Should I sell or build it?

[carlos marighela]

Not sure where best to post this, I suppose it could have just as easily go on the Bazaar boards...

While rummaging through a second hand cabinet in a local train shop, I came across a selection of the old Airfix mini ships, these were some of the first kits Airfix made back in the 1950s. Hidden among 2 or 3 Mayflowers, a Santa Maria and the inevitable HMS Victory was the elusive and fabled model of HMS Shannon.

I never had it as a boy, it's not been re-released since the 1970s as allegedly the moulds were lost/ destroyed. The version is in what the collector-knob ends call Type 1 packaging, a folded bit of cardboard with the instructions inside and the kit, complete with base in a plastic bag. A quick bit of research shows that this dates it to between the mid- 1950s and about 1971 when they repackaged it. Looks like it's in pretty good nick, packaging included.

Now, having purchased it cheap and having not seen another one in fifty years, do I flog it for an inflated price on eBay* or do I make the bloody thing?

It's about 1/400 so useless to put with other models, although I've half a mind that it could sit well back on a tables edge as an avatar for a naval presence. That said I haven't built and rigged a model sailing ship in over thirty years.

Dilemnas, dilemnas.... What should I do?



* Further research suggests that depite it's relative rarity, these things don't command astronomic prices.

[Michi]

As tempting as some models are for what they show, I always refused to buy any kit that doesn‘t match 28mm miniatures in scale, whatever the nominal model scale claims to be.
I live good with that (and probably a bit cheaper).
I wouldn‘t have bought it and therefore recommend to sell it.

[SJWi]

Carlos, I remember those kits well. Indeed, James May's programme about Walter Raleigh last night had a photo of the Golden Hind from the same series complete with its cardboard box art.  My personal view as I don't sense any great desire on your part to assemble said kit unless you have role for it with 6 or 10mm Napoleonic or Anglo-American War of 1812-15, would be to let it go. There must be someone who would really appreciate it either as a collector of Airfix or naval kits. No idea what it is really worth though. I see one on E-Bay selling for £8.50 plus £4 P&P.  It already has 4 bids with 5 days to go.  Might be worth "watching it" and see how much it sells for?     

[Leunstoelgeneraalbd]

This reminds me of something I read many, many years ago: if you are confronted with the question "do it, yes or no ?", take a coin, head = do, tail = don't. Throw it three times and decide what you feel about the outcome. If you agree with that outcome: do it. If you do not agree with that outcome: do not do it. This is of course not finding your fate but a rather simple psychological trick to discover your real feeling about the action to choose. If however you are a hoarder like me (;-)), there is another trick: ask yourself how to use it. Wrong (too small) scale: put it farther from the beach where your troops are landing.

[Jemima Fawr]

Having inadvertently upset some collector weirdos in the past by actually BUILDING (for shame!) some vanishingly rare 1/100th aircraft kits, I say definitely build it and then post the pictures on the collector forums.

[Cholmondely Percival IV]

All I can say is, if you build it, they will come. I suppose the question that then arises is, do you really want to see them?

[Aethelflaeda was framed]

Toys left unplayed with, games unplayed in their boxes, figs unpainted and models unbuilt are terrible sins.  For the sake of your immortal soul, repent!

[HerbertTarkel]

Build it!  Make a collector cry.

[has.been]

I too remember these ships.
I did about eight of the Airfix ones (Elizabethens) and two by Helier (?)
Wrote a simple set of rules I called, 'Drake's Drum'.
I drilled into the decks & put plastic tubes in. The masts could then be removed to show damage.
Great fun was had, especially as orders were written three moves in advance. No hand break turns in a sailing ship.

I even took the game to a primary school. The children quickly worked out 45 degrees was half of a right angle.
The teacher said she had been trying to get them to understand that for most of the term.

IF you want to make the models I could try & find the rules for you.

[vtsaogames]

Just keep it. And live forever.

I told my wife the old saw about a wargamer dying when the last figure was painted. She tells me from time to time not to paint them all. That's not a problem, considering what lurks in my closet.

[Aethelflaeda was framed]

My wife seems eager to make my pile smaller…

[carlos marighela]

Looks like the jury is in. I'll keep it and build it..... some day. 

[Lord Raglan]

Sell it mate, it’s a no brainer

[modelwarrior]

2025 project,build it.

[Daeothar]

.... some day. 

That's the spirit!