Monthly Archives: November 2022

Because I Was Inverted

Posted on by
Reply

Do you feel the need?

The need for SPEED?!

Ever since the 1986 blockbuster Top Gun catapulted Pete “Maverick” Mitchell, Nick “Goose” Bradshaw and their Grumman F14 Tomcat off the deck of an aircraft carrier and into action film folklore with Kenny Loggins’ Danger Zone blaring through the speakers I have loved the movie and, especially, the F-14 Tomcat.

With twin engines, twin seats, and variable-sweep wings (they move – “Swing” in and out: Out-stretched for slower and more stable take-offs and landings; Swept back, like an arrow for getting places faster than the speed of sound), in my opinion, the Tomcat remains one of the sexiest pieces of aeronautical jet engineering ever.

Undeniably the coolest scene in Top Gun is in the opening minutes when Tom Cruise’s Maverick flips his F14 Tomcat upside down and flies very close to scare off the newly discovered “MiG 28” enemy fighter jet that is locked onto, and has spooked, his wing-man Cougar.

Maverick says “Greetings!” and flips the bird (gives the finger) to the enemy pilot, while Goose takes a close-up polaroid photo of the enemy aircraft from his RIO’s back seat (for military intelligence purposes).

The plan works, and the MiG “bugs out”, leaving the American jets to return to their Aircraft carrier, the USS Enterprise.

I have long dreamed of recreating that “inverted” scene as a model diorama, but there were several hurdles in the way.

I had made a number of model Tomcats over the years in different scales (1/72, 1/48 and 1/144), but had never been able to find one with Top Gun markings until I was on my way home from my last trip to Auckland and stopped for breakfast in Taupo.

With the sequel “Top Gun: Maverick” on the horizon Airfix had re-released their original 1/72 scale movie kits and I grabbed this kit the moment I saw it in Taupo Hobbies.

I took my time building it slowly and carefully, not wanting to make any errors. It came together really easily and well! There were no problems from construction to painting.

I even masked and painted canopy lines for the first time ever, with the results far better than I had expected!

The decals went on without issue and, again for the first time, I sprayed clear coat over the plane to seal them and stop the decal insignia from eventually flaking off like has happened on a few of my older kits.

I even painted the figures with colored helmets to resemble Mav’ and Goose, tilting their heads back with pliers to look like they are looking (up/) down on the MiG’s pilot.

Aircraft anoraks will readily tell you that the “MiG 28s” in the original Top Gun weren’t MiGs, or even Russian at all – They were American Northrop F-5E (single seat) and F-5F (twin seat) Tiger IIs.

The continuity in Top Gun’s opening dog fight scene flips and flops a bit – The plane that Maverick sneaks up on is rather clearly a single-seat E variant from the distant shots:

But then, seconds later, as the inverted Tomcat and the “MiG” are almost canopy-to-canopy, the MiG has miraculously morphed into a twin-seat F-5F!

(We’ll forgive them – It was the 80s and lots of movies that tried to replicate Top Gun’s aesthetic made far worse errors – At least Tony Scott had the same model of plane…)

Try as I might, I was unable to find an Italeri F-5F – the ideal twin-seat kit for what I wanted, but I was able to get a single-seat “MiG 28” from Twitter friend Justin Ryan who had ordered some kits from Japan and kindly added a Hobby Boss F-5E kit to his order for me.

Once again, an easy uncomplicated build, paint and marking job had two elements of my dream diorama all set.

Now for the diorama itself!

I had seen a couple model recreations of the “inverted” scene online that used clear plastic rods as the supports for the planes, with the rods drilled into a wooden base and heated and curved up and around before slotting into the planes’ jet exhausts to give them a near-horizontal (the rods inevitably drooped under the weight of the planes along the long length of the acrylic rods), mid-air appearance.

But these displays were all open and uncovered – A disaster waiting to happen when it came to dusting, which they would inevitably need in short order.

So I started thinking of covered alternatives.

Boxes were too cumbersome and framing could block some angles of view or wreck the illusion of flight that in was trying to replicate.

So I considered a clear plastic tube, or perhaps the whole thing in clear plastic!

In Napier we have a plastic fabricating company called Classique Plastics who I previously used for the clear sheet on the front of my recycled Rimu Pint Sized Hero display case.

When I went to scope my.plans out they happened to have a cut-off of the exact diameter and length of clear tube I was after already in their stocks!

I asked for them to make an all-acrylic display I had planned amd sketched out, but they ended up being very busy with commercial jobs and after a few weeks I decided I wanted to try something different, as i was uncertain the plastic rods would hold the weight of the planes as I had imagined.

So I designed something more multi-media.

I bought a slightly longer than originally planned length of clear plastic tube from Classique (this alone was over $100, so I dread to think how much the whole thing in clear acrylic would have cost!) and went in search of some round Rimu and stainless steel rods.

The rods I couldn’t source locally, but found and ordered from Bay Hobbies in Tauranga.

I got recycled Rimu floorboard “plug” ends made to fit on a CNC machine by local woodworkers Stim Craftmanship.

I had one edge of the round Rimu trimmed flat so the display could stand by itself without rolling everywhere.

Then I took one of the plug ends to my father-in-law’s workshop and very carefully measured and drilled holes for the stainless steel support rods to fit into, making sure they would be close enough together to replicate the inverted scene from the movie, but not so close that the planes touched.

The results were pretty neat perfect:

I’ve been fortunate this year to have a very successful streak of crafty creations.

Aside from a few speed bumps along the way with this project everything went exceptionally well and i am really happy with the result!

Radio (Controlled) Car-Car!

Posted on by
Reply

When I was younger, I dreamed of owning a Tamiya radio-controlled car.

At the time they were far too expensive and technical for my pocket money, or engineering ability.

As I’ve gotten older, I’ve become more confident in my creative capabilities.

I also earn slightly more pocket money now than I used to when I was ten…

So, when I was able to cash in on some of my favorite childhood toys I took the opportunity to fulfill my Tamiya target!

As usual, I went to my local hobby shop, Cool Toys, who have a fantastic range of radio-controlled kits and ready-to-run vehicles.

After watching far too many YouTube videos I decided to get a Tamiya TT-02 kit, as it is very adaptable to different forms of bodies and on-road and off-road formats.

I must say I was still quite intimidated when I opened the box and was confronted with numerous bags of screws, multiple sprues of parts and an instruction manual the size of a novella.

The first part of the kit I made were the shock absorbers.

I had been tempted to get oil-filled performance shocks but decided to start off easily (and cheaply – Oil-filled shocks are over $100 for a set of four). They were also an easy part of the kit to build and give a sense of the kit’s construction being well under way.

(This wouldn’t ACTUALLY be the case until I started on the drivetrain.)

Gears, grease, screws and repeat, gears, grease, screws and repeat!

This is one of the parts of the build I feared stuffing up the most, as it appeared so fiddly.

As we know, however, appearances can be deceiving, and everything seemed to fit together without too much hassle, stress, blood or hair loss.

Next the motor went in (and out a couple times later on testing out the wheels), and the gear housings covered up all the greased-up bits.

The shocks I made up first off were no longer held in suspension (see what I did there?) as they were finally attached to the wheel assemblies on either end.

Universal joints and drive shafts will also provide power to all four corners of my RC beastie!

Giving the car some direction was next.

Steering set up was another rather intimidatingly technical bit, not least because I had heard and read several times about over-tightening screws de-threading softer plastic parts, so there was some added caution in this part of construction.

I think I got it all Goldilocks – I.e. not too loose, not too tight, JUST RIGHT!

On went the wheels (the smell of Tamiya rubber tyres has always been intoxicating!) and we were pretty much done! (after disassembling and reassembling half the bloody drive assembly because I unknowingly had the driveshaft and wheel bearings around the wrong way until trying, unsuccessfully, to fit the rims on..)

With the steering servo connected up It was time to give the chassis some cover and curves.

The kit I chose came with a 1998 Ford Escort shell.

The early 90s WRC Escort Cosworth was one of my favorite rally cars of all time. I made the scale model of the 1994 Cosworth RS many years ago, so this was an easy choice.

After buying the special curved polycarbonate scissors from Cool Toys I carefully cut around the exterior of the body shell to get it the right shape.

This body came with the wheel arches pre-cut, which made life easier, and the kit look smoother than my later work on the other body I bought.

After masking up the windows (also one of the more stressful parts of the build – you don’t want to get this far then ruin its appearance!) I sprayed the body (you spray the INSIDE of these models – the plastic body helps shield the finished paintwork) in four coats of Tamiya PS16 Metallic Blue giving it a similar color to the Subaru Impreza WRC rally car of the same era.

I managed to avoid any paint bleed under the masking and once that and the outer coating were peeled off and decals were added to the outside of the body the results were STUNNING!

I sprayed the windows in Tamiya PS31 Smoke to help hide the electronics inside the car.

One of the underlying reasons I chose the Escort and painted it in metallic blue is that my first long-term car (my very first car was a Ford Anglia that Dad and I partially restored in my last year of high school until it died of rear crossmember rust about a year later) was a metallic blue 1983 Ford Laser – kind of the Escort’s Mum/Dad.

It was an awesome, incredibly reliable car that served me really well, so I built this kit as a homage to that Laser.

I even used a label maker to recreate its number plate!

Is it a Bird? Is it a Plane? Not it’s V8 Supercar!

While scoping out my RC car purchase, I noted that Glen at Cool Toys had a Tamiya TT-02 Ford Mustang body shell and an after-market sticker sheet with the livery for Dick Johnson Racing modern Kiwi legend Scott McLaughlin‘s Australian V8 Supercar:

Despite being a fan of DJR arch-rivals Holden Racing Team from back in the Peter Brock and Mark Skaife days I couldn’t resist – I had to have a go at replicating the awesome looking DJR Mustang!

So, once I had completed the Escort, I moved onto the more complex task of cutting out, masking and painting (, and masking and painting, and masking and painting) Tamiya PS1 White, PS2 Red, PS6 Yellow and PS31 Smoke onto the Mustang to give it DJR’s iconic three-tone paint scheme.

With several coats, different colors, respraying, decalling and a few whoopsies I was finally able to make a realistic recreation that looked pretty bloody awesome if I do say so myself (just don’t look at the back of it..)!

Final Thoughts

Over-all this was a really easy, enjoyable experience with almost everything going right!

If anything the one big downside of the build is that I’m really annoyed at and disappointed in myself that my fear of inability kept me from building one of these kits a lot earlier in life!

(This is probably moot, though, as it wasn’t until recently that I had anywhere near the disposable income to afford making one.)

My Twitter friend Justin Ryan very kindly donated a hand controller and receiver he had spare to help get me going, so now I just have to get a nickel metal hydride battery, and I can start burning RC rubber!

Old Pain, Financial Gain!

Posted on by
Reply
MASK produced a series of children’s books which I collected. These were bought by a guy from Philidelphia, USA last year!

Nostalgia has been getting the better of me of late.

Whether it’s appearing on radio as a child, or dreams of building radio-controlled cars I could never afford, the past has been a bit of a focus for me recently

I had a bit of a clean out a few months ago.

I’ve slowly been whittling down the stockpile of 80s toys I grew up with and the most recent collection I divested myself of was my MASK toys.

MASK, or “Mobile Armored Strike Kommand” (sic) was an American toy line and kids’ cartoon series that began in 1985 and featured regular-looking vehicles that transformed into fighter planes, helicopters, boats, submarines and other types of offensive and defensive mobile weapon platforms.

It was very cool and very popular!

I was fortunate enough to collect several of them over the years, mainly on birthdays and Christmases (I got Rhino for Christmas in 1985 or 86), eventually holding onto four that I liked the most:

Condor – The smallest, cheapest and first MASK toy I got turns from a cool green motorcycle into an even cooler mini helicopter!

Thunderhawk – Quite possibly the coolest, Thunderhawk was the “hero vehicle” of the series and the prime vehicle of MASK leader Matt Trakker

Jackhammer – The only VENOM (Vicious Evil Network of Mayhem), “baddie” vehicle I got, but also one of the coolest looking, being a black Ford Bronco 4X4. I got this for my 8th birthday.

And finally, the biggest and best:

Rhino – MASK’s big-rig mobile command vehicle. Huge, with lots of chrome, buttons and spring-loaded features!

While they were very cool and I loved them, they had also spent the better part of 30 years in boxes in various wardrobes, seldom seeing the light of day, which was a shame because they should be out being appreciated and enjoyed.

YouTube is full of videos of toy collectors’ hordes in brightly lit glass display cases.

I decided my MASK toys deserved that and, maybe, the money I made from selling them could help finance my new radio-controlled car goal, so I shared some pictures of them on an 80s Toys Facebook group I belong to and, from the reactions listed all four of them on Trademe.

With starting prices amounting to around $250 (not unreasonable given their age, rarity and great condition – I loved and looked after my toys) I was stunned to earn over double that when the auctions ended!

All the toys were ultimately bought by the same bidder, so it was good to be able to keep them all together in their new home.

With the money raised I had enough to buy the Tamiya RC car I desired!

But that is a tale for another post...

A Blast From the Radio Past!

Posted on by
Reply
Napier’s “Broadcasting House”, now renamed for current tenants NZME. Bay City Radio occupied the top floor. The studio I did the kids’ show in was the windows directly above the main ground floor door.

Years and years and years ago I was on the radio.

This is before appearing on RNZ’s The Panel a mere six times in 2018-19.

Or doing midnight-till-dawns for six months on Hot 93 in Hastings in the dying days of local radio in the mid 90s.

Or even volunteering at Radio Kidnappers Access Radio while in high school.

In August 1984 I got to be the “Co-Pilot” on Bay City Radio’s Sunday morning kids’ show.

Bay City Radio 1278AM was THE local radio station for Hawke’s Bay for years and years. This is back when radio was broadcast locally, the announcers were locals (and some became minor local celebrities) and its constant focus was the local community.

There was a weekday breakfast show, talkback radio from about 9am until midday, with music in the afternoon and evenings.

On Saturday mornings all the upcoming local sporting fixtures for the weekend were promoted or dissected and commentary of big games, like the HB Magpies playing at McLean Park were often broadcast live in the afternoons.

On Sunday mornings there was a kids’ show, which had a local kid as co-host, or “Co-Pilot” (I don’t remember pressing any buttons, or taking charge of any controls, though.)

The Tamatea Hawks! I’m middle, back row (as always) Robert Stewart is to the left of me with the rounded collar. That’s his Dad, the radio announcer who coached us that year.

My friend Robert Stewart’s dad worked at Bay City Radio for a bit (they moved away not long after) and I though radio was pretty cool – I listened to the kids’ show every week, so must have written in, like so many others, asking to be part of it and I got selected.

I remember excitedly reading the letter we received confirming my selection in the driveway of our home one Saturday morning.

There was a few weeks’ notice of my appearance on the show, but I don’t remember much more than that, or the events of the big day itself.

Dad took me to the station early on Sunday morning (it was after dawn, but not by much), while Mum stayed at home and recorded the event on a cassette tape (kids, if you don’t know what one of these is, ask your parents…. Actually, you might be best asking your grandparents.)

I had found the tape when I was clearing out things at Mum and Dad’s place years ago but more recently looking through the mementos in my shed, I couldn’t find it and thought the tape was lost to the ages.

A couple weeks ago we gave away a large pinboard we had been given by a friend, but never got around to using. It had been leaning up against some garage cupboards that I had limited access to.

In one of these cupboards I found the metal cash box I wrote about originally finding amongst my folks’ possessions.

I looked inside the cash box AND FOUND THE CASSETTE TAPE!

However, I didn’t know if it would even still work – We no longer had any cassette players in the house, the tape itself was close to 40 years old, and I remember it got tangled up at least once or twice during replays years ago, so I wasn’t certain if any audio was recoverable.

I took the tape into Dean Mardon at Electric City Music in Napier, just down Dalton Street from Bay City Radio’s old studio, now “NZME House” (see top picture, ECM is down the road to the left in the picture) to see if he could digitize whatever was on there for me.

The condition of the tape wasn’t nearly as bad as I had feared and there was almost a full hour of recording!

I gave the file to a work colleague, who happens to be a former TVNZ audio man to clean up and, to avoid copyright infringements, remove any songs so I could upload it to YouTube.

For those playing at home the songs removed are: The Beatles’ Yellow Submarine, “Flick the Little Fire Engine”, “You’re a Pink Toothbrush “, Rolf Harris’ “Two Little Boys” (hindsight is 20/20 etc…), “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious” from Mary Poppins and the show closes out with, quite prophetically, Kermit the Frog singing “Rainbow Connection”.

You can listen to the edited version of it here:

I cried listening to it for the first time in over 35 years.

It’s a bit funny, a bit cringey, certainly nostalgic and, today, a bit sad, because I can hear my Mum’s voice, or rather her speech patterns in how I talked back then, and I can remember Dad sitting quietly in the corner of the studio, over my right shoulder, pleased as Punch.

For years I remembered it as my friend Robert’s dad as the host of the show, but it was a man named Colin Harris.

We talk about my school, Tamatea Primary, my apparent bus driving career aspirations (??), what I was doing in the school holidays (my studio stint was in the middle of the second and third term of the year – there were only three school terms back then), I say “Hi!” to my friends and <Gasp!> girlfriends (I was only six, OK?!)

I even got to do the weather!

Time has sadly robbed my memory of some of the finer details – I have no recollection whatsoever of a couple of my friends and one apparent “love interest” mentioned, and the fact I had to Google the movie “Sword of the Valiant“, which I say I wanted to see (most likely at the State Cinema diagonally across the Dickens / Dalton Streets intersection from the station) probably indicates I never got to see it.

Mrs Unwin’s class, 1984. I, back row, middle, look like a serial killer in waiting because the photographer kept telling me to “look down” so I would fit in the picture. I took stage instruction seriously.

My first foray in front of a microphone probably wouldn’t win many awards with several long, thought-filled pauses (dreaded “dead air” as it’s called in the industry), but there are still some moments of brilliance for an almost seven-year-old that make the likes of today’s simulcast announcers sound like a pack of un-funny men-children (#SpoilerAlert: That’s not hard to do, but sadly no one better is given the chance to!)

It was, however, the start of a lifelong dream for me to be on radio. A dream that has mostly only seen failure over the last three decades, as local radio in Hawke’s Bay has been cut back and cut back, undermined and undermined.

I have said that I don’t suffer from the “old pain” of nostalgia, but some recent events do poke at old wounds, gnawing “what-ifs” irritate and sometimes you just miss your Mum and Dad who did lots of little things like taking you to a radio station, and recording you on a cassette tape years ago.

I would be “almost seven, still a bit six” in this photo