Hi everyone,
A bit late to start, but I have decided to throw my hat in the ring as well as a tribute to my good friend. Dave always inspired me to get back to the bench, despite all of life's distractions (and even when he was no longer able to). I find myself in a position this year of being super busy with work, travel, and life, which has resulted in zero completions since about October last year, and a stalled project on the bench which just makes me groan a little knowing how much work I still have to go on it (which, in turn, has further discouraged me from sitting down at the bench). It's all conspired to result in me not having done much actual modelling this year so far, and not being terribly motivated to do any.
In watching all of the awesome responses and progress in this group build, I took inspiration and recollected Dave's words to me many moons ago, to remember the reasons why we find joy in our hobby, and focus on those aspects when we find ourselves not feeling motivated. So, on Sunday I cleared the bench, and decided to start one of the MANY kits I have in my stash, with the aim of simply building for joy, in tribute to Dave. My contribution will be a simple build of a simple yet fun subject, to get the mojo going, and get me back 'in the groove', as Dave would have wanted
In this case, I've settled on starting the 1/72 Revell Fokker Dr.1. This is the 2003 release, which is a much nicer release than the Revell kit originating from back in the 1960s. It is a very nice yet simple little kit of this iconic machine from the First World War (indeed it is a competitor for the best kit of this aircraft in 1/72, I think). Of course it complies with Revell's 'tradition' of releasing all of their Fokker Dr.1 kits in bright red plastic!
Maybe one day I should actually do a model as one of Richthofen's famous mounts...
The aim is to keep this one pretty simple, with only some minor modifications. In this case, I intend only on replacing the kit engine with an Eduard item, the guns with some Gaspatch guns, and a few minor upgrades here and there to the interior (i.e. seat mounts, seat belts, and so on) and exterior. The rest I will keep pretty much to what comes in the box, to maintain the spirit of this build.
Progress is small so far; I've built up the Eduard resin engine (designed for their kit but it fits the Revell kit fine), cleaned up the major parts, repositioned the control surfaces for some visual interest, and added some very crude seat mounts. For some reason Revell moulded recessed vertical panel lines on the fuselage, which I've filled with Mr Surfacer, to be sanded down later.
So far, even these simple small steps have reinvigorated me to getting back to the bench again... it's also reminded me of how small some of these aircraft are in 1/72!
Thanks for looking,
BC
