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Hello, all;
So, anyways, we was bustin' up this bar in Okinawa... Oh, wait, wrong story.
What I meant was this; a couple/three years ago, I was watching the news. They had launched SpaceShipOne for, I believe, the second time. They showed the pilot bouncing a model of the craft around in his hands in microgravity. And I said to myself "cool model. I wonder if they are available anywhere? Better still, I wonder if they can be purchased from the SS1 project?"
A little web searching revealed that there were no models that could be purchased. Or at least there weren't any that I could find. But lo and behold, a fellow named Ralph Currell had designed one in card and that the pattern could be downloaded at no charge. And a copy of the model made from that pattern was indeed what the pilot had been playing with.
So I downloaded the pattern (with a 33k modem, thank you very much). It took about two minutes to realize that I was in way over my head.
But I had the scent. The camel's nose was in the proverbial tent. I remembered seeing a couple of primitive card models of some sort in a passage in Paris a year or two before. Or, maybe, I saw the maquettes de carton first and then they launched SS1. After a certain age, it all begins to run together.
At any rate, I started searching and found lots of models at many levels of sophistication to try.
Yesterday, I got serious and started on Ojimak's Concorde, my first card model. Since I do not read Japanese, I misunderstood a couple things. I am re-doing the fuselage. It is very much an operation where I am making up techniques as I go. Wish me luck.
I am trying to gather the courage to tackle Ralph Currell's Concorde. I also am planning a go at Fiddlers' Green's F-4 Phantom.
I would welcome anyone's suggestions as to some good beginner's models. I have a major collection of FG patterns, all of Oji's, RC's and a few more. What do you guys say?
What is the record for length of a "hello" message? I would write more, but the battery light is flashing on my laptop.
Semper fi,
DW
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