BULLETIN: March 2020

MARCH MEETING IS CANCELLED DUE TO CORONA VIRUS!

BPMS
Bulletin 

by Bobby B2 Blue Pokorny

This year has been moving at an astounding rate. The  February meeting was HUGE,  having 31 members and five guests who brought in 41 models for the contest and  display.

February Meeting

NEW MEMBERS: Felix Olmo and Louis Segna have each attended three meetings and showed us completed models. For the second month in a row we voted in TWO new members into the BPMS! Welcome to the fold!

Contest NIGHT: This was the first quarter of the BPMS Annual contest. We had an impressive display of talent on the tables. We’d love to see even more for the second quarter!

SHOW US YOUR TOOL: This vulgar sounding activity is more of a simple BPMS tradition. Once a year we ask members to come to the meeting prepared with a tool or method they like to use to make their model building life easier. We had a bunch of members and guests who shared some good ideas with the group. 

2020 Model Pledge: Looks like we got this working nicely now! Bring in an unbuilt model between January and APRIL 2020 to declare as your pledge model. Please have it finished for OCTOBER 2020, for a display. After October you may bring back your pledge for the November meeting for the last contest of the year. For your efforts you get an additional FIVE Super Raffle tickets for completing your pledge! Sweet! Easy enough! We already have about one third of the active members signed up. Won’t you join the fun?

JUNE THEME: We have a commitment!

The Golden age of

AURORA

Celebrating 70 Years of Models

Details HERE.

raffle: We had another raffle with an impressive assortment of prizes. The club is always looking for donations for these activities.

On the agenda: MARCH

IN AN ABUNDANCE OF CAUTION THE MARCH 2020 MEETING IS CANCELLED. 

At this point meetings will be on a month by month basis depending on how events develop around the COVID19 infection.
  

DECAL SWAP NIGHT: Bring in decals to swap or sell. You may want to bring some money just in case. You never know if that sheet that you always wanted might show up!

FAVORITE MODEL: We all have a favorite model. Over the years it might change, or remain the same. We are asking you to bring your fav model, built or unbuilt, and be prepared to tell the group why it’s your favorite.  

raffle: We had a raffle during the meeting. It’ll probably go the same way for the foreseeable future.

BPMS Spotlight Modeler:

Chuck Contrino

Returning modeler and new BPMS member Chuck Contrino got his early introduction to the hobby from his father while growing up in Yonkers. “I must have been seven or eight years old,” he recalls. “My father was a model maker from when he was a kid, building solid wood and balsa-and-tissue models, later making plastic models as well. He got me some simple kits -- an F-86 and I think a MiG-17 - and showed me how to make them. He also got me a few ship models to build.” The young modeler was at one point inspired by a family connection to the iconic Sherman tank. “That kit was given to me by my uncle who was a crewman in a Sherman tank at the Battle of the Bulge, where he was wounded. That was the only piece of armor I ever made. I was about ten.”

Chuck’s main modeling interest remained aircraft. “Around 12 or 13, I got a package of kits -- three Me109s and three Mustangs. I cut the propeller blades off and made clear plastic discs to represent the spinning blades. Then I hung them from the ceiling in a battle scenario. I thought that was pretty cool.” His passion for the hobby continued for a few more years. “Once I hit high school, between a part-time job and discovering girls I fell out of modeling.” Chuck attended NYU, first in the Bronx and later in Manhattan.

After years as a bartender, Chuck found a new direction rebuilding computers and spent more than a decade in Information Technology with a major New York bank. The model-building bug nevertheless came back. “There was a period when I was unemployed for a while, and I started building models as a kind of therapy. Recently I’ve been making more, and I’m trying to learn new ways to do things. Modeling has changed. There are many more companies out there, new models, new paints and glues. It’s sort of a re-learning process that’s been going on for a while now.” Chuck added, “I also make balsa-and-tissue models. I have an Se 5A I built 30 years ago. That’s in the process of being restored.”

Chuck’s main interest remains 1/72 aircraft. “My display areas are limited. I want to build more WWII multi-engine aircraft, and I want to keep them in scale with the fighters. I don’t have the room for a 1/48th B-17.”  He added, “I do have some 48th scale models – a couple of Navy planes; a Dauntless dive bomber, and a F6F Hellcat; and a few jets in 1/72 scale, a Phantom F-4, an old F-86, and an F-101.” Chuck’s work area is a converted breakfast nook where he hand-brushes his models. “I’ve been using acrylics, mostly Tamiya. They seem to have the biggest variety of paints and colors. Sometimes I use ModelMaster paints. Originally, I didn’t like the acrylic paints. You really have to thin them out, but once you learn a few tricks you can get quite good results with a brush.

The now-retired Dyker-Heights resident found the Brooklyn Plastic Modelers Society last year. “I looked online without thinking of IPMS. I was just looking for scale model clubs in Brooklyn. Yours was the only one that popped up.” At the January BPMS meeting, Chuck presented his recent work, 1/72^nd-scale Nieuport biplane and Morane Saulnier monoplane fighters of the first World War. “Those were finished just before Christmas,” he said. “They were in my father’s basement; they had to be there at least 20 years. He always had several projects going on at once. These were ones he never got to.”

Though his modeling interests focus on aircraft, Chuck would like to see kit manufacturers release more motorcycle kits. He owns a real 1969 Norton Commando. “Manufacturers of model motorcycle kits have not produced many kits of British bikes. If they made more -- BSA, Triumph, and Norton kits –they’d sell I’m sure. The old British classics are not well-represented.”

Chuck looks to BPMS to teach him about new kits and techniques. “Seeing some of the fine examples of model building has inspired me to further my skills and make better looking models,” he said. “I just stand back an admire the work you guys do.”

~Frank Colucci

MARCH 2020 Meeting is

Cancelled!!!