Invid Fan wrote:

I'd been building models for around 35 years before I built mine, and it
kept me very busy, let me tell you.



I found I had glued something in the wrong place, with no way to
recover. The partly completed mess is still in a box in the closet



Do what I did: Saw it apart and put it in the right place. I ended up
doing that after I stuck the wrong end on one of the cylindrical modules
while fiddling around to see how things fit together. That was the only
model I ever used a rubber mallet to assemble parts of- some of those
rectangular pegs were a very tight fit, and got hammered into the holes
in the modules!
I thought the plastic might crack, but that stuff is really tough.



On the upside, it looks downright spectacular when finished.



Oh, yes. Anyone want to sell a finished one cheaply?



The model has so many fragile things sticking off of it that it would be
almost impossible to pack in a way that would let it survive even if
partially disassembled.



This particular upgrade from Realspace Models would add a very nice
touch, but might be fragile:
http://www.realspacemodels.com/html/iss_photoetch.html
Wasn't that some of the oddest plastic you ever ran into? It's very high
quality and tough, but it's not normal model kit plastic.
I think it's what they make model trains out of.



Well, when the model company has "Railway" as part of it's name on the
box...



Yeah, that's just what I thought- this was a very odd choice of a
product for them, and there's a story of some sort behind this that I
don't know.



The whole kit gives the
feeling of something designed for NASA publicity purposes.



It definitly was something not meant for the general public. Almost
like they had the molds, and decided to see if they could make some
extra cash by tossing the pieces in a box and overcharging for them.



Revell of Germany model company made a model of the offshore North
Cormorant Oil Platform and a Krupp bucket-wheel excavator:
http://www.internethobbies.com/inter...e1offshoi.html
http://www.toys-n-cars.com/images/images2/bwe1.jpg
.....and I always suspected that there was some connection between the
companies that made those things and those two models- that they were
used as publicity items in some way, as these wouldn't be obvious
choices for big-selling models.
And then there's this:
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articl...11/ai_n9462724
For those who want to build a model of a Finnish nuclear reactor with
3,175 parts.
And since it is a card model, you get to cut all those 3,175 parts out.
So after buying around 100 X-Acto #11 knife blades... :-)

Pat