We’ve all been there. At some point we all start a model kit only to realize that at some point in the building process, this kit is not going together exactly as you had hoped. And eventually, there comes a time when it’s so bad, that you’ll throw it in the garbage, smash it against a wall out of rage, blow it up with firecrackers, or something else.
So…what failed model kits have you done in the past or currently, only to give up 100% on them and chuck them in the trash, etc.
I started this small 1/700 scale What If USS Long Beach cruiser long, long ago. But gave up on it as I didn’t want to continue building it in a scale that I really didn’t like. I’d much rather prefer 1/350.
I gave up on this 1/72 scale snap fit Monogram F-19 stealth fighter long ago. I still have it on my “shelf of doom”. Don’t know if I’ll ever finish it. Highly doubtful.
I started to build a what if Independence class LCS long, long ago. But gave up on it as I didn’t like where I was going with adding spare parts and other structures. It eventually “went to the breakers”. Literally.
I was going to build a Air Combat Command display with the B-52, B-1, and B-2 bombers. All in 1/144 scale. But I lost interest in the project and gave all the models to a fellow model club member long ago.
Only one of mine has been trashed during the build process so far… a Lindberg M46 that I was attempting to backdate into a M26 based off of an old FSM how to article. Unfortunately, it was beyond my skill set at that time…. Not to mention that Dragon shortly later released their M26A1/T26E3 kits, so the need to complete the backdate conversion disappeared.
There’s been a couple… This was a hobby boss jayhwawk (1/72 and I really wanted 1/48…) which was going pretty good until the paint pilled over the entire bird. Didn’t seem strippable and I had used the same paint for my T-34 mentor so I kinda went king kong on the model
There has been a few over the years,I guess the one that stands out to me is the Hasegawa 1/48 Tomcat,TWICE.I got it when it first came out and it quickly dispatched me with major fit issues all around.
I tried again after the turn of the century foolishly thinking that I was a more experienced modeler,but no,it whipped me again.
I started an AMT Autocar A64B semitic truck kit this Summer and got so frustrated with AMT’s crummy instructions and poor fit that I boxed it up and buried it on my “Shelf-of-Doom” I don’t have it in me to chuck it in the trash because the kit has some “emotional” ties for me.
Sometimes it has been a case of just not giving a **** because the kit was essentially garbage, sometimes it has been because I would destroy already completed great work just to get a fuselage to come together.
Of the kits that I recall trashing:
Eduard’s 1/48 Sopwith Camel - biplane issues, particularly the cabane alignment
Revell’s 1/32 Sopwith Camel - ditto
Roden’s 1/48 Gloster Gladiator - double ditto
Kinetic 1/48 Republic F-84F Thunderstreak - this one fell and just broke apart into irrecoverable pieces
Monogram’s 1/72 Space Shuttle Challenger - the engine pieces on this kit were a disaster fit-wise, the aftermarket decals I spent a lot of money for didn’t fit worth a dang, and I just decided I didn’t want to deal with it
Monogram Pro-Modeler 1/32 Junkers Ju88A-1 - I was in the process of building a gorgeous cockpit complete with 3D decals when I went to put the fuselage halves together. I had made a horrid mistake in aligning some of the interior parts, and quickly determined that I would have to rip out a whole lot of the cockpit - thereby losing much of what looked really good - just to get the halves together. I was reluctant on it, but didn’t see a good path forward, so I trashed it. And I regretted that so much that I recently got another copy of this kit and figured out exactly where I went wrong, and was able to complete it.
Monogram Vought F4U-4 Corsair - I picked up this kit while on a trip through the Pensacola Naval Air Station Museum. I had never had this happen before, but the plastic was so brittle that parts literally disintegrated when I removed them from the sprues. So I won’t really count this one as me trashing it; the kit itself was trash (and it’s one that I had built many times previously).
I had to stop due to a fire in the house and the clean up. After a year I went back to it, the model had warped and I noticed so many other mistakes that I felt with my level of skill were too great to overcome. So I just threw it away.
Another one that went into the scrap heap was a BF-110. It got stowed for our move and was damaged beyond repair. I have no pictures of it.
I’ve put a few aside until I could recharge my enthusiasm (such as a Revell P-40B and a B-26 Marauder which is still sitting in its box waiting for a sunny day), but I haven’t thrown any away.
Of course, they will turn out terrible.
There have been 3 kits in my years that I have not built to completion and tossed.
Italeri 1/72 AH1 SuperCobra … that thing was just a mass of warped parts and short shots.
Zvezda 1/72 SU24 Frogfoot … yuck. Such a mess of a kit, wish there was a new tool of this bird someplace.
Italeri (again!)'s Lancia LC-2… Made efforts on this one too, detailed the interior, added belts and wiring, but the decals and body, wow another story all on its own.
For me it was the 1/72 Academy F-104. Absolutely atrocious. Every part seemed to have been cast by a separate team that hated all the other teams.
It didn’t even have a landing gear bay, just a giant gaping hole in the fuselage unless you glued the doors shut and none of those would align properly.
This was its excuse for a cockpit and pilot:
I have a bunch of stalled projects that I refuse to just throw away.
This is the Pejite Gunship from Nausicaa. The proportions are way off, so it will be eventually tossed out. However, I have started revised drawings for a completely new one, and so I keep this one around to remind me that I still have work to do.
Another project that will be junked after its replacement is designed and built is this Makoto Kobayashi-inspired Gundam.
I’m not sure if I will keep this AD Police K-11 powered suit from Bubblegum Crisis or build a new one with better features. It is 1/20, but I was thinking the #2 version will be in 1/12 scale.
And then there is Machinegun Snake, from Kamen Rider V3.
The mechanical parts are really bad (all my fault), so with the exception of the ammo belt, the gun, arm, and legs will get tossed and new ones will be designed and built. I already sourced a 1/12 M134 minigun from Tomy.
At the slow rate I build, these projects might just end up in the 1-800-JUNK bin after I pass away.
I have a F104 kit that had terrible fitting parts that I sort of gave up on. Put it most of the way together and now use it as a paint test platform for when I’m mixing paint colors to get the color I’m after. Works better then the flat plastic sheet I was using.
In 50 years of building I can only remember a kit going in the bin just once. A Testors P-38J if I remember correctly. It was a struggle with fit issues and after an on again off again struggle managed to make it presentable. Paint went down pretty good and was time for the detail parts, the last was the canopy and that’s where it all went south. It wasn’t a complete canopy, it was 2/3rds of the canopy that was miss molded. This was before the internet, so replacement parts weren’t really a thing yet. I couldn’t figure out how to fix it and so in to oblivion it went.
Revell 1/400 seaplane tender, don’t remember which name it went by.
The decks for the superstructure were molded at the portholes rather than each deck. That mean each porthole was not round, misaligned, with a huge seam running the middle of each bulkhead.
I managed to cobble it together, then found the hangar was terribly askew, and that was it.
I do stil have the flying boat model, which took work to make reasonable.
It’s been “interesting” reading about these “failed” models and it makes me wonder, how many of these kits failed because of a manufacturing error and how many failed because of modeler’s error?
I was building a Revell Jacques Cousteau PBY Catalina. I was converting to a Canso Waterbomber of the type used by the Newfoundland Forest Service in the 1950s and 60s. I had just fabricated curved panels to replace the side blisters which were removed on the Canso. Left everything at my bench and went away for a few days. When I got back, my two-year old had gotten in unsupervised and trashed the whole lot scattering pieces everywhere. I gathered it all up and dropped the whole broken works in the trash. He’s 46 now. I still tease him about it. Another time I had just finished my entry into a local model contest, an AMT 1949 Mercury. I had laid my best coat of black lacquer ever and a glorious yellow roof. Laid aside to dry overnight, I came down in the morning to see my baby brother running the car over the carpet, wheels off, bumpers off, paint ruined. Straight to the trash. My other brother won the contest with his AMT 53 Studebaker with twin blowers. I was rotted. The prize was a huge Revell USS Constitution which he, being a car guy at heart, never finished and which eventually was trashed as well.
I’ve had several that I’ve tossed, or put away for awhile with intentions of finishing someday that also got tossed. Sometimes the kit is just too frustrating and it takes the enjoyment out of the build so what’s the point? I don’t want to waste the supplies and time to build or finish something I’ve completely lost interest in. A few times I’ve messed something up and it just wasn’t worth the hassle of trying to repair it. Now this doesn’t happen often and I don’t buy $100+ kits so when it does happen I learn from it and move on. I don’t have time to be p!ssed off at the thing that is supposed to be fun and relaxing. If I wanted to be p!ssed off id just go find traffic to drive in.
Had a Revell 1:48th Bristol f2b fighter (think
it’s eduard moldings?) some years ago. Got to paint stage having made fuselage and intended to fit wings, undercarriage etc separately. Used tamiya paints, applied some sort of gloss varnish to apply decals on, then as final step sprayed testors dullcote over it. Not sure which layer reacted with which but the paint cracked and the decals disintegrated. No matter what I did I couldn’t get the finish looking right again. So the parts are in a plastic bag in a drawer, perhaps I’ll return to the challenge one day if I can find a paint stripper to go back to the bare plastic without melting it…
