Whispercraft Revival

 aircraft, models, new products, science fiction  10 Responses »
Jul 202011
 

One of the models I made master parts for Fantastic Plastic models was the 1/72 scale “Whispercraft” helicopter from the movie “The Sixth Day.” This was, IMO, one of my more entertainingly engineered kits, with lots of movable parts and options. Due to financial restrictions, it had no cockpit innards. And due to something happening with the molds and/or the master parts, it had a very limited production run and has been unavailable for some time.

There has apparently been enough interest shown that we are looking at re-releasing the kit, this time with full cockpit details. Also of *potential* interest is releasing a few extra parts to make a military variant. This would be invented out of whole cloth. I created a few clay “mockups” of potential alternate forward fuselage configurations, shown below. These are not meant to be the final designs, but instead are simply quickly-sculpted “sketches” to show possibilities.

If you are interested in a Whispercraft model, let me know via comments. Also, if you are interested in a Whispercraft and find one or another of the “alternate configurations” appealing, let me know that, too. if there is enough interest shown, the project will go forward, and probably with the alternate configuration that there is the most interest in.

First: a “conventional” configuration

Second: a “duck nose” configuration

Third: a tandem-seater like the Mil-24 “Hind”

Fourth: an asymmetrical configuration, like the Boeing AAH entry.

Fifth: a faceted “stealth configuration

 Posted by at 10:17 pm

Hammerhead

 aircraft, awesomeness, models, photography, science fiction, spacecraft  11 Responses »
Jun 202011
 

This is what one model builder did with the 1/72 scale  SA-43 “Hammerhead” kit that I mastered for Fantastic Plastic:

 Posted by at 11:56 pm

1/32 HML?

 awesomeness, blather, models, new products  8 Responses »
Jun 182011
 

A model I’ve wanted to build for *years* is one of the Small ICBM “Hard Mobile Launcher.” There were three different vehicles manufactured by three different companies; the one on my mind is the Boeing variant on non-display at the Hill Aerospace Museum. The time and effort involved in such an endeavor, with dubious hopes of payoff, have kept me from this one.

A recently mentioned, Revell later this year is going to re-release the 1/32 “Atomic Cannon.” It dawned on me that the two vehicle would look good next to each other. But a 1/32 scale model of a 110-foot-long truck would be a big, big thing, and thus kinda expensive. I have recently been making good headway with display models (I will shortly post photos of some recent and ongoing efforts), and so my thought for a large-scale HML would be to produce a limited number as finished display models. I half-jokingly posted this notion to another forum and did get one expression of interest, interest which apparently remained when I mentioned the pricetag. “Interest,” of course, does not count until  money changes hands.

So, my question here is twofold:

1: Anyone interested? The price would be substantial, but less if there are more interested & paying aprties up front.

2: Is 1/32 the right scale? Seems that 1/35 is a more common “armor” scale, and is of course slightly smaller. Wouldn’t affect price a whole lot, but a few inches off the length might matter (about 41 inches for 1/32, about 38 for 1/35). However, the Atomic Cannon is only available in 1/32… and another difficult-to-find and expensive version at 1/40 scale (33 inches).

 Posted by at 1:30 pm

You want this, don’t you…

 aircraft, awesomeness, models, new products  8 Responses »
May 302011
 

Now available… the “C-21 Dragon Assault Ship” model that I mastered for Fantastic Plastic. All assembled and painted, it looks friggen’ AWESOME.

http://www.fantastic-plastic.com/C-21AssaultShipCatalogPage.htm

Good, good….

Let the funds flow through you!

This is by far the most complexicated model kit that I’ve mastered, but from the looks of it, it was worth the effort. Now if it turns out that THIS was what was used to insert the SEALs into Casa Del bin Laden…

Even at 1/144 scale, it’s a substantial kit.

 Posted by at 4:09 pm

Advertising update

 AARRRGH, APR, blather, models, new products, news  9 Responses »
May 122011
 

Preliminary results are in for the performance of the ads. In order to generate something resembling a living income, I’d need to bump up page views slightly. Just a little bit. A minor amount. A factor of only 50 or so.

Gah.

Any suggestions?

Since I started the blog, there’s been a grand total of *one* day when viewership was that high. And that was based on THIS blog posting. The reason why it generated so many views was because it got picked up by FARK.com. Sadly, I post news scoops about internet memes only once a decade or so.

Sales of the drawings & documents have been falling for a few years now; I made a major strategic error with the Dirt Cheap Documents. As soon as I offered those, sales of the other documents essentially ceased. It makes sense… why spend five bucks for a document when you could spend 50 cents for another. Sigh. And Aerospace Projects Review has similarly crashed… the last issue only sold about 40 copies. Bleah. This is why I’ve been more focussed on getting the display model biz up and running again, and working on books for actual publication. But if I could get the blog viewership numbers up, I’d start offering up new high-rez drawings and docs *here* for free, converting from a “selling” business to an “advertising” business. But after three years of the blog, I’m still two orders of magnitude low. Once again… suggestions welcomed.

 Posted by at 9:01 am

“What the hell am I looking at??” Part Deux

 aircraft, awesomeness, blather, drawings, dumbassery, Gah., humor, models, projects  26 Responses »
Apr 102011
 

Kinda unavailable just now, so here’s a quick blog post with a  couple of images sent by a blog reader wanting to know more about this. I’ve not seen this before. To me it screams of Colani-esque levels of engineering FAIL.

Clearly, *somebody* devoted some amount of effort to this. A college project? The data indicates a “Professor” was involved. But a professor of what?

 Posted by at 9:19 pm

Last day of D188A sale

 aircraft, books, drawings, models, new products, projects, sales & specials  No Responses »
Mar 172011
 

Today is the last day of MagCloud’s sale on the products they print, including my “Bell D188A” book:

http://www.magcloud.com/browse/Issue/157099

Currently on sale for $15.55.

MagCloud holds sales whenever they want to, and don’t seem to hand out too much advance notice, so who knows when it’ll come again. Your best option is to order a few hundred copies… for surely these will one day be every bit the collectors item as Action Comics #1.

 Posted by at 11:10 am

You want these. Don’t deny it.

 awesomeness, blather, models, new products, photography, projects, spacecraft  6 Responses »
Mar 162011
 

The X-42 (1/48 scale) and X-15A-3 (1/40 scale) display models, nearing completion. They have been decaled and glosscoated; a little bit more surface work and some matte coating (Lesson Learned: matte coatings have added solventy goodness in them that can *eat* decals, so gloss coat ’em first) , and they’ll be good to go. The stands shown are also not the final stands, but are, err, stand-ins. Still, I thought they looked sufficiently neato that I wanted to gloat a little bit.

When these are done and out the door, I can take orders for more of the X-15A-3’s. Be advised, they are hand made in the USA by yours truly, not stamped out by Asian slave labor, so they’re a bit costy compared to those “genuine Philipine mahogany” wonders you see on ebay. Also unlike those craptacular Asian models, these will be made in *very* low numbers. I’d be astonished if I got to a dozen of any particular model.

Also: here they are next to a 1/24 X-20 Dyna Soar model I started quite some time back and set aside. YOU WANT THIS TOO.

 Posted by at 11:36 am
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