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Apollo at 50:
​Was it All Worth it?

By Bill Engar

Where do your rockets take you?
 
Dem Brudders dabble in model rocketry.  In fact, it was older Brudder Dick to whom I owe success with my first flights.
 
As with many readers I’m sure, my participation in model rocketry can be directly traced to the Space Race that began in the 1950’s and culminated in the Moon Landings.  I struggled in school; perhaps my best subject in elementary school was landing myself in the principal’s office for bad behavior.  Had I started school a few decades later, I’m sure I would have been the Ritalin poster child.  I'm rather jealous of kids who get to take that medication nowadays.  It likely would have saved me a few years of grief.


​In those days, a respite was live telecasts of the Apollo missions in the classroom.  I recall school literally stopping during the missions, and the black-and-white TV’s in all the classrooms were tuned to live network broadcasts when major mission events occurred.


I was captivated by these, and don’t recall missing a single one to go to the principal’s office.  I can trace my love of science almost exclusively to the NASA space exploits of the 1960’s and have the greatest gratitude to those teachers who recognized the educational value of turning on the TV to let us see science and history happen live.  OK, I did have some teachers who inspired me with their lessons including an English teacher whose advice I ignored to write every day—but only for a few years.


As many in my same situation will remember, an excitement over space and rocketry instilled by the 1960’s space launches and movies of the period motivated me into trying to build rockets of my own.  Around age nine or ten, I succeeded in launching a rocket I'd built powered by baking soda and vinegar to a breathtaking height of three feet.  Considering that technology mature (and running out of Mother’s vinegar supply) caused me to look to other reactive chemistries.
Picture
In 1971, ten bucks (list price!) would get you started in model rocketry with the Latest and Greatest.  Special "photo-flash" batteries  were supposed to dump a higher current pulse through an ignition circuit than conventional carbon batteries.  The downside was that these batteries didn't last long at all!  Alkaline batteries, just coming available in the early 1970's, made photo flash batteries obsolete and forgotten.
(Images from Sven Knudson's fantastic Ninfinger Productions rockets website)
Picture
This thing just looked better on paper.
It should be mentioned here that my rocketry pursuits were done largely in secret at this point.  In other posts, I’ve mentioned that our mother did not particularly care for our participation in any model building activities, and I assumed she would feel the same way about my desires to build my own flying rocket.  For the most part, my methods to hide my clandestine rocketry activities were probably similar to those you’d find today in so-called “rogue regimes.”
Picture
Brudder Dick caught this photo of the first model rocket flying that any of us had ever seen.  A Centuri Astro-1 takes to the sky on a 1/2A6-2 motor, also sold by Centuri.  To get that Servo launcher to work, I had to use both hands to get a good seal on the air-plunger.
From school lessons (and TV), I knew that the Saturn V was powered by kerosene and LOX.  I figured those materials should work well for my next rocket.  Finding the kerosene was easy, as we had a kerosene lamp in the house.  The LOX was a different story.  At a friend’s house, I saw some “LUX” dishwashing soap, and mistook that for the all-important oxidizer component of rocket fuel.  It wasn’t long before I realized my mistake; Lux dish soap in no way helped kerosene to burn.   And tin cans make a horrible combustion chamber.
 
About this time, our oldest sister’s boyfriend knew of my foundering rocketry development program.  He told me about a catalog he had with model rockets, engines, launchers, and everything I’d need to fly rockets.  He said he’d give it to me, and I was overjoyed when I learned that such a thing existed.  I hadn’t considered outsourcing the engineering of my own rocket program.  However, he kept forgetting to bring the catalog over, and then, horror of horrors, he and my sister broke up.

Picture
Not long after launching the Astro (spring, 1972), I finished my own Estes Big Bertha.  It's flying here on a B6-4.  I almost learned the hard way that the 18" parachute that comes with the kit might be a tad big on a breezy day.  Fortunately, I got the rocket back even though it landed outside field boundaries.
During the winter of 1971-72, I seriously messed up my leg skiing.  My parents saved all kinds of money buying me a pair of thrift-store skis, but one of the seriously antiqued bindings didn’t release when it should have, which put me in a non-discounted full-length leg cast for some time.  This brought my clandestine rocketry program to a screeching halt as it was a lot easier for my parents to know what I was doing.  By this time, I was getting into areas of incendiary chemistry that would have been very dangerous.  My skiing injury perhaps saved me from an even worse injury which also might have included burning down the house.
 
One day as I was near getting the cast off, my mother came home carrying a large sack.  She pulled out a big poly bag, and said it was going to be the present I’d give my cousin Milton, who had recently begun launching model rockets.
 
As you’d imagine, I was fully intrigued!  My cousin Milton did everything better than me.  His Hot Wheels cars always beat mine, he was better at every game, he got better grades, and he liked better movies and TV shows than I did.   

The rocket I was to give my cousin was no less than an Estes Big Bertha!  I recall the first time I beheld the shiny paper towel tube-like body and balsa nose cone and fin stock.
​The lightweight materials and modularized motors suddenly made perfect sense.  I knew that if my mother approved of Milton flying rockets, then I certainly could do it!  I sometimes got the impression that she wanted me to be just like him since it was well known that he went to his principal’s office far less than me.
 
My mother said I’d have to wait until my birthday, a couple months away, in order to get a rocketry starter set with rocket, engines, and launch pad.  In the interim, she picked me up a Centuri model rocket company catalog from our local drug store.  I didn’t know it, but the local drug store had just started carrying Estes and Centuri rocket kits and engines!  Recall that model rocketry was still a fairly new hobby in those days.  In many areas, the only way to participate was through mail order.  My guess is that many retail stores and even hobby shops didn’t begin stocking model rockets until the early 1970’s and it was kind of hard to learn about them otherwise!  Boy’s Life magazine was full of model rocket advertisements, but I didn’t subscribe to that magazine until after I knew about model rockets.
Fast forward two of the longest months of my life to the time when I could finally get my model rocketry starter set!  Still hobbled and recovering from my leg injury, I used the time waiting to study long and hard about the perfect launch set, and I decided to ask for the latest and greatest technology available!
 
Those of you who owned Centuri’s Servo Launch system will sympathize with me.  The idea was much better than its application.  The Servo Launcher first appeared in the Centuri catalog in 1971.   While most other launch pads were wood, the Servo Launcher was molded in red-orange plastic and looked just like a full-size sounding rocket launcher.  You could use it to display your rockets when not flying, it was that cool, according to the catalog text. 
 
Other launchers of the day had controllers requiring a lantern battery or large pile of “D” batteries, but the Servo launcher was designed to take only two photo-flash D-batteries.  Being a three-volt system, a voltage drop across twenty feet of wire would have been unacceptable to light any igniter, even with the "special batteries," so the ignition switch had to be inside the launcher, close to the igniter.  
Picture
Prepping an Estes X-Ray for its first flight.  As I recall, we flew it with a payload of bees recruited from a blossoming cherry tree in the neighborhood.  This explains the interest of the onlookers.
To do this, Centuri devised a thin spring-contact that would be actuated by pressing a pneumatic plunger at the end of a thin rubber hose.   Theoretically, this would inflate a balloon inside the launcher, placed near the internal contact switch (this part of it was the “servo”).  A new igniter-type called the “Sure-Shot” was designed to work on three volts.  That was the theory, anyway.  The practical application was a little different and the Servo Launcher wasn’t in Centuri’s catalog all that long.  It was just a finicky system.

Getting all this to work right was way beyond me, and thank goodness, older brudder Dick, who had recently graduated from high school, was willing to assist me to get the system put together and functioning.
 
I was very excited for my first launch.  The rocket that came with the $10 set was the Astro-1.  I did an awful job on its assembly, hacking the fins from the balsa sheet with my dull Cub Scout pocketknife.  Die-cut balsa was still on the horizon and laser-cut wood was science fiction circa 1972.
 
Finally, the rocket was on the pad and ready to go!  It wouldn’t fire!  We tried again!  And again!  It was hard to tell if the balloon was inflating enough to actuate the launch switch.  The safety key was actually on the launcher itself with a light bulb built-in and hard to see in full sunlight.  You had to make sure your thumb was making a good seal by tightly covering the vent-hole on the danged plunger.  Both Dick and I invented some new swear words before we got the bright idea to put the micro clips as close to the engine as we could.
Picture
An Estes X-Ray at or near ignition.
The first igniter misfired.  I didn’t think to bring a spare, having left the rest of them at home.  The things you learn as a new rocketeer!  Dick was irritated that we had to head home for another igniter, but he took me home and then back to the launch field, and we set everything up a second time.
 
With a swoosh, my Astro-1 lofted on its maiden flight, leaping skyward a small amount on its 1/2A6-2 motor.  The parachute didn’t deploy.  The nose cone came out, but the wadding and parachute must have been packed too tightly.  The rocket came back a little bent, but flyable again.  My first flight wasn’t quite perfect, but I beat my previous three-foot vinegar-powered flight by about 47 feet with that 1/2A6-2 engine!  If the flight wasn’t perfect, Dick got a picture that was nearly so with the rocket off the pad only a foot or two.
 
The next of three engines that came with the starter set was a B6-4, as I recall.  Our second flight occurred a few days later.  Another Centuri recovery device innovation that was supposed to be better than the Estes version was a foil stick-on thing to attach the shock cord inside the rocket body.  It seemed much more high-tech than  the Estes paper slop ‘n glue shock cord mount (that persists to this day).
The B6-4 provided a much bigger kick than that wimpy 1/2A6-2, and the Astro-1 made some serious altitude flying on this engine.  However, at apogee, the foil shock cord mount shirked its duty in the worst way, and the parachute and nose cone separated from the rocket body.  It dove straight into the dirt, crumpling at the front end.  I still hadn’t mastered the art of parachute folding, and this turned out to be a good thing as the partially-opened parachute put the nose cone down within the launch field.
 
I wasn’t really sure how to deal with the crunched body tube on my Astro-1, but Dick managed to cut off the crumpled portion, which was only about an inch or so. Thanks to him, my first rocket was ready for its third flight albeit an inch shorter.  I had built my second rocket, a Big Bertha, by this time, and used the same paper slop-and-glue method learned there to re-mount the shock cord in my Astro-1.

On a Friday night not long before school got out in 1972, our dad wanted to see a rocket fly.  He came with Dick and me to my school launch field to witness the Astro-1 fly with the last engine that came with the launch set—a C6-5!  I knew that we had to do everything right to get the rocket back in one piece on this engine.  We had somewhat mastered the finicky Servo Launcher.  It was a gorgeous night.  The sun was setting, and the sky was perfectly clear.  The field was wind-free.  I recall the sound of that C6-5 like thunder compared to its smaller 18mm brethren. 
 
The rocket shot skyward on a long tongue of flame that endured until the rocket was nearly out of sight!   Jaws agape, the three of us watched the smoke trail from that five-second delay, and we heard an almost imperceptible pop as the parachute presumably deployed.  We could see nothing.  The rocket had flown out of sight.
Picture
I helped my pal build a Centuri Vector V, just out of camera view in this picture taken by Dick.  As I recall, the glue was still wet when we flew it and the fins fell off like autumn leaves during the flight.
After what seemed like minutes of scanning an empty sky, we could finally identify a tiny dot against the blue; it was round and steady, and we knew we’d had a full ‘chute deployment.  The dot lingered in the sky, finally becoming perceptibly bigger, and after what seemed like a few more minutes, I could see a fully-intact rocket hanging under a perfectly symmetrical parachute canopy. I drew a final sigh of relief when it became apparent that the rocket would land inside the field.  As a matter of fact, it gently floated down not far from the launch pad.  Dick and I were ecstatic, and our dad said he was impressed!  With the confidence and experience from this perfect fight, we pursued countless more launches that summer and in subsequent years.
Maybe it sounds sappy, but I recall that my trips to the principal’s office ended abruptly with the beginning of my participation in the model rocketry hobby.  After that time, my interest in science skyrocketed (sorry, bad pun but I couldn’t resist).  Soon after I mastered the basics, I began to design my own rockets and had to contend with such realities as centers of pressure and gravity, coefficients of drag, and engine parameters such as newton-seconds and so on.  The Servo launcher was quickly replaced with a  reliable unit I built myself from our leftover basement-remodel mahogany supply.
Picture
Bill (L) and Dick (R), both seriously pants-challenged,  prep the Servo Launcher for a flight of Dick's Centuri Mach-10 rocket plane.  This model had truly spectacular flights which, as often as not, finished with equally spectacular crashes.
Instead of causing trouble in school, I focused on physics, chemistry, and electronics and eventually took a career path in all those directions.  In the 1980’s, and 1990’s, I put my knowledge to work helping the big rockets fly, working under contract on Martin Marietta’s Titan Rocket program and Thiokol’s Space Shuttle SRB’s.  

Going to work in those days was fun, as you can imagine.  In later years, I helped advance science and did my bit helping humanity through my laboratory and biomed work.
 
Some question the worth of the expense of space exploration programs.  For my life, their value is priceless.  Our rockets are small.  We cannot ride inside them, but by and large, I think they take us good places.

Check back often!  We have a lot of cool upcoming content!


NEW:


Oct 2022:  Atlantis 1/48 JS-III Stalin Tank Kit Review!
Sept 2022:  Atlantis 1/32 Tom Daniel Funny Cars Kit Review!
August 2022:  Atlantis 1/665 USS Wisconsin Kit Review!
August 2022:  Atlantis 1/618 D.K.M. Bismarck Kit Review!
​29 July 2022:  D&H Cyclops and Chariot From Lost in Space Kit Review!
16 July 2022:  Moebius Hal 9000 Review YouTube Video!
07 June 2022:  Atlantis 1/135 Convair 990 Airliner Kit Review!
01 June 2022:  Atlantis 1/24 Son of Troublemaker Kit Review!
​21 May 2022:  Atlantis 1/1200 US Combat Task Force Fleet Kit Review!
14 May 2022:  Atlantis 1000/1 The Amoeba Kit Review!
06 May 2022:  Atlantis Air-Land-Sea Gift Set!
26 April 2022:  Atlantis 1/139 Boeing 707-120 Kit Review!
25 April 2022:  Atlantis 1/77 F-89D Kit Review!
22 April 2022:  Atlantis 1/245 Monitor and Merrimac Civil War Set
15 January 2022:  Dream Gear 1/3000 Arkhitect Review!  Landmark new kit includes integrated lighting!
15 December 2021:  Atlantis 1/8 Forgotten Prisoner Review!
10 December 2021:  New Atlantis 1/96 Moon Ship Review
01 December 2021:  NEW Minicraft Kit Releases!
30 November 2021:  Atlantis 1/139 707 Kit Update
25 November 2021:  Atlantis 1/54 F11F-1 Cougar Kit Review
15 November 2021:  Convair 1/135 990 Test Shot from Atlantis!
September 2021:  NEW 1/25 Atlantis King Kong Kit Review
September 2021:  Minicraft 1/200 "Spruce Goose" Review and History
September 2021:  Minicraft 1/48 T-41 Review Update
September 2021:  Minicraft 1/144 F-51 Review
September 2021:  NEW Atlantis 1/32 1982 Camaro Review!
August 2021:  Minicraft 1/144 B-52 (Current Flying) Review
August 2021:  Minicraft 1/144 E-3/E-8 AWACS/J-STARS Review

July 2021:  New Atlantis 1/300 Nautilus Review updates our Nautilus history page!
July 2021:  Revell's Gemini Spacecraft Kits History
June 2021:  Minicraft 1/350 RMS Titanic Review
12 May 2021:  Titanic Models List!  One Movie.  Lots of Titanics.
29 April 2021:  Snoopy vs Red Baron live on YouTube!
15 March 2021:  Atlantis Snoopy and His Sopwith Camel Lands -- What Happens when they meet The Red Baron?
12 March 2021:  Atlantis 1/120 B-29 Review!  New Kit!  
08 March 2021:  Minicraft 1/144 B-24J / PB4Y-1 / B-24D Review!
10 February 2021:  Moebius 1/144 Discovery on YouTube!
07 February 2021:  Guest Gallery!  See our pals' models!
05 February 2021:  Moebius 1/144 Discovery XD-1 Review
Will the Utah Monolith stay vertical this time?
05 January 2021:  Hawk Beta-I Atomic Bomber Rebuild!
28 December:  Bill's Airliner Gallery! 
19 December:  Just in time for Christmas!  Atlantis Phantom of the Opera with Glow-in-the-dark Parts!
13 December:  Godzilla Returns Again!  Atlantis Godzilla with Glow-in-the-Dark Parts!
30 November:  Revell KC-135 and 707 Kit History!
23 November:  Minicraft 1/144 C-18A/707 Kit Review!
Another feature in our series about the KC-135/707!

12 November:  Atlantis Mr Gasser Review updated photos
09 November:  Dick's Lindberg XB-70 Restoration
09 November:  Monogram Air Power Set YouTube Video!
30 October:  Special Project:  Monogram's 1959 Air Power Set! (web page)
09 October:  A Review of Minicraft's KC-135 Kits continues our special series on the KC-135 (feature in-progress).
28 September:  Let's Play Battleship!  Atlantis 1/535 Iowa Class Kits review - and bonus comparison between Revell's USS Missouri and Atlantis Iowa Class Battleship kits!

20 September:  Kit History --  Revell 1/535 USS Missouri
07 September:  Ship It!  Academy 1/700 Titanic ICP Kit Review
22 August:  Revell's All-New PT-109 Elco PT Boat Kit Review
13 August:  KC-135 History Series Part II - AMT's 1/72 Kit:  It's In There
04 August:  Dueling Subchasers-- Atlantis S2F Hunter Killer Review
29 July:  Kit Review and History:  Atlantis Models P-3A Orion
26 July:  Book reviews:  The Vintage Years of Airfix Box Art by Roy Cross
A Weird-Oh World - The Art of Bill Campbell by Bill Campbell

24 July:  DEM BRUDDERS GO OFF THE DEEP END WITH THEIR  ATLANTIS PBY CATALINA KIT VIDEO REVIEW!
22 July:  Why Buy a PBY:  Atlantis PBY-5A Catalina Web Review!

09 July:  No shyin' away from the Cheyenne:  Atlantis AH-56 Cheyenne Kit Web Review
06 July:  Rank the Lanc:  Minicraft Lancaster MK-1 Kit Review
17 June:  88 Reasons:  Minicraft Ju-88A/C Kit Review
16 June:  We Dug the Jug:  Minicraft P-47D Kit Review
15 June:  DICK DOES CARS!  Dick's Car Gallery!
10 June: 
Minicraft RB-29 Review Updated!  Minicraft's Own Lewis Nace Builds an Amazing B-29 Conversion Collection!
05 June:  Minicraft 1/144 B-17 Kit Review!
03 June:  The Big Stick:  Atlantis' B-36 Kit Review!
30 May:  Minicraft A6M2 Zero Kit Review in 1/144
26 May:  Dem Brudders On Youtube!  Watch our Atlantis Ah-56 Cheyenne review. (We're a little disappointed with our new spokesman Roddy Redshirt.  When we find all his pieces, we might not use him again.)
22 May:  The Girl Next Door:  Minicraft 1/144 G4M1 "Betty" Kit Review
20 May:  Unmasking the Avenger:  Minicraft 1/144 TBF Avenger Kit Review
18 May:  B young!  B-29 again!  Minicraft RB-29 Superfortress "Postwar" Kit Review - We've expanded content on this page!
06 May:  KC-135/707 Kit History Series Begins!

27 April:  Enter the Mentor:  Minicraft T-34A Mentor kit Review. 
24 March:  See Dick.  See Dick build.  See  Dick's Large Aircraft Gallery.  Build, Dick, Build.
04 March:  Eat all your vegetables.  Open-Box New Kit Review:  Atlantis HH-3E "Jolly Green Giant"  
06 February:  Requiem for Mad Magazine: Aurora/Revell Alfred E. Neuman Kit History
12 December:  BEECH TRIP!!!  Minicraft's Civilian Aircraft Product Line

20 November:  More pictures added to Dick's Yo-Yo page:  B-24J Liberator "Yo-Yo" - Custom-Painting a 1/48 Diecast Model
20 November:  IPMS/SLC Group Build, Italy/Bulgaria Theme!
12 November:  We welcome Minicraft Models as our first sponsor!
​07 November:  We've again expanded our Report on the 2019 IPMS/USA Nationals in Chattanooga, TN!
15 October:  IPMS Boise Mad Dog Modelers Fall Show!

13 September 2019:  Aerial Photography for a Song:  The Estes AstroCam 110
28 August:  Kit Review - Atlantis 1/92 B-24J Liberator Bomber 
01 August:  We continue our Apollo at 50 celebrations by kicking off our new model rocketry page, and ask:
​Apollo at 50:  Was it Worth It?
20 JULY 2019:  HAPPY 50TH ANNIVERSARY, APOLLO 11 (We don't think you look a day over 40)!  Revell's Apollo Spacecraft Kits
25 June:  A New Blog Post:  Join us at the IPMS/USA Nationals!
19 June:  Build a Resin Figure Kit.  Dick shows step-by-step how he built Anime subject Mew Zakuro
15 May:  Smokey and the Bandit:  MPC's 1977 Pontiac Trans Am
25 April: 
History of Armor Modeling with pals James Guld and John Tate
03 April:  Car Modeling in the 1970's expands our History Series
26 March:  Kit Review--1/350 Space Ark from When Worlds Colllide
17 March:  Weird-oh's, Finks, Flypoggers, and More!  We continue our History Series with our various encounters in the Monster Figures craze of the 1960s
10 March:  Our First Kit Review!  Tamiya 1/48 Army Staff Car - Are we too hard on a Tamiya kit?
​23 February:  The Nuclear Family:  SSN Nautilus 571 - About the Lindberg, Revell, and Aurora Kits
15 February:  DON'T TRY THIS AT HOME I - Dick Builds a Batmobile--in 1/3 Scale!
13 February:  Modeling Outside the Box.  Dick goes all over the place, building a number of unusual subjects!
04 February:  NASCAR or Not?  Monogram's Days of Thunder Cars
31 January:  History Series Begins With The Aurora Monsters
27 January:  Build a P-82 in 1/144 Scale or Other Crazy Conversion
13 January:  The Anti-Modelers
05 January 2019:  The Day I Quit Modeling
01 January 2019:  dembrudders.com is live!!!

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    • Resin Figure Mew Zakuro
    • Yo Yo 1/48 B-24J Custom Paint and Decals
  • History
    • Monogram Air Power Set (1959)
    • Revell 1/144 DC-10 / KC-10 Kit History
    • History of Titanic Model Kits: The Big List
    • Revell Gemini Kit History - 1/48 and 1/24
    • AURORA MONSTER MODELS
    • Atlantis / Revell 707 and KC-135
    • Revell's 1/535 USS Missouri: An Iowa Class Act
    • Monogram Days of Thunder NASCAR Kits
    • Atlantis USS Nautilus SSN-571 Model Kit Review and History
    • Weird-ohs, Roth Finks, Flypoggers and Lindy Loonies
    • Car Modeling in the 1970's
    • Armor Modeling
    • Smokey and the Bandit
    • Revell Apollo 11 Spacecraft
    • Minicraft Civil Aircraft in 1/48
    • Aurora's Alfred E Neuman
    • KC-135 and 707 Part One: The 1/72 Kits
    • KC-135 Part Two: The History and The Build
  • Reviews
    • AIRCRAFT KIT REVIEWS >
      • Atlantis Models 1/175 B-52 With X-15 Kit Review
      • Atlantis 1/93 B-58 Hustler Model Kit Review
      • Atlantis 1/400 Boeing 2707 SST Kit Review
      • Atlantis 1/70 F-100C Kit Review
      • Atlantis 1/135 Convair 990 Review!
      • Atlantis 1/139 Boeing 707-120 Kit Review
      • Atlantis 1/77 F-89D Kit Review
      • Atlantis 1/54 F11F-1 "Blue Angels" Kit Review
      • Atlantis 1/120 B-29 Kit Review
      • Atlantis PBY-5A Catalina
      • Atlantis P-3A Kit Review and History
      • Atlantis AH-56 Cheyenne Helicopter
      • Atlantis B-36 Kit Review
      • Atlantis HH-3E "Jolly Green Giant" Review
      • Atlantis B24J Buffalo Bill 1/92
      • Atlantis S2F Hunter Killer
      • Minicraft RB-29 Kit Review
      • Minicraft 1/200 H-4 "Spruce Goose" Kit Review
      • Minicraft 1/48 Cessna T-41 Mescalero Kit Review
      • Minicraft 1/144 B-52D/F Review
      • Minicraft 1/144 B-52H "Current Flying Version" Kit Review
      • Minicraft T-34A Mentor Kit Review
      • Minicraft 1/144 KC-135 Review
      • Minicraft 1/144 F-51 Kit Review
      • Minicraft 1/144 E-3/E-8 AWACS/J-Stars Kit Review
      • Minicraft 1/144 B-24J / PB4Y-1 / B-24D
      • Minicraft C-18 (Boeing 707)
      • Minicraft 1/144 Lancaster MK 1 Review
      • Minicraft 1/144 B-17G Kit Review
      • Minicraft 1/144 A6M2 Zero Review
      • Minicraft 1/144 G4M Type 1 "Betty" Kit Review
      • Minicraft 1/144 Ju 88A/C
      • Minicraft 1/144 P-47D Review
      • Minicraft 1/144 TBF Avenger Review
    • Atlantis 1/8 Creature Model Kit Review
    • Atlantis 1/8 Wolfman Model Kit Review
    • Atlantis Models 1/8 Wyatt Earp Figure Kit Review
    • Atlantis 1/24 Mack Bulldog Stake Truck Kit Review
    • Atlantis 1/8 "The Mummy" Kit Review
    • Atlantis Rat Fink Model Kit
    • Atlantis Super Fuzz Kit Review
    • Atlantis 1/160 Lighthouse Model Kit Review
    • Atlantis Models 1/8 Flash Gordon and the Martian Model Kit Review
    • Atlantis 1/32 Jungle Jim 1974 Funny Car
    • Atlantis 1/500 USS North Carolina Kit Review
    • Atlantis 1/128 U.S. Space Missiles Set Kit Review
    • Atlantis 1/48 Japanese Medium Tank
    • Atlantis Snoopy and his Classic Race Car Kit Review
    • Atlantis Models Metaluna Mutant Kit Review
    • Atlantis 1/48 JS-III Stalin Tank Review
    • Atlantis 1/32 Tom Daniel Funny Cars: Mustang, Camaro, Duster, Charger!
    • Atlantis 1/665 USS Wisconsin Kit Review
    • Atlantis 1/618 Bismarck Battleship Kit Review
    • Atlantis 1/24 Son of Troublemaker Kit Review
    • Atlantis 1/1200 US Combat Task Force Fleet Kit Review
    • Atlantis The Amoeba review
    • Atlantis Air-Land-Sea Gift Set
    • Atlantis 1/245 Monitor & Merrimac Ironclads Diorama Set
    • Atlantis 1/96 Moon Ship Kit Review
    • Atlantis 1/8 Forgotten Prisoner of Castel Mare Kit Review
    • ATLANTIS 1/25 King Kong Kit Review
    • Atlantis 1/32 1982 Camaro Review
    • Atlantis Snoopy and His Sopwith Camel / Red Baron Reviews
    • Atlantis Glow-Godzilla Review
    • Atlantis Phantom of the Opera Kit Review
    • Atlantis 1/535 USS Iowa and Wisconsin Battleship Kit Review
    • Atlantis Mr. Gasser Review
    • Minicraft 1/350 Titanic Kit Review
    • Moebius 1/1 Hal 9000 Kit Review
    • Moebius 1/144 Discovery XD-1
    • Dream Gear 1/3000 Arkhitect Kit Review
    • D&H 1/35 Cyclops and the Chariot from Lost in Space kit Review
    • Academy Titanic 1/700 MCP Review
    • Revell ALL NEW PT-109 Review
    • Tamiya 1/48 Ford Army Staff Car
    • Pegasus Space Ark - When Worlds Collide
    • A Weird-Oh World - The Art of Bill Campbell
    • The Vintage Years of Airfix Box Art
  • Contests
    • 2021 IPMS-USA Nationals Report
    • 2019 IPMS/USA Nationals Report
    • Boise Mad Dog Modelers Fall Show
    • IPMS-SLC Group Build
  • Rocketry
    • Starting Rocketry
    • History and Use of the Estes AstroCam 110
  • Gallery
    • Bill's Airliner Models Gallery
    • Dick's Large 1/72 Aircraft Models
    • Dick's scale Model car gallery
    • Guest Gallery
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