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Thankyou Starfix
Topic Started: Aug 24 2013, 09:07 AM (91 Views)
DLG Dave
Lt Dave 'Wraith' Carter
Most of us will remember the old Skoda and Lada jokes. Different matter nowadays with Skoda but essentially Starfix are the Skoda of the modelling world.

You can still find a few - they box older moulds and apparently - like the F-5A and T-38 Talon they still build up a reasonable display piece.

I've seen anguished modellers looking over a Starfix model in model shows and whatever, indignant raised eyebrow peering in the wreckage of the box, when they themselves knew full well that's exactly the posture they took before they even slipped the box from the seller's shelves. That person already knew that Starfix wasn't, and isn't for him. Whilst there were a few in-house Starfix kits - not many - most were refugees from the Heller ranges.

Back in the day when the specific number of pennies in your pocket money defined whether you could buy an Airfix Series 1 kit, or the equivalent of Revell, Matchbox or Frog, Starfix represented bargain basement even then. An Airfix Auster Antarctic might have set you back eleven pence but a Starfix Kit at seven pence could just about get you two if you asked nicely at the till for twelve pence.

These were the days you were packed off to the weekend at Grannys and her preparation for your television was looking at the requisite recommendations on the radio times - 'perfect for children' meant 'Tales of Beatrix Potter' interpreted by the Royal Ballet and Val Doonican's singalong. You could of course be entitled by your granddad (if you had one, both of mine were killed in the war...) to experience the extraordinary sensation of eternal life by watching the cricketers walking very slowly from one end of the grounds to the other, but there was that one-in-a-billion miracle where the cricket ground was ruined by Free-George-Davis protesters, whence the Beeb panicked and accidentally scheduled 633 Squadron in it's place. That singular moment still one of the absolute major highlights of my life. Previous to that it would only have been 'Black Beauty' or 'Little Women'. Girls. Pfffttt.....

The one of the other major life victories was finding twenty pence down the gap between seats on the top floor of the No. 1 bus to the Tricorn where there was a toy stall at the Saturday market. They frequently had Starfix kits and wonder of wonders, on that day, they had a stack. Prize jewels among them were a couple of 1:48 dogfight doubles. Spitfire and ME 109, and a Mirage & Mig 21 at ten pence each!! :party

At that age, I don't think I was really too worried whether they had the correct radiator configurations, or number of prop. blades or whether the decals were off in tone. Just so long as they were complete, had a display stand and a pilot figure and they were thence just perfect. OK, the fit of parts wasn't perfect but you could have shoved a Tamiya kit in front of me in those days and I'd have found a way of ensuring each and every join was replete with cavernous gaps.

If - once again - you'd been categorically banned from hunting sticklebacks in the smelly, disease-ridden stream where the funny man who couldn't be approached used to be frequently seen, the etch-a-sketch wasn't really doing it for you and Rolf Harris was yet to invent the stylophone, models were really one of the only ways you could make the time pass.

And only then when you turned thirteen and accidentally watched 'Black Beauty' and noticed there was this 'Judi Bowker' starring in it and for some reason she was just that little bit more watchable than she was when you were eight did you realise they'd stopped making the bleedin' programme...

(Then again when I was four and watching 'The Avengers', Emma Peel did seem quite mesmerising even then.):bounce

So, let's not be beastly to the Starfix - they are in the right place in the right hands. And that's all you need to ask of them.

Wine tasters clean their palate between sips of different wine to ensure they approach each wine neutrally by having a small chomp on cheese or on a sorbet. Being I'm building the Trumpeter Skywarrior elsewhere it was interesting to clean my modeller's palate by building an original ancient Starfix kit. It makes you appreciate what you've lost and what you've gained.

And in comparison, I'd say we've gained quite a lot.

:party :party :party :party :bounce
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