"awe damn it" club!

Hey Drew;
Don't you hate it when that happens, it's like it never happened to me before, I built an A-20G Havoc for a customer and forgot to put in both of the backing plates I made for the side scoops on the nacells, OOOPPS, I ended up buying another kit and making it for them and keeping the original Havoc for myself, like I didn't mind
Have Fun & Remember To Relax
cuda

Yeah, it can be frustrating when you realize that you forgot to do something that was important.
My biggest blunder involved the Hasegawa Rufe. I installed a Verlinden cockpit in this kit, so it was one that I wanted to feature in my case. I built, painted, decalled & weathered the fuselage separate from the main float. It was only when I went to join the two that I discovered, to my horror, that I forgot to add weight to the float. VERY expensive mistake.

I done the same thing with the lower intrument panel braces when I was building/re-building the old Aurora Chinook, http://modeling.gunsagogo.org/, except with it, starting over wasn't an option. To correct it, I had to remove (destroy) the vacuformed chin bubbles I had made, and make new ones.

Speaking of disappointment, however, I've was taken with TWO cases of "What the heck" over the weekend.... once when I opened the box of the re-issued Monogram T-28A:

and discovering it WASN'T an "A" Model, but a "D" Model with a smaller engine intake. Note, I didn't say smaller cowling (as it should have been), just a smaller intake..!?!?! Also, the kit has the "B" & "D" Model short canopy, instead of the tall one with roll bar between the front & back cockpits. Currently working on two wooden molds, cowling & canopy, so I can vacuform new ones. Alas, it did have the "A" Model two bladed prop however...... go figure!

The other disappointment came when I opened the model car lit I was contracted to build, but that complaint will be posted in the "Auto's" section...... suffice to say, the kit contained a different body than the one pictured on the front of the box.

Are they chalanging us to be more inventive in our modeling techniques.... or is it just because they don't think anyone will know the difference? Grrrrrrrrr Here's the way my facial expressions went...... [:0].... then , as I conceaded the fact that here's another one of those 5 day projects that's going to take a month to complete.... oh well.

So yes, my membership card to the Club mentioned in the subject line is still in effect!

Frank

Most of my "dammits" usually come after I'm finished with a kit and wishing that I'd have spent a little more time on something or wishing that I'd have sprung for that Verlinden detail kit.

Then I reach to pick it up and snap off the pitot tube and/or antenna. Dammit!

My most recent was the 1:72 A4 skyhawk I completed. Beautiful paint, decals, finish you name it. Put it on the shelf and oops, nose in the air. I also forgot to weight down the nose. I could not figure out what that symbol was. I ignored it. Now I know what the symbol is and I have a plane in constant pointing to the sky mode. Unbelievable. Now the damn it comes from this corsair I am building which simply has two fuselage halves that will not come together if you include the cockpit. Just a lousey kit.

When I ran into the same lightweight nose "dammit", I drilled a small hole in the bottom of the nose area and squirted in a product called 'liquid steel'. That added enough weight to put the model in the correct attitude and then I just had to repair the hole. Try a plumbing supplier for the product.
Enjoy!

I have "Dammits" by the bushell;

I've overdone and underdone nose weights.

Snapped off my fair share of pitot tubes and blade antennas.

One of the strangest in my memory occured when I was building a Revell kit years ago...

It was their 1/48 air combat set, it included an Israeli F-16 and a Syrian MiG-21. I was building both at once and got the F-16 done a bit before the MiG, I was puting some finishing touches in the MiG's cockipit and it occured to me that something was amiss but I couldn't put my finger on it.

As I pondered what the problem was, my gaze shifted to my beautiful finished F-16 and the KM-1 ejection seat sealed under its crystal clear and well stuck down canopy!

I thought my MiG's cockpit was looking a touch too modern!

Upnorth, you could always put that one down to battlefield repairs?

Like many of you, I have earned the free lifetime membership in this not-so-exclusive club.
Like DrewH, I have at least one for every finished model (and a few for every unfinished one!
I have too many to even begin describing, but I sure feel better knowing that there are other card-carrying members of this club
besides me

My membership of the club is usualy caused by my own impatience.
I will get three of four encines installed correctly and then go blythly ahead and stick in the fourth only to find that I have it a bit off true!! Tailplanes also suffer from the same problem no matter how hard I try to get them right. I tried cars and trucks but they were even worse bits at all odd angles. As for tanks.....Just don't ask!
Why do I keep building? Because its RELAXING!!!!
Dai

Ah yes, I've been a member of the "awe damn it" club for .............. , shall we say, too many years.

Latest example........ , I was painting (airbrushing) a A-6A and as it just happened, I spilled paint on the underside of the right side of the wing. No big deal because of previous masking the upper sides, Yea Right ! It wasn't until I took off the tape from the upper side that I discovered the runoff along the full upper right side was almost continuous, not to mention very well stuck. Well, I sent in my dues to the "awe damn it" club house right then and there.

Thanks for the thread that will put these faux pas in the open.

Vance

My most resent really big F---- UP came about while building the below pictured 1/48th Airfix Spitfire VB. Mounted wing to fuselage, filled & sanded - ready to paint. OOOOPS ! I noticed that I had forgotten to install the control stick/rudder pedals assembly ! Too late now ! I went ahead and started painting it. It has been like this for over 5 years now - maybe I will go ahead and finish it someday. Will definately have closed canopy !

There have been many, many smaller "oopsies" since then.
Jim

I was working on building my office downstairs this spring and was moving my workbench to the outer wall. I have a half of a bookcase bolted to my bench to serve as shelves for various things. At the time, I was also moving finished models downstairs to put them in a case. Happened to leave my drill and some of my heavier tools on those shelves....had to tip the workbench a bit to fit in a piece of drywall to the wall....my hammer and drill fell off the shelf onto an IL-2, Mitchell, and Beaufighter. Luckily, only a few tings had to be fixed....and the Mitchell that had a package of 5 machine guns in the nose was reduced to only one gun....but other than that-- it looks alright :)

I was glueing together the engine of a 1:24 Fw190.. Dual radial.. Four halves. This was late at night, not quite paying attention. Only when the glue was well and truly set did I notice I glued the wrong halves to eachother. D'oh!

Ok Drew,
I think you opened a Pandora's box on this one!
My worste "Dammit" (among other very loud colorful metaphors) came from a car that I was working on. I know this is the aircraft forum, but hey, this still pertains!
Here we go:
It was a bright sunny day.....
I purchased a '75 Camaro from Deans Hobby Stop.com(not too cheap mind you!), and a '70 1/2 camaro from Wal Mart to be a donor for the chassis and engine, and wanted to make a replica of my '77 Camaro that I had in high school.
Well all went well with the cutting, gap filling, wiring the engine(little wire looms and everything), adding break lines, heater hoses---the works!
Then I got to the body.
Gave it two coats of a nice medium metallic blue(the match to the original was uncanny!), and three coats of gloss. Nice deep paint, smooth finish, all that was left was the bare metal foil.
Got that on, applied the glass, mated the body to the chassis, its almost complete(anticipation is killing me it so close to being complete!), and then my ex-wife's cat knocked it off of the bench cracking the windshield and roof right down the middle. Two months of work right down the tubes.
That was two years ago. Still not completely repaired.
It still bugs me to this day!

.....and Dai said that this hobby is supposed to be relaxing.....

Carlos

I love cats, they taste like chicken!
(thats just a JOKE for you cat lovers out there! only kidding!)

QUOTE: Originally posted by cferrero I love cats, they taste like chicken! (thats just a JOKE for you cat lovers out there! only kidding!)

Carlos:

No problem on the cat joke. I have a cat and while I have never threatened to cook and eat him, I used to threaten to flush him down the toilet or run him down the garbage disposal. He is now too big for that, so now I just threaten to put him in the clothes dryer. He just looks at me, yawns, and goes back to sleep.

Jim

Man everything was great. Then you post THIS!
Filling the gaps on my P-40 with strip stock. When I go to take a drink the fuselage comes with my hand. While holding the strip in place I glued the fuse. to my thumb! AND I was reading this post while I held it! WHAT IRONY!

So far, the worst is drilling holes on my Tamiya F-16 kit for the gas tanks (I prefer my models "loaded") then I realized they aren't really accurate as the plane I was modeling rarely used their tanks. owell. It wasn't a bad fix a typical modeler can't handle. Myabe not bad enough because I don't build so much right now as I am too busy with school and other stuff.

Hope you aircraft guys don't mind a post about a car damn it> I had just finished my 1992 Chevy Caprice Minnesota State Patrol car, and was admirining the job I had done on it, it took second in a contest, and noticed that the screen on the inside that seperates the front of the car interior from the rear for the officers safety was installed backwards!
Lee

I could say that I have been there but we all know that modelers never forget anything we have just decided to customize the kit

Well, let me count the incidents...
The most recent ? I have Hasegawa's 1/72 Viking on the bench at the moment, nice kit I've been looking forward to building it for a year...You know how in some planes you're really scratching for somewhere to put the weight so you don't have a tailsitter ? Well not the Viking, there's acres available...as long as you still remember to put it in before you glue the nose wheel panel (Quite large) into the bottom...So now I've loaded the engine nacelles up with blutack and continually balancing the thing on my finger in line with the rear undercarriage and trying to convince myself that it will be OK...Without going into the myriad other examples, let me sum up by saying that most of my models are 'handed' in other words I display them to the side with the least 'damn its'. Oh well as my old Graphics teacher used to say, it looks good from a distance...got a bike ?

Davey

Hey Guys!
Love this. I have my fair shares of "OH Dammit!" Of course the biggest ones happen with that expensive conversion for that rare model. I love/hate photo-etch, especially when it is a small part that wants to stay on the tweezers more that the model, or that plastic that you took too much off of resin conversion part. Of course, I love my cats, but especially when they run right for that not-quite complete delicate aircraft model sitting right there on the work bench that they somehow mysteriosly snuck into.

Like everyone else, I have too many stories to list here, but this was my worst "Dammit". Although this is a Helicopter, It definitely relates here.

I had just finished my 1/35 Whiskey Cobra after 1 month of work, paint, decals, canopy, everything. I was about to attach all of those little items you are supposed to leave off till the end with super thin super glue (you know the one, thin as water and sets in 1-5 sec.) I was trying to pour some glue and found out that the top was clogged. Well I removed the top, cleaned with a needle and placed the top back on the bottle when I was called away. When I returned, I squeezed the bottle and the top came off! Well it seems that I forgot to screw on the top when I left. Glue went everywhere! Crazed my canopy, glued the skids to my workbench, got all over the finish and my hands!

Needless to say "dammit" was not the word of choice that I used. When my wife came in after hearing the intense screams of profanity, as she described it, I was on the ground looking like Charlton Heston in Planet of the Apes. You know the scene, at the end where he discovers the Statue of Liberty.

Well after I regained my composure, I discovered that the Helo was a complete loss. No surprise there. I had to chisel the skids off my work bench and it took about 2 weeks to finally remove all of the glue off of my hands.

As a result I always check my lids (on paint, glue, everything) and pour everything away from my work.

P.S. I finally finished my second Whiskey Cobra without incident

well, I'm glad to see that I'm not the only one that does this. I'm quite sure to say this at least once more during this build. Maybe I will actually count the number of times I say that on my next model.

thanx
drew

I will always remember my worst "damn it!"
I used to be a crew chief on the F-4 Phantom. I was an active model builder so one of the pilots asked me to custom build a model of the F-4 he flew, of course I jumped on the project!
I used the 32nd scale Revell kit, (new back then), and spent more hours than I can count detailing, scratchbuilding, doing my best...after all...he was going to pay me for the completed kit. Finally...all that was left was the final paint job. Of course I wanted the paint to be as accurate as possible and that would be easy, I was able to get a spray can of the actual paint used on the actual plane!
It sprayed on easily...nice smooth coat.....OOOoooo this kit was going to look great!! I went to town that evening leaving the model on my desk to dry completely. Hours later when I returned to my barracks there was a foul stench...like hot plastic.
Sitting on my desk was no longer a beautifully built F-4 but a sick looking puddle of melted plastic! Paint designed to be used on a supersonic fighter does NOT work on kits! Please...take my word for it! The words I used was a bit more powerful than "damn it"...ask everyone who was living in these barracks at the time!

Skipper

Having participated in this hobby for about 50 years (or forever) I definatly have my share of "aw damns" (perhaps the mildest thing I have said). I finally learned to learn from each experience (so as not to repeat it). Only took me two bottles of liquid cement (and two models) to convince me to make a base to put the bottles in. The only thing I haven't learned to refrain from gluing my fingers to the model. Happened just the other night and after thinking about how I was going to avoid it. I have heard that a little humility is good for oneself but this is stupid

Since I've built over 875 kits of various types, I am at least one of the top officers of the "Aw Dammit!" club! Many times I've broken pitot tubes, antennas, etc. Some of the most recent examples that burn me the most:

1) Building my 1/600 scale H.M.S. Warspite, I cut one of the 15-inch gunbarrels off the sprue only to hear it go "sping!" followed by a distant clatter of small plastic hitiing an immoveable object. I have no idea where that barrel is now; I believe it achieved orbit! It certainly isn't in my Hobby Room! Now my Warspite is still sitting and waiting to be finished almost a year later.

2) Building my 1/72 scale CF-105 Arrow, I managed to successively shorten the nose probe three times while trying to build the kit. Finally, I just cut the whole thing off and rebuilt a new probe from stretched sprue and put in on at the very end!

3) I was bringing down my 1/72 scale Panther tank to give it a clearcoat, wash, and drybrush when it fell out of my hand after I hit the shelf above me. The tank fell nose first, and broke off the main gun. That happened three months ago, and I have yet to find it. Totally screwed up a great-looking model!

And the list goes on....

So far, the seven kits I've almost got complete now have not had any major "Aw dammits!" (knocks on wood!)

I have been building plastic models for about 50 years and I have more what I call, "Awe S_ _ t" stories than you could put in a VERY thick book. Maybe, after another 50 years of trying, I will actually build that "Perfect" model with no stupid mistakes.

Just had another this morning. Building a Jaguar XKE for a guy at work, only 2 parts left, lose my grip on it, hits the floor. I think you know what's next. Pieces all over. 25+ hours of work in pieces. The kicker is I have to get it done this weekend.
Lee