PMM Vendor Spotlight with updates from KITMASX and SQUADRON: Episode 126

Welcome to Plastic Model Mojo, a podcast dedicated to scale modeling, as well as the news and events around the hobby. Let's join Mike and Kentucky Dave as they strive to be informative, entertaining and help you keep your modeling mojo alive.

All right, Kentucky Dave, you ready for 126?

I am indeed ready for 126. I've been ready for 126 for a while.

Well, that's good, I have too.

Yes, I know.

More on that in a minute, but welcome all our listeners out there to episode 126. We look forward to this one. Finally, it's a little late, but thanks for bearing with us. Dave, what's up in your model sphere Well?

my model sphere could not be better. It is fall. In the last three weeks I've attended two model shows, gotten inspired. I've seen some really fantastic models, and I don't know about you, but I always get motivated and inspired. In addition, got to see a lot of modeling friends, some of whom have kicked my butt about not getting things done on a pace that I should. So that's nice to get a little kick in the butt pants when you need it. And I've acquired a few things here and there that we'll talk about later. So I'm motivated, I'm jazzed, I want to get things done and I see a clear path before me. So my model sphere is great. How about yours? I'm just trying to catch a break, man, I know, man, you really have had it.

Last time it was no power and this time it was no internet. Yeah, and then we've been traveling a little bit.

Why was the no internet? Explain to the listeners what happened.

Well, apparently we had a latent failure due to the wind and rain from the prior week, so I don't exactly know.

So you spent four days without internet. I did, and you devolved back into a caveman.

Well, I still had a little bit on my phone, but I couldn't do. Nobody could do anything productive.

Gotcha.

Like schoolwork and real work and podcast editing and recording and all that kind of stuff. So, yeah, we have a fresh new fiber line into the house, so hopefully we're good until the next inclement weather situation.

Sounds good.

How's your model sphere? Now that I've got one again, it's pretty good. I'm motivated too, because we just got back from Chicagoland and the MMSI show That'll probably come up a time or two in this episode. It will for sure. We're going to push the bulk of that off till 127 yeah we record a little content there.

We're gonna pick up a little more mmsi related stuff, hopefully sometime after the weekend. I think we'll try to get that worked out and put that together. But you know, I've been getting kicked in the pants too by somebody at your bequest.

Well, we both need the motivation. You actually kind of requested the pants kicking.

I did, I did. I needed some accountability.

Well, that's what this podcast is partly supposed to do. So, listeners, if you want to push Mike and I along, send in emails, dms, letting us know we should get some stuff off of our tables.

Other than that man, I think my motivation's found. I've dabbled a little bit on one of my projects that's been sitting stagnant now for several weeks, so we'll talk about that later and just get on down the road with it.

Sounds great. So, Mike, of course, if we're recording an episode, you gotta have a modeling fluid in hand. What's your modeling fluid?

It is Three Floyds Gumball Head Purchased on location at Three Floyds Brewery in Munster, Indiana.

Yes, you and I got to visit the holy land, Munster, Indiana.

Well, we didn't have time for a tour or anything, if they even offer that but we stopped in there for a few minutes and picked up some wares and some beer. It's a good time, man. That's what I'm drinking.

Yeah, it was a great time. Listen, mike and I love Three Floyds. If you are in the Munster, indiana area, the Chicagoland area, go by their brewery and support them. It's great stuff. What are you drinking, man? Well, I am drinking Westside Brewing Hefeweizen Weed Ale out of Cincinnati, ohio. So hang on, there we go, westside's Good Brewery. Have not had this particular beer before, so we'll see how it does.

Well, let's hit the listener mail now that you're going to settle into that. You got it. We got some good stuff here, man, all right. First Dave is Will Woods, again from Yorkton, saskatchewan, and there now exists a Yorkton scale modelers club.

That is fantastic news.

He had written in a couple of weeks ago, maybe a month ago, not real sure now at this point about starting the club, because there wasn't one.

Right.

We encouraged him to do that. They had their first meeting Wednesday, October 2nd 2024. A great success with five people, including himself, ranging from teens to seniors, so that's already a good thing. Representation from armor, aircraft, cars and Gundam. The next meeting is set for November 6th to 2024. And he wants to give out a big shout out to Joe at Sky's the Limit Fireworks and Toys for allowing us to use a room in his shop. It'll work out for him in the end.

Yeah, yes, it will. But that's fantastic. That's how you start a club. You determine that there's not one and you want one. You go out and you find the modelers. If you've got a local hobby shop, they're almost always willing to be of assistance. And then, once you've got that first meeting with five, you're on your way and in the blink of an eye you'll turn around and it'll be 10 or 12 or 15. I'm happy because, again, model clubs and contests are a great way to get a social aspect to what is, in essence, a very solitary hobby.

Well, paul Buzzett could listen to us commenting on magnification. We've been talking about these reading glasses a lot, yep, and he sent in a link to his Scale model workshop website about magnification and all that and it's a pretty good. It's a pretty good write up with some interesting graphics and he thinks it's important when discussing reading glasses, power of magnification versus the actual X power, magnification of loops and something like an optivisor, because they're not the same Right and they're not nearly as powerful even though they're written as 2X, 3x, whatever, one and a half. I'm going to put this in the show notes and I encourage folks interested in magnification to check it out.

I was going to ask you to do that because I'd be interested to look at it.

And it's good information. So thanks, Paul. Tim Cavalier, our friend out there in Moscow, Idaho, is writing in again and he says he missed his show last Saturday.

Well, we cannot be everywhere. Especially Idaho, yeah, especially Idaho. We're trying. I mean, I hope one day, when I hit the super lottery, I'm telling you I'll be at a model contest every weekend and my wife won't care.

Well, a couple of things. He listens on Spotify and he's really liking the chapter stamps, the timestamps that are showing up now, and he didn't know if that was us or Spotify. Well, it's us. We're doing some of that kind of stuff, and by us wait a minute, and by us we mean Mike.

Okay, I'll take that. I'll take that. I'll take that Timestamps there. There's a transcript there and the timestamps and yeah, we've started including that stuff in there and you're going to see more of that. It just makes listening easier and going back and finding stuff you want a whole lot easier. And another comment he's got about Bases, our Bases segment. Yeah, he thought it was really good. We'll appreciate that. And he says he's not sure about this hanging over the edge point. He's got a 1 to 144 scale ME 323 diorama, what's that?

The 323 is the thing that Barry Numerick builds when he doesn't build 109s. It's the giant, the gigant Right.

The giant powered glider the giant right.

Well, I can understand that, yeah, yeah, especially those wings get really thin at the end. So I can, I can definitely understand this hesitation. So just don't, just don't have tons of extra space when your model's on a base.

He says his jury is still out on books versus online slash digital content. But not having the constant adverts in his face is a plus for the book column. That's a good point.

Yes, that is true, depending on how you get your books. How you get your books, okay, some can be with advertisements, but if you buy off of Amazon, you get a digital Kindle copy. You don't have to worry about ads.

Voice of Bob Bob Bear from Charlotte writing in and I guess this is in response to your modeling fluid last time your high wire brewing.

Yep, the one out of Asheville.

Yeah, they got clobbered man. Yes, they did. They had a couple locations in the River Arch District and Biltmore Village that got really hit hard and it sounds like a lot, if not all their current manufacturing was lost.

They made good beer. I hope they get back real quick.

They've got a hurricane relief fund too. Maybe we'll put that in the show notes as well For the beer drinkers who want to help out a micro brew. Absolutely yeah. They got a tough road to hoe there, yeah.

All those people do.

Well, on that same thing, Rock Roszak writes in. He liked, of course he liked the discussion on books. Yeah, I'm sure he did I think we dropped his name in there and talked about their story a little bit.

Yeah, as I've said a number of times, there are some real advantages to reading material on tablets.

Well, and he talked about the attempt at digital and morphing back over to hard copy on the OTB interview that he was featured on. Well, rock was not untouched by the storm either. Yes, I saw that man. Uh, they've got a place about 35 miles away from blacksburg, virginia, where they live on lake clader, or clader lake, which the, the new river, flows into, yep, and their house was fine, didn't even lose power, but their dock and boat got got clobbered. Man.

Yeah, his boat ended up under his dock man. That's tough.

Well, good luck sorting all that out, Rock. Yes absolutely Well. Dave Will Woods snuck in a second listener mail. Okay, he wanted to talk about his experience at Zipty Zoom Toys Hobby Room in Regina, saskatchewan. Okay, he wanted to talk about his experience at Zipty Zoom Toys Hobby Room in Regina, saskatchewan. Okay, he went into this shop to pick up some styrene sheets and ended up picking up a 72nd scale KS61. Oh, the Tamiya kit, beautiful. Oh, the Aoshima kit.

Oh, the Aoshima kits are really. They're not old Aoshima, they are modern. Aoshima kits are really. They're not old Aoshima, they are modern Aoshima. And those kits, in fact, I have one of each variant that Aoshima does.

Well, he'd never heard of this company. He's wondering if you had and you can elaborate a little bit more any experience with these kits. They say it looks like a great kit with the ground crew figures, a couple of ladders and jacks and sawhorses for the wings, the ground crew figures, a couple of ladders and jacks and sawhorses for the wings, and he forgot that he'd gone in for styrene, which means he has to go back because he forgot to get any.

That's the sign of a good hobby shop. Aoshima is a longstanding or Aoshima is a longstanding Japanese model company. Back in the day, in the 60s and 70s, they did some really awful aircraft kits, but some-152, a N1, k2, george. Then they did the KI-61 series and everybody was shocked because again, they're completely different models. They are modern 90s standard models. As good as any 90s fine mold or Hasegawa kit and better, in fact, than most Hasegawa kits. So yeah, as long as you make sure that you're buying modern Aoshima, they're good kits and I can highly recommend all that they make.

They're doing a bunch of new Jerry Anderson, thunderbird stuff.

Yes, I believe Aoshima is the one that is doing a bunch of the Thunderbird stuff too. Yeah, aoshima has a very wide catalog and military aircraft are not really their focus.

Up next, Dave from Finland. Philae Jervainen has written in again, Okay, and he had a comment about our speaking of negative modeling and he says that got to thinking. Is it a real thing? I mean it's modeling and an opportunity to learn stuff Next time. You probably says that got to thinking. Is it a real thing? I mean it's modeling and an opportunity to learn stuff. Next time you probably know what not to do yeah, Maybe there's a better word for it. And he takes a picture of an older tester's instruction sheet and I'm going to read this verbatim and there's a before starting header on this. Patience is the key to obtaining neat and professional results. If you have a problem at any stage of assembly, give it a break and resume assembly at a later time. Now we talk about that a lot. That's called the walk away.

Yes, yep, absolutely, and that's what you want to do, and this is especially true with me. For airbrushing. There are some nights where I'm doing everything exactly the same as I always do it, and for some reason I'm not getting a good airbrushing result. And I'll fiddle with it and fiddle with it, but I have found over time the best thing to do is simply clean the airbrush and walk away, because there are some nights where it's just not happening, and you are better to do that than push a bad position and make things worse. Now, in regard to negative modeling, there is some negative modeling where you learn something, and he's right about that.

Let me read on here and we'll get to that, Okay, In bold letters. Remember colon, it's only plastic. Modeling is meant to be a pleasurable and relaxing experience, not a negative one. You also have to look at mistakes not as failures, but rather as learning experiences.

Well, and there are some mistakes that are learning experiences. And then there's mistakes where you do something stupid like drop the model. Okay, I'm not sure I learn much from having dropped a model or a part other than I need to be more careful. So maybe there is a lesson in that. But yeah, no, a lot of negative modeling you can come away with a lesson from and, yeah, you should do that when it, when it happens, you should learn that.

And then I went on to explain to him that it's just a tongue in cheek vernacular that we've come up with only to do with the timeline of getting a project from point a to b. I mean, if you've met, if you mess up, you're going the wrong direction on the timeline because you gotta, you gotta undo it. So that's negative modeling, not a negative experience. Well, in the grand scheme of things, it could be a little bit, but you'll usually get over it and get back to enjoying it. Yeah, another interesting we'll put in the show notes is from Michael Alusi, who we saw in Schaumburg.

We got to see Mr Alusi in Schaumburg and that was really really nice.

Well, he had sent in an email prior to that. He says here's another modeler and rail fan directed at me, and this was a Reuters article which I will put in the show notes from September 27th of this year and it involved the pastimes enjoyed by the likely next Prime Minister of Japan, shigeru Ishiba, and it involves his interest in scale modeling and railfanning and ramen. So I've got to put that one in the save pile, so I put that in the show notes. So the show notes are going to have some interesting links in them this time, folks, so be sure to check it out. Finally, from the email side of things, dave, mr Lee Edmonds and he enjoyed our conversation about bases as well, and he shared a couple of his, and he builds a lot of really obscure and rare aircraft which aren't usually known to the casual viewer, so he makes his bases as a form of a museum placard.

Nice, I like that.

So in general they're a little oversized for the model because they have to be big enough to read the information Right, but I think in this kind of format it works.

Oh, I agree. No, absolutely I would agree. That's the exception that proves the rule.

So we were mostly talking about more scenic bases, right when the model can get lost, but this has got a big block of information in the model and they look real nice, so thanks for that different spin on it there. Yep, well, dave, what's going on with the Facebook direct messages?

Well, we've got a few of them that I want to bring to everybody's attention and comment on. Our friend out in Seattle, Mark Doremus, reached out to let us know that the date for the Seattle Spring Model Mania has been set April 27, 2025, and he expects both of us to be out there for that. We'll feature that show when it gets closer to the time for that show. But Mr Doremus is doing well, which I'm happy to hear, and he's looking forward to the show, so I'm sure it's going to be a good one. Our friend, Warren Dickinson, who I got to see at the Louisville show, but you didn't because you got hurricaned out. He was going back through our back catalog and he heard me talking about using denatured alcohol to wipe away excess Mr Surfacer, once it's dry, and so that led to a little bit of a discussion about what Mr Surfacer I use and what type of alcohol. And you want the glass-cleaning denatured alcohol, not the fuel type, because the fuel type has some sort of oily additive to it. But it was a nice little conversation and it was good to see him at the Louisville show.

Charles Rice sent a DM where he wanted to bring a YouTube video to my attention. It was on the Japanese pre-war and World War II bomber, the Ki-30. And I really now I happen to follow that YouTube channel already, but obviously Charles didn't know that. I really appreciate the listeners, know that, I really appreciate the listeners. If you think there's something that you come across that Mike or I will be interested in, please send it to us. Again, one of the benefits that I never saw coming from this was that we're building a community and a big part of the benefit of that, at least for me, is all these modelers out there who know what I'm interested in and know the types of things that interest me, and they come across stuff and and send it to me and go oh hey, did you see this? It's it's like having a team of researchers out there crawling the internet. It kind of multiplies my ability to see stuff. So I really appreciate that. Charles, thank you for doing that. And if anybody else comes across stuff and you think Mike or I would be interested, please send it to us. Please send it to us. Next, Bob Baer also did a DM because he was down at the Mighty Eight Air Force Museum in Savannah, Georgia, and our friend Mark Copeland hooked him up with the curator of the museum and so Bob got some special tour of the exhibits in the museum and Bob sent me a picture of himself sitting in the B-17 in the museum in the cockpit with the curator. So that was really neat and I sent Mr Copeland a thank you for arranging that for Bob. Bob does a lot for us and it's nice to see some benefit come back to him.

While I was at the Louisville show there was a vendor who was blowing out books and magazines and they had magazines for a dollar a piece and I'll talk about this on Breaking my Wallet piece and I'll talk about this on Breaking my Wallet.

But I picked up a couple of air enthusiast magazines because, A I love them but B our friend John Vitkus likes them and I didn't know if John would have these he's only missing a couple of volumes and so it turned out he had them.

But I picked them up because they were a dollar each and it led to an interesting discussion of some of the articles that you'd find in Air Enthusiast and ended up John pointing me to information that I didn't know about the Lithuanian Air Force pre-World War II, and it was just a great conversation pre-World War II and it was just a great conversation. Again, one of those things where I just picked these up, said, hey, do you have these? And he said yes, and one thing that led to another and we're then discussing different articles in the different issues. It was really nice. And finally, speaking of listeners pointing out things that they think we might be interested in, Stephen Lee to bring to your attention that a company had apparently announced or released a 72nd scale Reba Botan, the little Hungarian truck and he sent a link to the announcement and all of that. And you said that you knew, because there actually have been a couple of kits in 77.

There have been two or three released prior in 72nd scale.

Okay, but there's never been one in 35th. Nope, okay, okay, okay, but it was very nice of Stephen to come across that, to think of you and to send it to bring it to your attention. Is that all you got? That's it. When you're done listening to this episode, please rate us on whatever podcast app you listen on. If you know of a modeling friend who is not listening to Plastic Model Mojo, please recommend us to them. It's the best way for us to get new listeners. If they need a little help downloading a podcast app and subscribing to the podcast, please help them out with that. We appreciate you doing it.

And when you're done with that, please check out all the other podcasts out in the model sphere, and you can do that by going to wwwmodelpodcastcom. That's modelpodcastpluralcom. It's a consortium website set up with the help of Stuart Clark from the Scale Model Podcast up in Canada, and if you go to that website you can find the aggregation of all the banner links to other podcasts who are participating in the spirit of cross-promotion with us. Now we've got a lot of other friends out in the model sphere, not just podcasts. We got some bloggers and YouTube friends out there as well Stephen Lee, who we just mentioned, spreepi with Fretz. You can check out his blog. Chris Wallace great blog, great YouTube channel. Yes. And we got Evan McCallum Panzermeister36. You're going to want to check out his Ukrainian Bradley video Unbelievable video.

Unbelievable video, Really really fantastic.

Paul Budzik Scale Model Workshop. Now you're going to want to go to Patreon to find this one to get the latest and greatest content, and we encourage you to check that out and subscribe there. Always great stuff from Paul and Jim Bates Scale Canadian TV. He must be living large. He didn't have time to make videos anymore.

Well, actually I talked to him today on the way home from work and he said that he was doing a video in the next day or two.

I think you said some version of that last time.

Yeah, I know, and I gave him crap about that. Please, if you're not a member of your national IPMS organization IPMS USA, ipms Canada, ipms Mexico or wherever you happen to live please join your national IPMS organization. It's a bunch of guys and gals who are volunteering part of their modeling time to try and make your modeling experience better. Time to try and make your modeling experience better. Additionally, if you are an armor modeler or post-1900 figure modeler, consider joining the Armor Modeling and Preservation Society, amps. A-m-p-s. Great group of guys. We had a great time at their national. Mike and I are already making plans to go to their national next year. Please join.

Well, Dave, let's have a word from our sponsor. You got it.

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Well, listeners, and you too, Dave, our special segment tonight is going to feature some of our favorite vendors. We've been getting some feedback about these folks and it's all been pretty much positive, so we want to reach out again and touch base with them and see what's been going on. And first up is Kevin Hedrick from Kitmas out in Canada. Yep, dave, in our effort to keep promoting some of our favorite vendors, we put together this episode and chosen to have a couple of them back to give us an update. And the first one is going to be Kevin Hedrick from Kitmas, out on the western coast of Canada. Kevin, how you been.

I've been excellent and I have to say thank you very much for having me back. I'm been excellent and I have to say thank you very much for having me back.

I'm quite honored. Well, we've been following your business through both customer feedback and just checking in on your website every now and then, and I think that's the first place I'd like to start. Since we talked to you last time, your website has kind of exploded a little bit.

We've added a few new products. Yeah, One or two of exploded a little bit.

We've added a few new products. Yeah, one or two. Remind me who's your website developer, who's the genius behind the?

genius behind the website is actually my wife. We needed to get that in. Yeah, her name's Janelle, so her picture is on a bunch of our stuff along with mine, and she takes care of literally everything except making the masks.

Well, at a high level. Let's talk about that. What's been going on with kit masks that have led to this swelling of your website?

We well, when we started, I kind of had the idea to do custom masks for people that had the kit. There were no masks available, so we started the made-to-order thing and that just absolutely exploded. Right now we have stuff from people sitting in the queue and on the shelf that I'm not going to be able to get to until I think we're booked out into April next year. Wow.

Now I assume a lot of these are older kits. A lot are older. Yeah, just simply because the folks who are making kit masks usually focus on the latest release. Focus on the latest release. And so there's a lot of orphan kits the last 50, 60 years that not only don't have a mask, but probably never would if it weren't for you.

Yeah, I've done a few really oddball stuff that surprisingly people still want and still need. We have a few old kits that we sell on a regular basis.

What's been?

the one that surprised you the most. You know what? The Italeri DO217 has been a solid seller ever since I brought it out. We probably sell one, two a week.

Next time I place an order with you all. I've got to order that because, yeah, I can see why that's still a kit that is out there. That is probably the kit you want to build if you're doing one, but yet it's old enough that a lot of kit mass manufacturers. They'll never get to it of kit mask manufacturers.

They'll never get to it Unless it releases it as one of their classic or upgraded ones. Nobody probably will.

Well, I'm also seeing on your website some insignia sets.

now I've been trying to work on those as much as I can. I'm so busy I just don't have time to really learn anything or do anything else other than the masks. So as we get some decal sheets that come in and that people want markings made, I try to do the main markings and then create a separate set of insignias and then we just throw them up on the site when we can, which sounds like you need an intern.

I need something. Well, don't let it kill you. Go out there and get that intern if you need them.

Yeah, I've gone down to four days a week at work, so that's helped a little bit. Oh wow, but I'm not quite. Don't have enough self-control to start at eight and work the full day through on my day off. Start at 8 and work the full day through on my day off. Who does Right?

Yep, especially in the summer, when it's super nice and you've got a bike in the garage that's beckoning your name Well, and now we're coming on to fall and winter, so it's going to hit there in Canada pretty soon. You're going to be snowed in for three, four months. I expect to see a lot of production out of you.

I'm hoping to get a lot of production. I have a guy that sent me his box of 80. I want it done right away. Oh wow, because I'm really really behind on it. I feel bad. We've been in contact with him constantly. He's a really good guy.

It's one thing to let things languish, even unintentionally, because you're busy, but to keep that customer contact going during those situations, I think that seals the deal. I think it just people don't lose faith in you if you keep the, if you keep the communication rolling yeah, man about, like most of us.

You know this guy's not good. Cliff is his name. He's not going to get to all 80 kits within the next two months. I mean if he does.

Yeah, we know some fast people, but I don't think we know anybody quite so fast.

Yeah. So I mean just be honest with them and just say, hey look, I'm busy, I'm still on them. I do the best I can Tell me which one you want next.

Let him prioritize.

Yeah, I started off right at number one. His organization skills were crazy because he's got a full list. I started at number one and then he had a request, so I jumped the queue and did that one, and then you know whatever he wants.

Well, that's one thing. I will tell you that, mike and I, one of the reasons we wanted to connect with you again is just like with Dr Miller. I cannot tell you how often we have had listeners DM us, email us, whatever, and communicate to us that either they dealt with you through the website or they ran into you at a show or whatever, and full of praise for the fact that you were very customer service oriented, that you were focused on the modeler, that you went the extra mile to get them whatever they needed. And there are a lot of modeling businesses out there but, to be honest with you, customer service is not all of them, it is not their strong point. But one of the reasons we wanted to touch base with you again was because of the fact that you really do seem to have focused on your customers and getting them what they need.

Yeah, we work really hard on that. If somebody has a complaint, we get the odd one here and there. We'll address it. We'll either refund their money back or do something else for them. Everybody's been really excellent and it just makes it easier to go above and beyond for really what seems like modelers in general. Everybody's just so friendly, so nice, they're so accommodating and patient, and I'm not interested in treating anybody badly. I want them to have the best experience possible. I would like them to come back. Even if they don't come back and buy my masks, it doesn't matter. Customer service is sorely lacking in this world right now. We just need more of it.

Exactly, and that's one of the reasons that Mike and I wanted to touch base with you, because you're supplying that. I'm telling you. We hear quite often from folks who have run into you at shows or have interacted with you through the website Speaking of shows what ones have you done and what ones are you anticipating doing?

The last one we did was in Seattle earlier this year. Right, that was awesome. That was a bigger show than what we've usually been to, so that was really nice. We met a lot of people that we've talked to online. A bunch of the guys from Vancouver, british Columbia, came down. They were in Seattle, so we got to see them again. It was awesome. We do have a show coming up on Saturday in Vancouver. However, we won't be able to make it. I have my father's 80th birthday is tomorrow and my sister's coming up from Seattle.

Oh, well, that's way more important.

Yeah, we had to cancel.

Again priorities.

Yeah, as far as upcoming shows, I now know when Heritage Con puts their tables on sale, which is in November.

Are you?

coming.

I am going to try really hard. Both my wife and I want to come out there. I really, really, really want to be there. I love that museum. We've met a few people that work at the museum. They just treated us like gold when my dad and I were there and it just sounds like a really, really good time.

Let me tell you, Mike and I can heartily recommend you going to Heritage Con. We've done it twice now. It has been fantastic. The guys from Hamilton are great. They really go the extra mile to make you feel welcome and I think it's on Mike and I's list of shows that we have to be dead to miss.

Well, let's hope we don't miss it then.

Yeah, we're not going to miss it?

Well, let's talk a little technical here. What's it take to keep production going these days? How many you running one cutter? You running more than one.

Right now two cutters, a couple of computers. I do have plans in the next little while to get a laser. I think that's the next step up. The vinyl plotters they have a limit Right how small you can go and we've all seen one man armies. They're freaking phenomenal. I haven't seen them in person but I've seen results. I said they are amazing. Yeah, that's where I want to go next.

Yeah, That'd be interesting. We have a laser at work, but it's not one you would want to cut that kind of stuff on. But yeah, I'd be curious to see how that goes. Another thing I want to talk to you about you might want to let folks know about a little more is the last time we were on here you were talking about the old Falcon vacuform canopy sets, and now I've seen some of those popping up on your website.

Yeah, I've been trying to do those as much as I can. I have about 30 or so boxes of them. My friend that got me sort of into this whole thing just sent me another dozen, so his are going to get done before mine, but they they are in the queue somewhere after I get through most of these.

these made to order ones, but the the falcon ones, they're still in production, I believe yes, as, as far as I know, they are in production, I think in aust in Australia. Yeah, australia or New Zealand.

Right, yeah, so there's a good market to fill for those, because people hate masking and if you can make it easier for them, everybody appreciates it.

Especially with a vacuform canopy. Yeah, I mean, a mask is important for a regular canopy, but if you're doing a vacuform canopy, trying to mask it yourself is a nightmare.

Yeah, cutting through the plastic is not that hard.

Yeah, exactly Ask me how I know yeah.

Was there anything else you'd like the listening audience to know about kit masks, either present or future?

Like I said, we plan on getting a laser cutter, so we're going to delve into a little more fidelity. I guess a little more precise, and we do have. Between now and when I get through my made-to-order stash, we're probably having about almost 100 kits coming online in the next few months.

Wow, that's a lot. How many are in your catalog currently? It's a lot.

I think we just did. We're right around 170 in the 70-second scale and around 120 or so in 48 scale, 30 second scales a little lacking. So it sounds like you're.

You you're probably in the lower 300 range for total number of products yeah, yeah, we'll be up there soon.

That that's a lot, it is a lot If you're going to double your number of items or increase it by 50% in the next few months. That's flat amazing.

Yeah, I do as much as I can with the time that I have. I wish I could do more, because I don't like to keep people waiting. When somebody asks me for something, I really hate saying no.

You need to find one of these high school nerds who's good with computers. You need an intern. I'm here to tell you get yourself an intern.

Yeah, I just got to find a way to do this. Full time is what.

I need to do, there you go.

Yeah.

Well if that's what you want hope you find a path there in the next few years.

Yeah, yeah. I mean the dream is to travel around to all these shows and do stuff for people right on site.

That would be nice, that would be awesome.

That would be a very interesting thing to do. Yeah, that would be awesome. That would be a very interesting thing to do.

Yeah, it would be kind of neat Just back up to the vendor doors and pop open the tailgate and go to town.

Well, I'm telling you what the news that you are going to try and be at HeritageCon in 2025 warms my heart, because man, mike and I are going to be there and I cannot wait to meet you in person and hang out at a show as fantastic as Heritage Con is.

Yeah, what we'll all have to do is I'll crash Ian McCauley's house. There you go, there you go. We'll all stay there and just invite ourselves.

Ian crashes our house, usually on Sunday night.

Oh, there you go.

Yeah, it's only fair then. Oh, speaking of that, that's what I wanted to ask you. I know that you hooked up with the Hobby Center and you've got some of your product there, up with the hobby center and you've got some of your product there. Have you actually have you tried to market your product to any more retail locations?

we get that. We get asked that a fair bit, especially from from europe. Okay, they have like vat and all those you know, shipping customs. We haven't really focused on it. We're not sure how to enter that because we're so busy with what we're doing. I think we might have to expand a little bit more before we can make that viable. It's just we're new to this thing, so we really have no idea what we're doing.

You're learning as you go.

Literally learning as we go. Nothing wrong with that, no, and we make tons of mistakes along the way.

It's all right.

Well, the website's phenomenal. Your wife's done a really good job. She has your customer feedback on there is amazing. I mean I think I saw 160 or 161 feedbacks, almost all of them five stars.

Yeah, we had one two-star. I saw that too, but you took care of it, we took care of it. We tried our best to help them out and we did. But man, it just kills me to see that two-star review.

Well, we've got a one-star or a two-star, where the person left a favorable review just clicked the wrong star. Yeah, Okay yeah, that's even worse.

We had somebody do that too, and they managed to redo it, so that was awesome. It's kind of a relief.

Kevin, won't you tell us the website again and tell folks what exactly is you're doing and what your product is and where to find it?

All right, what exactly is your doing and what your product is and where to find it All right? Well, we are wwwkitmaskscom, that's K-I-T-M-A-S-Xcom. We do canopy masks for old stuff, new stuff, we do markings, insignias and, more importantly, we do made to order. So if you have something that you can't find canopy masks for, wear, your stop to get them done. That's fantastic.

All right. Well, Kevin, thanks a lot for coming back on. It's a pleasure to have you back and hopefully good to see you at HeritageCon.

Yeah, I'm really looking forward to it. It's been on our bucket list for the last couple of years and every time you guys talk about it it's just like oh man, I got to get there.

Well, kevin, let me tell you that if you manage to make it to Heritage Con, an invitation to the dojo is open to you If you bring your lovely better half her as well where you can spend time with modelers and good quality modeling fluid. Well, that sounds awesome After you talk to my wife, though you won't want to talk to me anymore. Well, that's true for all of us.

All right, Kevin, we hope we catch you around.

Yeah, for sure, hopefully to see you in Hamilton.

Yep.

You take care, all right, you too.

Kevin's busy Dave.

Yes, he is, and man, I'm telling you what you talk about somebody who's given customer service. He is responsive.

Well, he's making one of your favorite things in this hobby canopy masks, Canopy masks.

Well, we wish him to continued success and to keep his head above water, and hopefully we'll get to see him at HeritageCon. I hope that works out Well. Up next folks, we are going to get back with Brandon Lowe, the current owner of Squadron Mail Order. He's had a busy year too. He has, and get caught up with Brandon and let's get into that. Yes indeed. Well, dave, this next one's been kind of hard to pin down for the last couple weeks, but we got a very busy man here.

Mr brandon, low from squadron, how you doing, sir? I'm doing pretty good. How about you? Well, we've been busy. We just got back from chicago. Today we're up with the military miniature society of illinois show. It's kind of a really figure centric show. So it's kind of we used to go up there all the time, but this, this, we hadn't met up there in like 25, 26 years. So we know some of those guys and it was just a fun time. It was real quick weekend. We tried to compress it down as much as we can not to be gone too long, but we saw the entire thing. But we've been busy too. But you've been busier than us, man. You just moved your whole operation, that's right.

Yeah, we are on the tail end of hopefully being able to put a pin in it and call it done, but it took a lot longer than we had anticipated.

I can imagine.

So what's that mean? I mean you got everything moved up to North Georgia, there near Chattanooga, I assume yeah.

So back, oh man. I don't remember exactly when, but back at the beginning of the summer. Of course we knew before then that we were wanting to move, but it must have been sometime in June, I think it was. But we found a place finally that we wanted. And unfortunately, where we knew we were going to be long-term, the building was not finished yet and, honestly, at that point it had not even been started. But to be able to do it how we wanted and where we wanted, we kind of needed to lock in a lease with this landlord, because he's got this.

We're right off of I-75. We're the last exit in Georgia. I know it well. Yeah, if you're coming from Tennessee, we're the first exit in Georgia and there's a big Costco there. There used to be a big cabela's there, not cabela's well, yeah, it was cabela's, because bass pro shops is right up the street from there. But all these things are there and right behind that is where we are and it's a I describe it as an industrial complex, I guess and there's all these big warehouses, just one after 10 000 square feet a piece, and they just build them in there like gingerbread houses, just one after the other, after the other and it's a very popular area for business. There's a lot of car auto body shops, there's construction businesses, there's a big rig place, I think. They're open all the time and they're working on big rigs and there's just all sorts of different kinds of businesses in there and the guy that owns the place he's done very well for himself and he has no problem renting these things out. So when we first met him and went there to look at this place Of course we had looked at all sorts of other places too in the area, but when we found this place we really liked it and we went to see it and the place was I don't know, it was 10,000 square feet.

I mean, it was a big place and we're like, yeah, this will work. Well, we always try not to just give an answer right immediately, you know, just give it a 24-hour test. You know that's kind of always what we try to do, just to make sure. Because when we get back in the car, you know Russ was with me, my dad, as I refer to him, if you hear me call him dad. That's why. But you know, we always like to get together by ourselves and talk and of course now my brother is a big part of the business as well, so the three of us always want to get together by ourselves and talk about it.

Well, so we told the guy. We said we'll let you know something in the morning. Well, we called him back in the morning to tell him that'll work, we'll take it. And he said sorry, I've already rented it out. We're like what are you talking about?

This happened twice with the same guy in the same complex and we're like my gosh, this guy, like he's got people lined up ready to rent his stuff and he must be printing money. Well, I mean, it's a really good location. It really is. And the buildings are. They are nice. I mean there's nothing to it. It's a big metal building, but the facility is nice. You know everything's paved, it's clean, it's new construction, there's nothing wrong, it's. It's everything you would want for. You know, if you're looking for a big metal building, and so we're like well, good grief. So we told him. We said look, we'll just take whatever the next one that becomes available or that you finish building. He was still building, we'll take it. And we said done, deal, don't ask, it's ours, we'll take it.

So, like I don't know, a week later, the next building that was going to be completed was supposed to go to some, I don't know a bread company or something, I don't know what kind of food, but they were some distribution company. Well, for whatever reason, their move or their expansion or whatever it was, got delayed. So they were going to be a few months before they were ready. So the guy called and said hey, you said you wanted the next one, it's ready. We said we'll take it. Didn't even really know what it was. We just said we'll take it. Well, it was 10,000 square feet and we said, well, that's not going to be quite enough. So around the corner he had these 10,000 square feet buildings, some of them he splits into 5,000s, or some of them he splits into four 2,500 spaces. So we ended up getting one of his 2,500 square foot spaces right around the corner from this new place just kind of to use as overflow.

How does that compare to what you had up in where you were?

In Blue Ridge, the big store with the giant out front. That store was 5,000 square feet.

Okay, and then how much other warehouse space did you have up there?

That was it. Now we had hooked on to the back. When we bought that property, all that was there was a double wide. It was a bank. You know how banks build out of double wides, yeah. So however many square feet, a double wide is some 2,500, somewhere in that ballpark, 2,000 maybe, I don't know. So we had that and that's where the bathrooms were and the kitchen area, and I think there was three or four offices. So that's what we used as our offices and whatnot. And then we built the 5,000 square foot store and basically hooked it to the front of it. So all in we had 7,000 or 7,500, whatever it was. So you're almost doubling your space, more than double. So that's the largest we had ever had prior to now.

Because when we moved, when we sold Free Time Hobbies and then ended up buying well, dad bought MMD and then I bought Squadron we combined that back together, so to speak, and we were working out of like 1500 square feet. A few months later we moved across the street into about 2500 square feet and in that little shopping strip over the next six months to a year we increased it literally every month until the landlord was out of space. I think we maxed out at somewhere around 8,000 square feet, eight or nine, I forget exactly. It was kind of weird because it was a shared space space. So on days if we had a big shipment come in, you know, we would cheat our space a little bit. As long as we had everything moved into our space, at the end of the day we were fine. But but I mean, we were just way out of room.

So. But when we moved over to Ringgold we had the 2,500 square feet and around the corner we had 10,000 square feet and we moved everything over there. And this was all based on the fact that they were building us another 20,000 square feet, literally right outside the front door. So we knew that at some point we were going to have plenty of space, but we had to take it when we could get it before we've rented it out to somebody else. And that way we kind of looked at it as a stepping stone, so to speak. Okay, we're going to be there that way. When that 20,000 feet gets done, we, the day that he says it's ready, we just start, you know, wheeling stuff across the parking lot, exactly.

So how quickly is the 20,000 square feet supposed to be done and you make the move into the big consolidated space.

Oh, it's done, we're in there now. Oh okay, that has been what we have been doing over the last month. Gotcha, I don't know if we've been there quite a month yet, but it's close.

So have you managed to fill 20,000 square feet.

Oh well, you know me.

We'll give you a list of brands to add. You've already added a few of them.

Every time I go on the app, there's new brands, so it's not like you're not expanding to fill the space.

Well, it's funny you mention that, because this past Wednesday night on my show that kind of came up as a topic and people were asking you know what brands are you going to add there? So you're going to add that. And my halfway serious but halfway joking response was well, I want everything.

Right.

You know, and to some degree that is true, but I think I made the comment that there's only so much time, space and money, but most of those I can't get any more time, but hopefully I can get more space in this complex.

And that'll bring more money.

Yeah, exactly, and in this complex we're in now, we can basically add space as we need, as it becomes available. For a very, very short window we were working out of, I guess it would have been 32 and a half thousand square feet, made up of four different buildings that were all within a. You know, you can throw a rock and heat each one of them, you know, yeah, but our goal is to reduce it down, hopefully, to the 20,000 feet and let the others go, because, I mean, space costs money, right? So, and the it's as cool as it is to have, you know, 100,000 square feet of model kits, I mean, the idea at the end of the day isn't to collect them, it's to get them in and turn them around and sell them to you guys.

Speaking of which I was going to say now you talked about when we interviewed you previously, about being in Blue Ridge and how you all were overwhelming the post office. Oh yeah overwhelming the post office. I assume that I mean I've noticed from ordering your shipments from your new location are very, very quick. I'm assuming, being in a more urban location with more direct connection with shipping, that that solves of your, your shipping woes it.

It does and and has been a lot better so far. It's still a work in progress because, as as large of an area that we're in, we're still kind of a unicorn, so to speak. Speak, because the massive amount of packages, you know, the day before we got there they didn't have that and then all of a sudden the next day, here we come and you know I'm on the phone with them saying, hey, I need you to come pick up you know however many hundred packages every day. They're like, wow, you know. So there, it's a work in progress.

But the cool thing is, if you've ever dealt with the post office in a large capacity or anybody listening to this knows about. The post office has larger capacity, that kind of I don't know if bypasses is the right word but goes a step above your local post office and they, you know you get to sign a contract with them and you kind of become a big deal, so to speak. But what that does is that gets you, you know, one step above, but you have to. We never really had that option in LHA. It's going to send a semi-truck by, or whatever size truck it is, to come by and pick us up. There's so many more options now, being in a big town. Now, granted, they probably have their own post office inside their facility, but my point is, in this area, there's a lot of e-commerce that takes place. So, as we've been here, we've been getting to know all the people and all the places of business to work with.

Here's an example DHL. I thought they were long gone. Well, as soon as we moved here here they come knocking on the door asking for our business. I'm like, wow, you know, you didn't get that in LHA, so it's it's. It's really good for us and that's why we moved here. I mean, honestly, it was LAJ and Blue Ridge. That was great, awesome town, love it. A lot of people retire there. It's a great town to go retire and it was fine for us with free time hobbies.

But now, with this being so much larger, we needed the large town services, if you will well, speaking of your, your app, which I love, but okay, whoo, uh, that's a dangerous thing to just sit there and start scrolling on. Um, I love it. Very easy to use, very user intuitive, all. Is it set in stone or do you all have any plans? For future add-ons, developments, improvements, etc.

Well, yes, so this one, this is a big one. So when we started the app, we were in Elegy and we actually started the app before we even knew we were going to be moving. Now, don't get me wrong the summer of two or the fall of 2021, I knew in the back of my mind that at some point, sooner or later, we were going to have to move, because, you know, just seeing the records, knowing what squadron used to sell, you know we, we got everything. I was like, wow, we can't do that, we can't do half that, we can't do a third of that in, you know, in Elegy. So I knew that it was going to come sooner or later, but anyway. So we started doing this app, but at the time moving was not on the table yet. We get the app launched and all of a sudden we're in the middle of moving. So it's there and I'm glad to hear that you like using it, because there is a I don't want to use the word flaw, but there's a big problem with the app that I don't like that we are trying to work out right now and the problem it's probably not as big of a deal for you and I'm glad to hear that you like it as big of a deal for you and I'm glad to hear that you like it.

But the problem is the way that the search on the app works and the way that the categories are populated on the app are different than how they work on our website. Gotcha, we spend a lot more time working on our website than we do the app, which is not a good thing. I need to work on both Right. But what we are working on, that we fingers crossed hope to roll out by the end of the year.

Really, I hope it gets done in time for the Christmas season rush. But we've got a way that we are going to link our app searching and categories to exactly the same way it works on the website, so that when we make changes on the website it reflects in the app and why that's important. If you go on our website and you go to the aircraft section, for example, all those filters on the left, they've been out of date for a long time but just in the past couple of weeks we've started going through and we're going to try to get those sorted out. And when I say outdated and really I just mean a lot of errors, like when you click on aircraft models, you might see a ship or you might see a tank.

Yeah, we're trying to work if you click on, been miscategorized Exactly Data deteriorates Exactly, and that's you know we've been with.

you know we started Free Time Hobbies in 2006. The company that we bought that really got the ball rolling. Trident Hobbies it started in like 2001 or 2. And then, of course, squadron 1968. I think their website started in 95 or two. And then, of course, squadron 1968, I think their website started in 95 or 96. So you get 20 to 30 years worth of building a website.

Everything comes to an end in 2021. And over the past two years we've been trying to recreate it and get it back to good. So we're just throwing all this information and all this product into this new website and things just got miscategorized, things got missed and you know, throw this big move in there. There's, there's a lot of stuff that we really, really hope to sort out soon and make the whole shopping experience better on the website and on the app. And with the app doing the push notifications. You know, if I want to run a little sale, it'll pop up on your phone and say, hey, open the app and save 10% a day, or whatever it is. I have all that capability. You're killing me, man. He's coming for you.

He's not utilized it yet. Yeah, he's coming for you. Oh man, you're killing you. Yeah, he's coming for. Oh man, you're killing me, yeah.

Well, it's, it's. It's amazing. You've well, all the school, all the aspects of squadron you've reconstituted in the short period of time you've been doing it, and this move and the app, and all that, and as if that wasn't enough, you got a new book trying to come out.

Yeah, Trying is. The is the key word there now I by the title it.

I assume you're kind of reconstituting the line of books. I'm assuming this one's new, but I'll let you go from there. But this line existed in the old squadron before this title series, so so you take it from there, man.

Yeah the Planes, Names and Dames series. The Squadron Signal Publications is most known for the inaction series of books. Right, I mean, I would be very willing to bet you a Coca-Cola that there's not a modeler that hasn't owned at least one inaction book at some point in his life.

Oh, if it were only one.

I probably got 20.

They're everywhere. I mean they over the years they did, I think. There's seven or eight hundred books, 800 books, in the entire Squadron Signal line and the large majority of them are inaction. They're so affordable. Yeah Well, especially now you can go to a model show and there's always at least one vendor that's got a box of old inaction books for five bucks a piece.

Mike and I were both just at MMSI. I can testify that that is indeed the truth.

It is, and that's a great thing for me, because to kind of incorporate both topics of the night so far into one the new store or the new warehouse we are doing a retail store, we're incorporating a retail store into the front of the warehouse.

It's not going to be huge Road trip, mike Road trip.

It's going to be about 2,500 square feet, which, if you remember, the Blue Ridge store that I said was 5,000 square feet. Only half of that store was actually model kits. The other half of it was puzzles and games and kites and die-cast cars and some of our storage. So the 2,500 square foot storefront that we're building as a part of our new squadron facility is actually going to be exactly the same size as our Blue Ridge store as far as model kits go. But within this retail store we're going to also refer to it as the squadron museum and there's I mean there's going to be.

We've got some of the original squadron signal artwork that Don Gura painted. This is going to be hung up on the wall and we're going to put a little plaque that says Don Greer painted this. It was for this. Blah, blah, blah. We're probably going to make up a short history of the company and hang it on the wall, that sort of thing. And we've got a lot of just random things that customers have sent me that were Squadron branded or that had something to do with squadron through the years. So we're going to display all this. But one of the big things that I think is cool that we're going to put in the in the little museum area is the entire collection of squadron signal publications.

Oh nice.

So, going back to the model shows, finding your $5 squadron book bin. I've been buying a lot of books out of the $5 squadron book bin, trying to collect every one of the books, and I've got hundreds of them but I still don't even have half. So I'm always on a lookout. I've got a little Excel file in my phone so every time I'm at a show or every time somebody says, hey, I got this, do you want it? I can pull up my checklist and see if I've got it yet. But yeah, so the inaction books.

A lot of people remember the Walkaround series. That was probably the second most popular series, but then they had so many other little just whatever. I mean, anytime they had an idea, they even had a. Well, it wasn't a series, it was a one-off book called Down in the Dungeon. That was just images that Don Greer and I forget the other guy. There was two of them that painted all these things and it wasn't Dungeons and Dragons, but it was marketed to that same customer base. Yep, so they were always doing stuff Well back in. And I've got the book here. Let me see if it's got a date on it.

Oh, I've got the book. Yeah, in fact, if you gave me 10 minutes, I can put my hands on it.

Well, I'm looking at it here and it's odd that there's not a date on it.

Well, it was like 90 or 91. I was gonna say my guess would be 90 or 91.

Yeah it was, I don't. I think it was 90 or 91. Larry davis wrote the first one and it was called planes, names and dames, volume 1, 1940 through 1945. And this book was let's see how many pages is this? I'm working off of a PDF here.

Yeah.

I guess 67 pages.

I would have guessed about 90.

Yeah, so it's not very long, very long. But basically, if, if you really look at the inaction books, especially the later ones, the earlier ones had a little bit more history of the planes and whatnot, but the later and when I say later I'm talking about like late 90s, early 2000s, on to now they really turned into almost picture books. So you get nice pictures and you get a caption. You get to learn a little bit about what the picture is representing and that's kind of what the planes names and dames was and it was basically a nose art. If you look at the front cover it says nose art Art Series.

So you go through the book and it's nose arts, it's planes, it's all World War II bombers, fighters, everything is in there. And most of the pages had anywhere from two to four images on there. And then in the middle of the book you had a few pages of original color photos, which is kind of nice. So this was just a really good way to see the nose arts. I mean obviously a lot of girls, women, but you had the cartoons, just whatever these guys were painting on their planes. Larry put it in his book and you got to read a little bit about. You know, this was this bomber in this squadron and it served in the Pacific and it was very basic stuff, but it was good information and a lot of people got to see some of these planes for the first time.

It was a good inspiration book.

It was.

A modeler could leaf through it, find a particular piece of nose art on a particular aircraft that they're interested in doing and that would set them on the path of finding all the information in order to do that model, oh yeah.

So that's what it was. And then so larry followed up with and this was just a couple years later followed up with volume two, which was 1946 through 1960, and then the final volume, volume 3, 1955 through 1975, and and that was it. It was a three book series. Larry davis wrote all three and and that was it. It was a three book series. Larry Davis wrote all three and it was a fantastic series and, looking at the when we bought the company, looking through the histories of how many books were printed and sold, it was a good series, I mean they did really really well with it Exactly.

So you know my good. He's become a really good friend, peter, which I did an interview with him recently and I asked him to please pronounce his last name and I'm not going to try to butcher his last name here, but his website is Peter, like you would spell it, p-e-t-e-r 4.com, and that's short for his real name, which is not English. But he's become a real good friend and he's the guy that does the 3D renderings that create the artwork for our books that we have done so far, the inaction books that we have done. But he doesn't only do book covers for us. He does box art covers for Edward, for HK Models. He did the Gerald R Ford box art for Magic Factory. He does a lot of publications in Europe magazines. He's even worked. He's starting to do a little bit of film work. Now there was a movie that came out about the Lancasters and the Dam Busters and he did all of the visuals for that movie. That Lancaster that's in that movie is his 3D creation and his animation. So I mean he's a very talented guy. Well, as we've been working together the past couple of years, every, every time he does something for us, it just triggers another idea, or or every time I ask him to do something it triggers an idea in him.

And somehow or another, we started talking about doing like a like an artwork book, because customers that really start liking his work. I keep getting questions like hey, can you get Peter to just like, do a book that's nothing but his artwork, like a coffee table book? I'm like that's a good idea. Well, peter's done something like that before, but not anything on a huge scale. And then, of course, for me, the B-24 is probably my favorite plane. Amen, brother, there's just something about it. It's very cool. And the fact that I got to see one in person. They flew into our little airstrip up in Blue Ridge or Blairsville actually it was the Collings Foundation. It was painted up as the witch, what's it called, I don't know that one. So they're between and it's just a super cool plane. So I really love it.

And somehow or another, we started talking about well, what if we just did some posters or something? And one thing turned into another and we said let's just make a book dedicated to B-24s and we'll do your artwork? And that's how this whole project started. And then one day I was moving some stuff and I opened a box of Squadron books and came across Larry Davis's book. I said that's the title of our new series and I pitched the idea to Peter and of course he loved it because he's I mean, he's always been a Squadron Signal book fan since he was younger. And he says man, that would be awesome if we bring that name back.

So we recreated the exact we're using the exact same logo, everything. And we said well, let's make this book. Well, I said I want it to be your artwork, for sure, but I want it to be more than that. So let's take the idea that Larry did you know the inaction, you know the pictures and the captions. That Larry did you know the inaction, you know the pictures and the captions. Let's, on one side of the page, let's put an original picture and the caption, the information, you know what squadron it was in, just whatever. And then on the other side of the you know the other page, right next to it, we'll do a full picture of your artwork. No text, no logos, no, nothing, just a nice big picture. That way, because a lot of these planes, the only pictures, the only original pictures we've got are the nose. Yeah Well, you can, you know, figure out what the rest of the plane looked like, based on what squadron?

and all that Right. You can figure out the tail code and the serial number and all of that from the nose exactly.

So he, he will just take that. I mean, I don't know if you've seen it yet. We've just recently posted what the front cover is going to look like. Yep, and that double trouble. Well you, that picture is not real. It looks real, it's not. So we're able to take whatever plane we're going to put in the book, which there's a bunch of them, and we're able to create images that show the full plane in ways that people have never seen it before. So I think it's really going to be something special. Peter's artwork so far is just. I can't wait for everybody to see it.

You're speaking my language Well so, as this book has expanded so many times, it's like we've got to quit adding ideas to it or we're never going to finish. But what we've decided we're going to do is we wanted to. So we're going to have the original image, we're going to have his artwork, but then we thought we'll do side profiles too, so the modeler can have an idea of how to paint it.

Right.

Well, you know kind of like instructions for a decal set. You know you've got the side views or whatever.

I see where the creep is coming.

Oh, you do, and I'm like, well, wait a minute. I've been wanting to release some b24 decals anyway this is this is where this idea goes beyond the original book. Yeah, and I'm like we're already creating the instruction book and you're already, already, in essence, creating the artwork.

We are. Yes, because every one of the nose arts that Peter renders we are creating. And I've got another guy that works with us, that's become a really good friend, his name's Gabriel. That's doing the majority of the nose arts. I mean, he'll take the original image and then he he redraws them in 2d, you know, and he does a fantastic job. So he'll, he'll draw the nose arts and then we give them to peter and peter sprinkles his magic on them to make them look like they're really painted on a plane, and so I'm like we've got everything already. All we have to do is get Cartograph to print them.

Yes, indeed, that's who you want, printing them to Yep.

So you know, and we work a lot with Microskill too and they can do a really good job, but they can't do the CMYK nose arts, you know. So we're probably as big of a project as this is. We're probably going to have micro scale and cartograph both involved in the decals and it's. There's more information on how that's going to work coming because the problem is or well, the problem, the idea that creates the problem, is the word you're looking for.

The idea that creates the problem is that Opportunity is the word you're looking for.

The decal set. I want it to include. Every single plane that we show in the book will be on the decal set. So what that means is so there's going to be a and, like I said, this is still the work in progress, but there's going to be a and, like I said, this is still the work in progress, but there's going to be a generic sheet that's got your stars and your bars and your everything else that every B-24 needed and that's going to be. You know, that's what we're getting, probably from micro scale and that when you buy the book you're going to get one of those Right, so you're going to get one of those Right.

So you're able to build a plane and then the nose art sheet or sheets most likely you're going to be able to pick everything. So, if you need dragon in his tail, you got dragon. Everything that was unique to dragon in his tail is on that nose art sheet. Was unique to dragon in his tail. Is is on that nose art sheet. And then all the squadron tail codes, all the nose are the uh, stars and bars, all the stencils, the generic yeah, I want to include all the stencils, everything, more than enough. All that stuff is going to be on the generic sheet. So if you want to build 10b24s, you buy the book I want to build. I want to build 10 B-24s you buy the book.

I want to build at least 10 B-24s Exactly, and so we will sell the generic set separately. Oh great, you see what I'm saying. Yeah, if you buy the book, you get all the nose arts and you get one sheet of the generic, but then you can buy as many generic sheets as you want.

So you can do as many of the planes as you want. That's great. Oh, you are speaking my language.

Yeah, and we got to work out all the details, but that's the general idea of how that's going to work. So when I say you can build every plane out of the book, that doesn't mean you can do it. We're not sending you 10,000 stars and bars. I understand what you're saying. Yeah, so that's kind of the work in progress and the idea there. What a great idea. And right now the plan is to do it in 72 scale and 48 scale.

Yeah, plan is to do it in 72 scale and 48 scale.

Yeah, we, obviously it will be designed in to where we could do it in 32 scale, right, but I mean, just dragging in his tail alone in 32 scale is a couple of sheets. Yeah, that's big as the book, yeah, right, so that's that's kind of the idea. Yeah, and we'll see how it goes. It's going to be something special. It really is, oh yeah, so I don't know, I'm excited about it and we're just working as quick as we can. It's just not quick enough, unfortunately.

You're talking my language, brother.

We appreciate the inside view on that, because we've been seeing the artwork for a little while now and the cover and stuff and I just think it's a great idea. And I hope the first one's a success because if you do a B26 equivalent kind of book, I got one for you.

Well, the idea we've kind of road mapped out six books and if the first one does well actually I should say if the first two do well, because we're already kind of working on the second one too, because the second one is B-17. Oh, I figured it had to be so if those, if they do well, the rest of the series as it's. You know, everything is carved in soap, as we say a lot around here. I understand.

Let me tell you, you've already got my money.

Well, there you go. Well, if they do well, b24 will be first, b17 will be second, b29 will be third. And when I said six books, I meant five.

Oh, you meant six, come on, come up with the six.

Then the fourth book will be Fighters. We thought about doing a P-51 book on its own, but then we thought you know, if we do a Fighters book, 75% of it's going to be P-51s. So if we do a book that's just all the Fighters, we'll be able to throw everything in there, because these are going to be pretty long books, yeah. And then the fifth book would be all the other bombers. So you get your B-25, your B-26, your A-20s, all that stuff, everything else light bombers, medium bombers that would all be coupled into one book as well. And then the idea if we can pull all this off. The idea is at the very end. When we do the last book, it will come with a box to put all of them in. So it would be a box set that would go on your bookshelf.

Nice.

Nice. So that is the idea and we will see we're going.

I'm buying what you're selling, baby.

Well, good, well, good, well, good. Hopefully we can get a few other guys on the bandwagon with you and we can get this pulled off.

I think we can.

All right, brandon, that's a good update on what's happening at Squadron. I guess we're going to let you go here and we'll touch back.

We didn't mean to keep you this long. Thank you for your time.

Absolutely, man. I hope to do it again soon, and maybe by the time you think about me again, I won't be so busy we hope you are.

We want you busy. We want you working 24-7 on those kind of ideas.

His wife might not want him doing that. Yeah, well, that's another thing.

We do want to keep him married.

There you go. Well, hey, going back to what I was talking about the store earlier, we've got some fun ideas that are going to incorporate the store and the whole warehouse and just a lot of stuff that we're really looking forward to 2025. So just keep an eye on what we've got going on and I hope you can get down here for a visit at some point soon. We're coming, we are coming Awesome. Well, I look forward to it.

Thank you very much.

You're welcome. Y'all have a good evening.

You too.

Well, that's always fun.

Mike, that was a fun conversation, I gotta tell you. I, you, you and I intended that to be a 20 minute conversation and it blew up and I just I was enjoying every minute of it. Brandon is really a nice guy. I love what he's got planned for the future and you can tell he's enthused about the business and that's really great.

Well, there's one thing we didn't mention in the conversation that we're going to mention now. At least give a teaser for it. In support of Brandon's and Squadron's new book, Planes, Names and Dames the book on the nose art for the B-24 that he's working on we're going to be giving away a Hobby Boss B-24 kit Yep, the late model kit, the late model kit, and so folks need to stay tuned. The details for this will be dropped in a short sometime after this. I'm not sure when yet, but you're going to see it pop up and see what it takes to get in on the chance to win that kit.

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Well, Dave, it's time for the Bench Top. Halftime Report.

Indeed it is.

I know you've been busier than me, so I'll let you start what you been doing.

Well, I've been modeling. The SAM is mostly in paint in bottom and top color. I am about ready to gloss, coat it, decal it, and I've been discussing with Steve Hustad some of his techniques for using oil paints to weatherMSI, and so I'm just about ready for that point in the modeling experience. So it's moving along. The other thing I've got on my bench well, I've got several other things on my bench, but the big thing I've got on my bench is the Moose Route, which is moving along.

No, I'm not posting any pictures of it, no, I'm not going to go into detail other than it's moving along. I hope to have the model completed by the end of the year so that I will have a good couple of months for coming up with the vignette, because not only do you have to complete the model but you have to put it in a vignette and I've got several ideas for that and I want to give myself plenty of time and that means I got to get the Moosaroo done. So I'm moving along on it, not modeling as much as I want. Nice that people are friends, are pushing me to get my button gear. Thank you all of you, but I am making progress and I feel good about it. I know you've had some special circumstances, so what's your model? What's your bench? Look like it's clean.

It's clean model. What's your, your bench look like? It's clean, it's clean. No, I I came back from mms. I'm pretty enthusiastic about getting rolling again. So yesterday I started laying out a post-it note along the kit decal sheet to mark the, the angle and spacing of the, I guess the deflection stripes for the, the horizontal stabilizer, right, I assume that's what they are. I'm at a loss as to why they're also on the bottom of the horizontal stabilizer. That is weird. Maybe they were. Maybe they weren't, I don't know.

I would not believe they would be.

Yeah, I don't know. I'll look around and see If anybody knows. I mean, I don't know why they would be down there.

No, I mean I don't know why they would be down there. No, I've only ever seen them on the top.

Okay, because the decal is a wraparound, it folds under Maybe they thought it Because it's gray on the bottom. You're not going to be able to see them anyway. Right, man, I just got half the job done right there in that conversation. There you go, I cut your work in half. So the point there to get those post-its set up and then I can transfer them to the horizontal stabilizer and set them off at the right spacing from the leading edge, yep, and then just cut the length and then put them on there and make sure they're all in line with each other the marks on the paper versus the decal and hopefully make quick work of that You've got to get that sucker decaled, I do.

You've got to do that before you move on.

So that's going to be happening, hopefully, uh, this week getting rolling on that and I'll put some pictures on the dojo if I'm successful and just make myself accountable here and get rolling you got it anything else? That's it all right, man. Well, speaking of squadron, let's hear what they got going on classic model mojo is brought to you by squadron.

Head on over to squadroncom for the latest in kits and accessories, all at a great price and with great service. Are you a modeler on the go? Check out the Squadron mobile app for your Apple or Android device for easy shopping from just about anywhere. Squadron adding to the stash since 1968.

Brandon gets that mobile app fixed. Man, You're going to be in trouble.

Yeah, well, I'm already in trouble just the way it is and it works beautifully now. But yeah, once he cleans up the rotten data, it's going to hurt me even more. Mike, have you been spending money on modeling items? I have, Dave, I know you have. I have too A lot.

Well, we joked in Chicagoland that this seemed to be the year of the book. Oh yes, at least for us. I think from the shows I've attended this year it's been a lot of books.

Yep.

But not all books not all books.

You've added some kits too.

Yeah, fairly recently. Anyway. Well, let's talk about. Let's talk about the books. First go ahead. I recently paid for and was delivered the the new kv book from tanko grad. I got that from David Doyle Books and that was cheap, right, yeah, that was real cheap. In fact, I bought two because I got picked up Evans as well, because there's no Canadian supplier for these books. So I got about 20 pounds of books in the mail, big 700 and something page book. Oh my God, I've talked about a little bit already because I showed it on the dojo and made a comment.

It's an impressive book. This is the first time it's showing up in what broke my wallet. Yeah, it's an impressive book. So I've just started going through it. I'm really pleased with it and I had to cull a few things off the bookshelf to even get it to fit. So that's a big one.

Well, the books didn't stop there. I picked up a few more at the MMSI show. In fact, that's all I bought at the MMSI show was books. Yeah, from Andrea Press, the Haytai book, japanese equipment book. You got a steal on that. Yeah, I did. I picked that book up for 50 bucks. It retailed for an even hundred, brand new and it's out of print. So we saw one at Amps for like 300 bucks Exactly, and I was like I don't want it that bad, but for 50 bucks, you pointed out, and it was in my hand in about eight seconds after that, because you already have it, I'm glad to spend your money and, speaking of out of print books, also picked up the both volumes for the LVT Amtrak vehicles that David Harper did for VLS quite a long time ago.

They're just really good references for those vehicles and we had this conversation at the show with Steve or somebody. I can't remember who we had the conversation with, but generally, hey, are you going to build one of those? And I'm like I don't know, but these books are good kind of-point references for these vehicles. I don't know of much else out there on them there probably is. These are just really good little guidebooks for building these models. If I ever do want to build one now, I'm set. That's why I always pick up stuff like this. You never know, you never know, you never know. The other one I picked up, dave, is an old writing book from the from the 90s which is a reprint of a late 70s book which is a kind of a primer on british wartime trucks that was a really neat little book it is.

it's got some good drawings in it and it kind of sorts out the different makers and models of the trucks and lorries and I guess the thing that kind of spawned this purchase was just the desire for some knowledge, because I guess it's IBG who's released a bunch of these different ones.

Yeah, IBG has released a bunch in 72nd scale.

And a few in 35th yeah, 35th, yeah, and I'm like, well, that's kind of neat, but I've never heard of that before and hopefully this will shine a little light on that, should I get the itch to learn a little bit more about them. Well, moving on to kits for me, I finally picked up the Soviet SMK tank from Hobby Boss. Now, this is one of two different multi-turret heavy tanks they prototyped and field tested in the Winter War in Finland and I was looking for something to hopefully use as a. I want a decent model out of it, but almost a mule for doing a worn winter whitewash.

Yeah.

So this kit doesn't really have any aftermarket available for it.

Right, you can build it out of the box and yeah, and use it as a as a weathering mule.

so the temptation to do more to it doesn't. Well, the risk isn't very high. Let's say it that way. Yeah, I mean, I could probably dig and dig and find something to change, or oh yeah, I'm sure you could, but hopefully won't do that In addition to that one from IBG and you got one of these too, dave, the Romanian IAR-80 fighter.

Yeah, the first version of it Did you look at that one yet oh gosh, yes. How could I not?

That was a pretty impressive little kit from IBG.

Unbelievably impressive. Short-run manufacturers have been coming out with IAR80 kits for like 20 years and I know back in the stash I've got one from at least five different manufacturers and they're all categorically awful. They are all category yeah, there are some version of awful and they are all headed to that great blowout in the sky because none of them will ever be needed once you, once ibg completes releasing the entire series.

Well, my last little model pickup is from mini art. I pick up their their pipeline set and 35th scale for its little diorama accessory set.

So yeah, I thought that was really kind of neat yeah, doing for doing factory pipes and stuff like that.

So right, I've had some ideas in my head for a number of years and that's kind of what these are slated for. So that's what I've picked up over the last couple three weeks. What about you?

well, my purchasing makes you look like a piker, because well, first of all, I made it to the Louisville show and thus had more chance to spend money than you did. Books have been a big theme for me as well. I was at the Louisville show and there were a couple of vendors who were blowing out books. They had magazines for a dollar and books for either $5 or $10. And I bought the two issues of Air Enthusiast. I mentioned previously a book on markings for Midway aircraft, another one on German night fighters. I bought a book on one of the units that participated in Ploesti because I couldn't remember if I had. It Turns out I did, so I gifted that one to Steve Hustad. I bought all books at the Louisville show other than I did find it to me a zero, and so I bought it. To me a zero. That brings me back up to, I think, 13. I'm going to have to recount. So I got good deals. I spent some money there, but I got good deals. So in the scheme of things, it wasn't bad. Then, from Brian at Scale Reproductions, I got the Royal Class kit of the Edward G10, 109 G10s. Mr Husted is working on a pair of those right now because he got that same Royal Class kit right now. Because he got that same Royal Class kit. Just those things are beautiful and I couldn't resist picking up the Royal Class boxing. I picked up from our friends at Squadron two Hobby Boss F8F Bearcats that are going to be in the September's group build for Hampton this year. I picked up a IAR 80, as you mentioned, and I picked up the Hobby Boss U2A, which I've wanted for a while. How's that? That one's beautiful, it is really really nice. It's not one of the simplified Hobby Boss kits, it's one of the regular kits and it looks really really nice. So I'm looking forward to doing one of those At MMSI. I'm like you.

I bought books. I did buy some tools. Our friend John Wojtek at UMM USA was at MMSI and I bought some tools from him. It never fails when I run into him that I end up buying tools and stuff from him. In addition, I bought the Franks book on the JU-88, the Part 1 version on the early bomber versions. Ju88, the part one version on the early bomber versions. As it turns out, mr Hustad bought volume two on the later JU88s. I bought a book on the HE162 that may come in handy for you and I. Later in the year, later in the year or early next year. Again at MMSI, there was someone had an estate, the books from an estate, and they had plenty of books this year and they were really trying to move them and so I bought five books for like $12, a couple of Osprey books and one on German night fighters. It was great.

I love going to shows. I love coming across a vendor who's got a lot of books that they're moving cheap and if that's the case I'll almost always buy some, simply because almost can't bear to let books not come home with me if they are ridiculously cheap compared to their normal cover price. So I broke my wallet pretty hard in the last month, month and a half. I spent a lot of stuff or spent a lot of money, but I got a lot of stuff. I got to say value for the money. I think I've done pretty darn well, mike. We're almost at the end of the episode. I'm almost done with my modeling fluid. How's your modeling fluid?

Well, it's gone, but it was really good.

Well, gumball head, it's almost like. Did I have to ask? I knew you were going to enjoy it.

Well, the best part of the enjoyment was the price for a 12-pack up there at the brewery.

Absolutely. And getting to visit the Holy Land itself. I mean, we talk about Three Floyds all the time and to go up and actually be at the facility. And if you look on the dojo you'll find a couple of pictures that Mike and I took at the Three Floyds Brewery. It was just really nice, after having talked about it for years and years, actually going and seeing it. Well, my Westside Brewing Hefeweizen Wheat Ale is almost done. It's 4.9% alcohol by volume. It's your classic wheat ale Very good, very light. This is clearly something if you're out by the pool in the summer or you're doing yard work in the fall and Lord knows I've got some yard work ahead of me. This is a really great modeling fluid. Great, a really great modeling fluid mike.

Do you have any shout outs of the uh this month, this episode. Well, I got several new supporters. I'm trying to get get caught up on on the supporters of the show, dave and uh. Yes, I want to shout out tom choi, robert klein, david brown and steve charazowitz. All these folks have helped support Plastic Model Mojo through their generosity through one of our avenues of support and if you'd like to be like these gentlemen, you can support the show through those avenues which can be found in the show notes of this episode. We've got links to all the avenues of contribution and we just really appreciate it. We're certainly moving things forward this year and into next year and everything helps. So if you're inclined to help us out, we do appreciate it.

Very much. Thank you very much. You're making some things possible coming up here that we hope that you'll really enjoy. I would like to shout out the guys at the Military Miniature Society of Illinois. We got to go back to that show after more than a 20-year absence. We didn't know what to expect. The folks who put on the show were extremely welcoming. They made time for Mike and I to answer questions that we had, for Mike and I to answer questions that we had. They arranged for Mike and I to be able to attend as observers the Friday night, judging and getting to see their judging process, which is very different from either AMPS or IPMS style judging. The facility was great, the hotel was great, the room was well lit and thank gosh, it was because, man there were a lot of impressive entries up there. It exceeded my expectations. So thank you to the Military Miniature Society of Illinois. Y'all did a great job and Mike and I are looking forward to it next year.

I hope we can keep it on the calendar man, because that was sure a lot of fun.

It was great fun, and if we do it next year like we did it this year, we shouldn't draw too much resistance.

That's true. Anything else, Any more shout outs. That's it. Well, I got one more Go ahead. Chris Medding's had some very complimentary words for our show and I just want to let him know that we appreciate it very much.

Yes, yes, absolutely Anytime anybody reaches out and we get this all the time and we don't read them out regularly but the number of people who just reach out to tell us how much they enjoy the show or tell us what they particularly like that we're doing well it's, it's always your, your, your comments don't go by without being noticed, and we really appreciate it and it it keeps us going when we encounter things like somebody having four days without the internet.

Well, Dave, we're at the end of this thing.

Yes, we are man, you know what they say.

So many kids, dave. So little time. Mike, see you soon. All right, we'll see you soon.