gauntlet and give you my thoughts and feelings after
more than a decade of building kits. The subject of my article is,
of course, the builder's kit, the miniature rather than the model,
the car, as BH likes to say, 'to make a project of.' Luca Tameo
I consider the greatest innovator when it comes to 1/43rd car modelling.
He is always one step ahead of the other manufacturers and while
the latter are busy incorporating his solutions into their designs,
Tameo has moved the goal posts with a new release in his World Championship
series. Still, my remarks are also meant for other kit makers for
I feel that the whole of the present day kit market is more and
more threatened by the die-cast revolution. Right now I remember
an article from an 'occasional' FSW contributor from the past, Tim
Williams, on Tameo's release of the Lotus 25, Jim Clark's 1963 Championship
winner. Every single sentence of that article expressed amazement
of what was in the box. 'Everything' ,Tim wrote, 'in the Williams
household has come to a full-stop.' I built the kit myself and it
is indeed a little gem sitting on my shelf. However, Tameo went
on: we got the Lotus 79, Jackie Stewart's 1973 Tyrrell, the McLarens
of Hunt and Fittipaldi, Scheckter's Ferrari, I built them all. The
latter three even had computer drawn full-colour instructions, what
more could we wish for? The next release in the series was Ayrton
Senna's 1991 McLaren-Honda and it featured a chassis with separate
lift-off body work. The instructions had been improved, for now
we had plenty of detail shots of the real car as well. Still, I
began to feel a bit uncomfortable. First of all, the step-byÐstep
instructions make building the car seem a doddle. What you tend
to forget though, when you look at the illustrations, is that what
seems to be a Tamiya kit is in fact a 1/43rd scale model. So once
you have located the part you need, you soon find that you will
need two toothpicks and a pair of tweezers to apply the part to
the car itself. |
Finally,
to support my theory, in FSW I detect a shift of emphasis to lots
of things except building kits. If I compare the contents of the magazine
to those of, say, six years ago I notice the absence of photos and
articles (we even used to discuss the size of squashed flies on the
windscreen) produced by builders, apart, of course, from our veteran
Wayne Moyer. But maybe fellow readers feel differently - do you? What
you get is not a cockpit, but different panels that make up a cockpit
and the dashboard; the box for the gear lever is a p.e. part that
has to be folded and glued into slots in the side panel; the steering
wheel comes in three pieces, there are connectors and p.e fixing points
for the cables the size of a pinhead. I could go on and on, but after
finishing the model Ð yes, I did Ð I felt that this was it. I knew
I had reached my limits, so perhaps this was a good time to stop.
Then, with the Mattel - Ferrari deal threatening the whole modelling
world, Tameo brought out two other Ferrari kits, Lauda's World Championship
mounts of 1975 and 1977. The rviews in FSW were full of superlatives
for what Tameo had achieved this time. I really couldn't resist and
ordered both kits, only to find out that Ð yes, I am sorry to say
Ð I couldn't do them. These kits were a bridge too far. I have tried,
even asked for extra parts from the Man himself, but I wasn't able
to come up with a satisfying result. Apart from that I discovered
something more serious: this was not what I wanted to do. The fun,
in other words, had gone out of modelling. As you will understand
I didn't order Tameo's latest, the 1984 Lauda/Prost McLaren. There
is temptation but I can resist it. What is wrong with the Tameo kits?
To my mind, in their search for perfection, the Tameo people have
taken things a step too far. If I compare Tameo's latest to, for example,
a Superior kit, it strikes me that there are an awful lot of p.e.
parts in the Tameo kit making things needlessly complicated. In case
of Meri's Serie Speciale we find something similar: with far fewer
parts we get a just as good end result. So what Tameo does is stretching
its own limits, and, of course, that is a challenge for the technicians,
the average builder, however, is beginning to lose track. After all,
very few of us are Stephen Barnetts! Does the same go for his ordinary
range of F1 cars? For the slightly experienced modeller these kits
don't pose much of a problem. With a limited number of parts you get
an excellent miniature in your cabinet. Yet, I have built Tameo F1's
for over ten years and I feel putting them together has become a bit
of a chore. Besides, the gap between kit and die-cast model is narrowing
in many aspects. Have you ever studied Gilles Villeneuve's Ferrari
by Paul's Model Art?  |
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The model above is
MG Models 1:12th scale Ferrari 312PB long-tail - built by Harm Kruithof
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| The three shots here are of the Tameo Kits 312T - it's the model that Harm says he could not build...........you could have fooled us! |  |
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| With
some additional work you can't tell the difference with a Tron kit;
it can even compete with Meri's 126C2 apart from the underbody detail,
of course. Over the years the die-cast manufacturers have cleverly
incorporated a number of typical kit items into their products: p.e
wheels, p.e window frames, clear windows and realistic looking tyres.
The kit, on the other hand, still has its strong points and the way
to go for the kit industry is to exploit these: a kit doesn't have
odd join lines, has far better wings and front and rear suspension
are much more delicate than on a die-cast (as indeed is the finished
product - Ed). The main advantage
a die-cast offers is that the car has been painted and fully decalled,
often to a standard very hard to achieve by an amateur builder (but
usually with some significant parts missing - Ed). Painting I feel
is the aspect of kit building most builders dread or hate, for so
much can go wrong during priming, spraying, decaling and clear coating.
Besides, it is often a messy and time consuming business. So let us
return to the pre-painted kit, in some cases perhaps decalled as well.
Plastic kit maker Revell already offers pre-painted kits in plastic
and metal in order to keep the customer satisfied and interest a new
group of people with an interest in motoring and motor sport. In order
to make kits more attractive to a bigger group of enthusiasts I think
painting should be done by the factory. Also, the number of parts
can be reduced by producing them in a casting machine rather than
an acid bath. |
This
way we can have simpler brakes and wings and let's be honest is there
much of a difference in your cabinet between a well-built Tameo of
ten years ago and a recent one? I don't think so, and if we could
have pre- painted bodies we will be another step ahead of the die-cast
industry, for then we will have a model with a professional finish
and far better detail. Moreover, there is another aspect I am worried
about. How many young people are actually interested in building kits?
In most toy shops I notice all space formerly given to plastic kits
is now being taken by computer games. And wasn't it plastic kits that
aroused our interest in modelling? I really don't know any figures,
but I suspect most kit builders are in their forties and fifties.
Years ago I remember Jim Parker (whatever happened to him?) saying:
'When my eyes are packing up, that's probably a good time to stop.'
Well, my eyes are packing up but I have bought myself a pair of reading
glasses that enable me to go on building cars. Still, I feel a preference
for bigger scales now: much more expensive, but they have given me
back the joy of building models. Apparently I am not the only one
for in FSW 5-2000 I noticed Tony Bourke, the 1/43rd super detailer,
having built a Tamiya Honda. Is this some kind of omen? |