Metal Earth: a humiliating confession

Don,

  I have done a few. I found they were not good choices as gifts for my Oldest Grandchild to build. He is now the Reciprient of a Tiger I, Millenium Falcon, and AT-AT Walker.

     I found it was good practice for learning patience and forming metal. And, they actually look quite good in a Decorative sort of way. When I had them at my house visitors took note of them more so then my wifes' Precious Moments figures.

       Jim.

One problem is that forming sheet metal into compound curves is quite difficult, especially a hard stainless.  One can tell by looking at pictures of them that many subjects do not lend themselves well to PE contstruction.

I have bought two construction vehicles, an excavator and a bulldozer.  These, especially the dozer, have few panels where the prototype has a compound curve (curves in two dimensions).  I think I can make pretty good models from these with a bit of extra detailing. 

I think a model of one of the new stealth destroyers with faceted surfaces would work well.

I always buy these things at Hobby Lobby using the app. It has a 40% off coupon every week. I hope this helps!

Did their Huey for a bud who was a crew chief/doorgunner on one back in the day.  Decent little thing that went together well.  Have the Arizona, and not ready to attempt her quite yet.

Yeah They are !

 Now that said , They will definitely prepare you for Most Photoetched kits including EDUARD and BIG ED  , Which have a lot of stainless in them . T.B.  I found this out with the 1/350 ALABAMA kit .

I think, after careful reconsideration, and the fact that I just spent about 2 hours completing ONE engine for their B-17 kit, I'm sticking to my original observation - Metal Earth kits are hell in a very small, albeit stainless steel, place.

Yeah !

 For years after Nam I had a strange vision problem . I would look at an instruction sheet and something seemed off .Turns out the left eye was not seeing in the right way . Some kind of nerve thing .A little time at the eye surgeon's fixed that . Now I am only partly confused . LOL.LOL.  T.B.     P.S. Guess the gord got rattled too many times LOL.LOL.

Yes;

     I found that if I carefully curve the parts or shape them on foam ( a nose cone or such ) .They come out okay . My Chinook has ALL the right shapes in the surfaces .Wasn't any harder than P.E.

Someone mentioned problems with curved pieces.  I have done three airplanes and I found I could get a nice symetrical fuselage by curving the piece around a drill.

I'm just getting back into modeling after 20 or so years so I was looking at the Metal Earth kits as a good training ground for PE.

I enjoy them. I have a LEM and a USS Arizona to do yet.  I helped my daughter with an Eiffel Tower. I don't think any of them took more than two hours. 

Don ;

  That's why I bought the jewelry cutters . It cuts stainless fine And works well with most wire rod in brass up to .010 .Stainless a little smaller . On the stainless I do a light annealing . That seems to help .

    Of course you can't do that to the M.E. parts . So this cutter with it's perfectly flat surface on one side cannot be beat . They have light orchid colored handles and are available at Hobby - Lobby !     T.B. 

The metal earth kits seem to be stainless steel PE.  I find that much harder to cut than the brass.  I can usually deal with the brass stuff okay, but sure struggle with the s.s. stuff.  I worry about it dulling my knife blades and Xuron cutter quickly.

Hey , Mfsob ;

   Listen here , I didn't know about that book . As to " Metal earth " Time is the ruler here . Take the time and read the instructions ten times if you want . Then do the step described once .

 But really , I feel they are a good primer for anyone getting into P.E. . As I said if you can do one , then P.E. will be a lot easier .

 The antennas on gun directors in 1/96 for example are no easy task . Even harder in 1/350 . So there you have it .The simplest  "Metal Earth " kit will help train the eyes ( no matter how bad or good ) and hands in this small metal bending world .

  One important thing I picked up on .The blade you use , ( if you choose to use one ) to remove the parts should be gone over with a Black magic marker . This way you get closer to the sprue when you cut the part off .You can see where you are putting the blade !

    I recommend the same technique with the P.E. Scissors ( which I really don't care for ). I use a cheap pair of " Jewelers " cutters with one absolutely flat face and modify them for P.E. ( narrow the tips from top to bottom .) These are much better for the kits .

 The P.E. Scissors require a cut at a shallow angle into a tight space . The cutters I modify and use can go in at 90 Degrees to the part. Keeping them sharp is no problem either .  T.B.         P.S. Before I get into an intense P.E. part session , I do a  "Metal Earth " kit to warm up these old arthritic hands . It works !

What was the name of that book about the French Indochina War?

Oh, yeah, Hell in a Very Small Place. I have found that with these Metal Earth kits.

Hi ;

 Smee Agin ! I got to thinking about this very carefully . I realized another problem with " Metal Earth products . Can you say Orthographic Projection ( Perspective ) ?

       These and some P.E. I know of have directions that sometimes can confuse a builder .Why ? Well , they project say , a three Quarter view of the part in place .

 Sometimes it's color coded sometimes not. This then requires an ability to mentally picture the product at this assembly point and the parts relationship there .

 No , I do not recommend these , for those who didn't pay attention in art or engineering related classes .    T.B.

Operation Christmas Child ?

 I don't think so . These things are not really difficult but definitely not for Children under a certain age . My neighbor's boy was given one , "Himeji Castle ". He did a passably good job , he is thirteen .     T.B.

Hi John ;

  I forgot to give some information to folks doing these .Get a pair of very small art or surgical scissors to cut the parts of the sprues .Use a fine triangular file for smoothing and use Stamp tweezers to fold the tabs .

    You have to understand one thing , although I never thought I would admit it . I am driven since childhood to explore new realms of crafting . Being that my first models were built from twigs .

 We started out as Farmers and Fishermen .There was no time for store-bought toys . In my beloved Granma's words . "Them store - bought toys are too dear and they don't look well made either !"

    For those of you who are under 35 " Dear " is an old , old term meaning " Expensive ." Even if that expense was a dime or a dollar !

I've decided to take the plunge into Metal Earth, to try and reignite my 1/700 ship model building in earnest. So far their P-51 is going together fairly easily, but -

- I had to dig out several of my smaller pliers to fold and crimp tabs;

- the Tamiya diamond needle file is getting a workout to take care of the nasty fret attachments remnants.

- No. 12 Xacto blades aren't the best for separating the components but it's better than a razor blade.

Still, at the end of the day, it's a model. And if a grandchild gets hold of one of these, my first reaction won't be to scream!

Phil ;

   You will enjoy this kit if you don't rush it . I spread mine over four nights . An hour or so here and there . It came out quite nicely . It has a lot of confusing join places though - so be careful !

I have spent literally hours on the rigging for one cannon, with 24 to go, but lack the patience for these things. My daughter had to finish the red baron fokker for me.

I bought a couple kits and gave one to my 12 year old grandson. Mine, I had to fiddle with, but the kid - he breezed right through it! Pretty amazing.

I agree, working a kit or two of something in your interest will certainly hone your PE working skills, inexpensively, something I needed for sure.

EJ

Well , I gotta tell you .

     I do recommend them to folks thinking about spending ninety or a hundred bucks for P.E.for their Tank this or ship that and they've never used P.E. before . Twelve to sixteen bucks is cheap to learn if you can do this extra operation , Especially if you have a low self confidance , confusion and anger threshold .

   I have seen folks working on a plane or ship destroy the whole thing because of the P.E. . I don't think folks should do that . Enter " Metal Earth "

Your experience reminds me of when a friend printed me a paper model of a rabbit. He was big into building paper models, so I gave it a try. Think that it might take 30 minutes, but over 2 hours later I was just finishing up. It was not as fun as building a real kit, so I have not done another.

Par429

Thanks!

   I received on of these kits for Christmas this year.   The Himeji Castle.   One of the better looking ones, I think.  (Relevant since my sons live in Japan).   I haven't started it yet, but it's nice to have some idea what to expect.

Thanks again,

Phil

I bought that one awhile ago to build for my wife, who has visited Japan.  I asked her to choose whether she wanted it shiny like kit, or should I paint it in real castle colors- she hasn't decided yet.

I have tackled one of these things - the P-51. Yes, when finished it looks like a Mustang, when held at arm's length.

And I also had to dig out the PE shears, file to remove all the numbs, and several sets of pliers. But it got done!

I was at Barnes &Noble yesterday and they have a full line of Metal Earth kits including the Titantic,,BlackPearl and Golden Hind.They also had a 3 pack of WW2 tanks that had the Tiger 1,Sherman and T-34.