“Final Details” wants to know: What was your first (unassisted) kit?

Hello! For attribution, can you do me the favor of sending me your name and where you're from? Thanks! Mark Hembree, FSM Associate Editor, mhembree@finescale.com

The very first model I remember building by myself was the Aurora Prehistoric Scenes Saber Tooth Tiger. I got it as a birthday gift. I Googled the kit and it was released in 1972, so I would have been 8 years old. It is one of the prehistoric kits that wasn't reissued by Monogram.

It was a snap together kit that consisted of 24 pieces including a two piece base. It had eight different legs providing option poses. The base could be mated with other prehistoric scene kit bases to create a large diorama. I ended up building most of the kits from that line throughout my youth.

First kit built on my own was a Skycrane helicopter.  i believe it was a Revel offering and it was ( I think) 1/100 scale.  Had to be 1980 or so.  Funny, I found the engines in the spares box just a few weeks ago.

My first unassisted kit was a 1/144 scale F-16.  To be honest I have no idea what brand, but I think it was Revell – it was one in those small boxes with a single sprue of parts.

I remember is was around 1987 and I received it for Christmas.  I would have been six at the time. It was a Thunderbird model, however, I borrowed two tins of Humbrol (green and brown) from my cousin and painted it with a military camouflage.  For some reason I only ever painted the top though – I guess I was too anxious to play (and eventually break) it.

My gosh, it's been so long I honestly can't remember. I know it had to be an airplane kit sometime in the late 1960s or early 1970s but for the life of me I couldn't even begin to guess which one!

Nice!

My first finished kit was a balsa stick model, a Guillows Aeronca kit.  It was a few years before the plastic kits came out.  I built both plastic and flying (balsa) models for several decades, till I got too irritated with weather cancelling out planned flying sessions.  Now I build almost exclusively non-flying shelf scale models, only rarely a flying model.  My non-flying models are not all plastic, however. I still scratch build (or even one of the rare available kits) a wood "solid model."

I think it is surprising that I remember that first model so well, since it was almost seventy years ago!

First solo kit for me was the (then) Monogram P-61 Black Widow. We had extracurricular courses in middle school, around 1987, and one was model building. Got 45 minutes after school let out to work on the kits in a classroom.  I brush painted the interior silver, left the outside bare plastic (black) and masked off the red wing walk lines with scotch tape and brush painted them. I've had a thing for the P-61 ever since.

My first and first unassisted were the same. Forget the actual name, but it was a Chevy Snap-Tite 1/32 van that my First-Grade teacher bought me (I was in a remedial class for troubled kids) in about '72. A bunch of snap-together kits later my parents finally got me a "real" kit - a 1/48 Revell Starfighter and a Monogram 1/32 6x6 Army 21/2 Truck! ;-)

I really don't remember the first one I built without help (some 35+ years ago). My son Ethan just completed his first one unassisted just a month ago (he's nine years old). It's a Polar Lights "Stone, Woods and Cook" snaptite drag car.

Glenn

I remember after doing my first kit with my dad (Monogram 1/48 AT-6), he took me to the hobby shop and bought me a Monogram 1/48 (I think) Cessna 180!  He set me up in my room and he let me at it alone!  What a site it was!  Hand painted silver paint!  Glue everywhere!  A horrific decal job.  But that was all it took to get the fever and never stop loving it!  I still did kits with my dad too...best of times!

Eagle90

For me it was a Brontosaurus skeleton kit by Glenco , I won first prize at a Hobby Show in Liverpool UK , I was 12 at the time .

I remember my mother getting me a DC3 in 1965. I was about 10 years old at the time and made a big mess with the glue and clear parts. Pretty certain it was a Monogram kit and remember the decals were bright red so they had to be TWA markings. That was a very long time ago.

Well , lets see ;

   Back in the day it would've been a Dornier D.O.X.  Yes , it was all wood ! Thing is , I got an " A " in shop class with that one ! Darned thing started a snowball effect that continues to this day .My Dad and Uncles NEVER had time to teach me that .

When I was around 6 or 7 years old, my first unassisted model kit was a snap-tite Mustang II Funny car.

Hello!

My first model was brought to me by my uncle and he also helped me to build it - it was a 1:72 glider - and I can't recall the name of the machine or the maker of the kit. But then a few months later my mom bought me a 1:72 model of a Polish pre WWII liason aircraft called LWS Czapla by a polish company Plastyk Pruszków. Back in the eighties you had to stand in a loong line to buy something like that. I put it together and it looked terrible, but I've been modelling ever since!

Have a nice day

Paweł

I believe it was Monograms "Heavy Chevy"  1970 Chevell.  I was probably around 12.  I got started after my Dad helped me build a Riviera an have enjoyed it ever since.

My first kits were Strombecker solid wood models of civilian aircraft, back in the early  1950's, and also plastic Revell "highway pioneers" antique cars.  The solid wood models came out rather crude, as I did not have much patience for sanding and shaping, but the plastic cars were pretty good.  I remember I

had to use a heated metal tool to melt and seal the axles to hold the wheels on!

My first unassisted kit was also my first.  I was at most 6 years old, and I wanted some green army men like I had seen the other neighbourhood kids playing with.  Parents took me to the local department store, but all they had were a few Tamiya 1/35 scale figure kits - I choose the British infantry set that came with three soldiers.  

They weren't pretty when assembled (pieces were just twisted off the sprues, no clean up, etc),  but back then, I thought they were great.  Little did I know what it would snowball into...

regards,

Jack

My first kit was the F-104 Starfighter by Monogram, I was about 10 at the time.  I remember picking it out because of the name, I had a huge love of science fiction at the time, and I didn't realize it was an actual plane.  I would build a few more Cold War era jets before I would stop building models.  Only to pick it up 30 years later....

I do not recall what was my first un assisted kit- Most likely it was one for those little Hawk 1/72 aircraft kits as I remember building many of those. We wouold get them at local store down the street. I very much recall the first kits that I built with dad though...

Boy that's hard. I think it was the Disneyland Moonliner Space Rocket with TWA markings.

My first kit was when I was 8, in 1965, it was the Revell 1/72 F4U-1. Unlike some, my first model kit and my first unassisted build were the same model.

I recently bought the same kit in a new Revell of Germany box, to place next to my first model (I still have it),,,,,and plan to buy the new tool Revell F4U-1D kit when it gets released.

That will allow me to show the same aircraft type from Revell back then, then the same tooling built from the ground up using "modern methods", and the newest Revell version, all three together on the same shelf.

Rex

My first one was a Revell DC-7, in its beautiful original box and American Airlines. I think it was in 1957, when the kit was brand new and I was six years old. My mother paid a dollar for it at the sporting goods store two blocks from our house in Columbus, Ohio.