SMW 2014

[PR19_Kit]

I'm still thinking that SMW is far too big for just two days, it's gone the way of RIAT, grown bigger than its audience in the time available.

As I seem to be going down with a serious cold/sore throat etc. it may have affected my judgment, but I had the same thoughts after last year and I was OK then.

Some terrific stuff on show though, the 'Mini-TSR2 SIG' area between the Whiff SIG and Project Cancelled looks great and got a lot of interest. The Airfix Swift FR5 looks excellent, their Defiant, He111-P and Sea King Commando are going to be good too, and HMS Queen Elizabeth (how predictable can you get?) will be awesome when it arrives. As Steel Penguin mentioned the 1/48 Concorde is horrendously expensive and my suspicions were confirmed in that the entire fuselage and wing are a single piece fibreglass moulding with the rest in resin, there's a LOT of it of course.

That metal and plastic 1/48 Horton/Gotha flying wing thing was awesome, but pointless to my mind. Why build an entire internal structure to scale from metal and then cover it all with plastic which you'll paint so that you CAN'T see the internals? 

Those guys marketing was WELL over-the-top as they had the whole stand ringed in with 7 ft high advertising banners and people who'd pre-ordered one had to sign-in to get onto the stand to collect their kits! By mid-morning today they'd sold out of the darn things. I wonder what they're going to do for tomorrow?

I broke the habit of a year as I bought TWO kits  a Sycamore chopper from  Nick (top man  ) that may get Whiffed or I may do it RW as one of them was the first helicopter I ever saw close up at age 7. Plus Mrs_PR19 bought me a Revell 1/72 Airbus A400M for Xmas/Birthday (it's ENORMOUS!) which is going to be mated with the Snoopy Herk conversion kit to make 'Snoopy 3'. Someone else is doing 'Snoopy 2' but you'll have to wait to who's building it and what from. 

[Chris Payne]

Sorry to say this but the 1/350 scale HMS Queen Elizabeth is not being done by Airfix.

It was a scratch build model done for Airfix by a guy called Dave Coventry for the floating out of the real HMS Queen Elizabeth and will eventually be displayed on board the ship when she enters operational service.

http://www.airfix.com/news/airfix-visits-the-hms-queen-elizabeth/

[PR19_Kit]

Sorry to say this but the 1/350 scale HMS Queen Elizabeth is not being done by Airfix.

It was a scratch build model done for Airfix by a guy called Dave Coventry for the floating out of the real HMS Queen Elizabeth and will eventually be displayed on board the ship when she enters operational service.

http://www.airfix.com/news/airfix-visits-the-hms-queen-elizabeth/

I read that on the web site too, but they would be crazy if they DIDN'T do it.

[lenny100]

If you look close the f35 on the deck of the QE are the big wing c model

[Chris Payne]

If you look close the f35 on the deck of the QE are the big wing c model

That's cos at the time he built it no one did a 1/350 scale F-35B so he had to use some Orange Hobby F-35C's.

[kitnut617]

There's a build sequence for it on The Airfix Tribute Forum.

[Weaver]

Good show, bit quieter than last year, but that pleased me personally, even if (I bet) it didn't please the traders. Nice to see everyone, and the SiG table with the full monty display set up looked great. Didn't go mad with spending: even though the list is quite long, most things on it were either cheap to start with or seriously discounted.

[Dork the kit slayer]

A few things that took my eye plus the odd quirky stuff that makes this a good weekend.

http://s44.photobucket.com/user/ajay471/library/




Saturday as usual was manic,Sunday not so much so and I personally thought the competition viewing (for the "great unwashed") was better than last year. Talking of the "great unwashed" their were a few( phew) of them.
Our stand was well turned out and attended,its always good to catch up and have a bit of banter as well as a couple of nips of a rather cheeky vino.

Off on my hols in three weeks but Ill be back and hopefully up running for Huddersfield.

[buzzbomb]

Some great pix in that lot.

Say to the Mrs yesterday, that this time last year we were in the UK at the best model show on the planet.

[Thorvic]

Sorry to say this but the 1/350 scale HMS Queen Elizabeth is not being done by Airfix.

It was a scratch build model done for Airfix by a guy called Dave Coventry for the floating out of the real HMS Queen Elizabeth and will eventually be displayed on board the ship when she enters operational service.

http://www.airfix.com/news/airfix-visits-the-hms-queen-elizabeth/

I read that on the web site too, but they would be crazy if they DIDN'T do it.

It was there to promote Airfix's relationship with the RN as the Navy had approched them about a ships model. However it was also there to gauge interest ans demand. I think we can rest assured that they have a kit in their plans, but will be awaiting its comissioning to verify its actual fit and layout rather then risk getting it wrong as they did with the Amazon.

[Thorvic]

Emjoyed the show, didn't go mad trying to see everything, just the bits i wanted to see, numbers were down on last year as it was the 5oth show last time and had a lot of extra visitors. It was still busy and the trader stalls were rather crowded Sat 10-2, however set up went to plan and resulted in a rather calm and efficient opening for a welcome change.

[JayBee]

Here is the link to my photos. No particular order, and taken over two days.

http://s652.photobucket.com/user/JBricknell/library/?sort=3&page=1

[PR19_Kit]

Quote from Howard's post elsewhere.

hmm, apart from getting annoyed about the exiting arrangements from SMW   AGAIN! [which i will be writing to the exec' of IPMS about and the people at the International Centre too, to voice my concerns. i has to be done, btw]

I'm with Howard here. The Centre staff are either stupid, deliberately perverse, or just enjoy making modellers angry.

I took three trips to carry my stuff out to the car at the end, the first two went fine as I'd deliberately got there early on Sunday morning so I didn't have to walk so far to re-load my stuff. The third time went via the same route to find some over-officious clown closing the big roller doors everyone had been using for 20 mins or so because '.....we have to keep the fire doors closed sir....' I pointed out that they'd been open all the time we'd been arriving on Friday and he himself had opened them about 20 mins before. He blatently ignored me and turned away, so I walked round in front of him with my camera at arms length pointed at him! He started to shout about '...photographs not being permitted....' but by that time 20-30 other modellers were crowding out under his partly closed door!

He fully expected me to go out through the doors nearest the Holiday Inn Hotel and traipse the entire distance around the Centre to get back to my car!

The IPMS SMW staff and the Centre staff need to get their collective act together, stick to that act and NOT change it every year, as it is the whole situation is farcical.

[philp]

Thanks for the pics guys.  Was good to see some of you I recognize from last year (course the names escape me for most of you but I am old).

Would have been nice to go again this year but got notified while at the US Nats that my job had been "right shored" to India and Oct. 31st was my last day at work.  Course, since I have been there 30 years I get 60 weeks severance and at the end of that can retire but not enough to survive on so will have to find something else.  At least I have a little time to look.

[zenrat]

Right shored?
That's a new one on me.  Sucks though whatever they call it.

Kit, petty officialdom is international and perpetual.  They got rather upset with us at Melbourne Model Expo when we found a roller door and drove a station wagon into the hall.