The 'What Shuld I do with This?' thread

[PR19_Kit]

While moving vast quantities of model kits around the house, in the fond hope of discovering what colour my carpets are, I've come across a number of kits that raised the above question. Why EVER did I buy some of these, with almost no ideas of how to Whiff them in the first place? 

Top of the list are two Trumpeter kits of the USNs LCAC hovercraft, one in 1/144 scale and one in 1/72.The latter is a pretty darn big model, so big that a Harrier would fit nicely in its cargo deck, but it seems the Marines actually did that once, albeit without flying it off the LCAC.

[Rheged]

Build one (or both) of them as Royal Scottish Navy, with Tartan skirts...kilts...?  A civilian one in Caledonian-MacBrayne colours,  or a Sealink one with the BR arrow of indecision on the sides,  or an RCN arctic version.

[Nick]

Ruddy Red for the British Antarctic Survey. Ideal for moving large things from base to base. And capturing those pesky 'Things'!

Desert Sand for service in North Africa with the modern day Imperial Camel Corps. 

Hovertravel. For the fastest car ferry to the Isle Of Wight.

[jcf]

Ruddy Red for the British Antarctic Survey. Ideal for moving large things from base to base. And capturing those pesky 'Things'!

Desert Sand for service in North Africa with the modern day Imperial Camel Corps. 

http://www.jameshovercraft.co.uk/hover/tiger4.php
Tiger 4 used in '70s by British Antarctic Survey

http://www.southpolestation.com/trivia/history/hovercraft.html

[JayBee]

Build one (or both) of them as Royal Scottish Navy, with Tartan skirts...kilts...?  A civilian one in Caledonian-MacBrayne colours,  or a Sealink one with the BR arrow of indecision on the sides,  or an RCN arctic version.

The Royal Scottish Navy with tartant kilts. I like it. It would of course have to be Royal Stewart tartan kilts. It would have to be a Stewart tartan as that is the line that I am linked to through my wife.
Cal Mac would just not work. Cal Mac is dependant for their profit on the fact that passengers pay for their bacon rolls but can then not eat them because the crossing is too rough, trust me on this point I know from experience! Trust me I lived for three years in the Western Isles.
No the LCAC, because of it's size, would have given such a smooth trip that the bacon rolls would have been eaten and so would not have been re-cycled for the next victims. 

[zenrat]

I wish i'd bought one of the 1/72 ones when I had the chance.  But they'll be released again.

In Iain M Banks book Against a Dark Background there is a group of solipsist mercenaries who use (amongst other things) an ACV (last seen drifting down river, engines running, after removing the propulsion prop blades on a too low bridge).  I'd build my idea of something similar.  Maybe more piratical.

Another option that springs to mind is a post apocalyptic refugee mobile home.  Part of a larger mobile community.  Mad Max meets Waterworld meets Damnation Alley.

[Hobbes]

Build one (or both) of them as Royal Scottish Navy, with Tartan skirts...kilts...?  A civilian one in Caledonian-MacBrayne colours,  or a Sealink one with the BR arrow of indecision on the sides,  or an RCN arctic version.

Fashion the exhausts into giant bagpipe drones 

[Rheged]

Build one (or both) of them as Royal Scottish Navy, with Tartan skirts...kilts...?  A civilian one in Caledonian-MacBrayne colours,  or a Sealink one with the BR arrow of indecision on the sides,  or an RCN arctic version.

Fashion the exhausts into giant bagpipe drones 

Hovercraft are noisy enough without adding a mighty set of drones............but it's a wonderful concept!!!    Ask Kit about hovercraft noise for a first hand account.

[NARSES2]

Build one (or both) of them as Royal Scottish Navy, with Tartan skirts...kilts...?  A civilian one in Caledonian-MacBrayne colours,  or a Sealink one with the BR arrow of indecision on the sides,  or an RCN arctic version.

Fashion the exhausts into giant bagpipe drones 

That just has to be against some clause within the Geneva Convention ? 

[PR19_Kit]

Hovercraft are noisy enough without adding a mighty set of drones............but it's a wonderful concept!!!    Ask Kit about hovercraft noise for a first hand account.

Just one of the reasons I now wear TWO hearing aids I suspect!

[Gondor]

Build one (or both) of them as Royal Scottish Navy, with Tartan skirts...kilts...?  A civilian one in Caledonian-MacBrayne colours,  or a Sealink one with the BR arrow of indecision on the sides,  or an RCN arctic version.

That's a plan I have had for a number of years for an Airfix SRN.4 which I hope to get around to at some time 

In Iain M Banks book Against a Dark Background there is a group of solipsist mercenaries who use (amongst other things) an ACV (last seen drifting down river, engines running, after removing the propulsion prop blades on a too low bridge).  I'd build my idea of something similar.  Maybe more piratical.

Thank you for saying that. I really enjoyed that book and had no idea which one it was. Some very interesting and odd ideas in that book, the monks that are chained to an overhead trackway for instance 

Gondor

[PR19_Kit]

Some of those ideas would need a ready supply of the dreaded Humbrol Tartan paint, which was the subject of a devious April Fool joke some years ago...............

[jcf]

Another option that springs to mind is a post apocalyptic refugee mobile home.  Part of a larger mobile community.  Mad Max meets Waterworld meets Damnation Alley.

With patchwork skirts because they wear out relatively rapidly, especially
the fingers. 

SR.N4 achieved a skirt life of up to 400hrs at speeds of 50-70 knots, VT-1 was
slightly better, the SES-200 achieved 1500-3000hrs, but at 25 knots and it was
a sidewall design that only had skirts at the bow and stern.

Aside from the operational wear skirts are also subject to environmental conditions,
heat, cold, UV etc.

Mantle points out in his High-Speed Marine Craft: One Hundred Knots at Sea that
following the cancellation of the US large SES project and general downturn in ACV
development/production that little work was done post-1980 in improving skirt
materials.

[zenrat]

Build one (or both) of them as Royal Scottish Navy, with Tartan skirts...kilts...?  A civilian one in Caledonian-MacBrayne colours,  or a Sealink one with the BR arrow of indecision on the sides,  or an RCN arctic version.

That's a plan I have had for a number of years for an Airfix SRN.4 which I hope to get around to at some time 

In Iain M Banks book Against a Dark Background there is a group of solipsist mercenaries who use (amongst other things) an ACV (last seen drifting down river, engines running, after removing the propulsion prop blades on a too low bridge).  I'd build my idea of something similar.  Maybe more piratical.

Thank you for saying that. I really enjoyed that book and had no idea which one it was. Some very interesting and odd ideas in that book, the monks that are chained to an overhead trackway for instance 

Gondor

The monowheel, the land train, Carrier Field,  the tri-hull amphibious assault sub and of course, above all the wonderfull Lazy Gun.  Possibly my favourite "M" book.  Definitely my favourite non-Culture "M" book.

[TheChronicOne]

I've surmised that some of the more mysterious wares in my collection have no purpose and that they simply were tag-alongs that came with some other purchase I made.  May not be true for EVERY kit, but helps me sleep at night.    I figure to some day trade them I suppose.