r/DIYModelKits

I looked at the screenshots of the House Atreides ornithopter and it was fairly clean. So I gave it a simple paint job.

Mods, if this is the wrong place for this kind of post, apologies. Was super chuffed with the kit and thought this sub would appreciate it! Super tedious, but building it was loads of fun

What is Dead may never Die

....except for masts, may they die a thousand times.

A friend of one of my long term friends is going through chemo right now. He was struggling with the isolation needed for chemo and his activity level being reduced to next to nothing. My friend knew about my passion for wooden models and shared this hobby with him and bought him his first kit. He just finished that kit, the Eiffel Tower. He reports that this has been a lifesaver and is just what he needed.

My friend was planning on buying him another kit but I'm going to gift him one from my build queue that can continue his momentum. I can replace it anytime and I'm full of joy in sharing my hobby in a way that helps someone.

This hobby's given a lot of people more than just something to do with their hands, focus, a sense of progress, something to look forward to finishing. For him right now, that matters in a way most builds don't have to carry. I like to refer to building as active meditation. Mindfulness has an amazing effect on your body.

Wishing him strength through treatment. Proud to be part of a community that gets passed along like this.

Didn't see much of this brand(HowCat) around, so I wanted to shine a light on them.
Considering it's the same kind of parts as booknooks, I thought maybe it would interest some people here.
It's just as fun to build as a booknook, takes a bit more time but the exact same tools.

Six weeks on and off, 600+ pieces, and I finally got it to the finish line.

I colored all the edges and changed up some of the colors. I didn’t like either the shiny gold or black cannons, so I used a bronze marker on all of them. The little seahorses on the sides disappeared because they were black, so I did them in gold. I also used several shades of brown on the deck details to give it more of a classic model ship feel.

The anchors and chains are jewelry charms, as are the seahorses on the sides of my custom sign. The lifeboat was something I found for a couple bucks on a boat modeling site and built separately.

Overall, this was a very satisfying build. The amount of black edge coloring I did was extreme — I burned through an entire acrylic marker — but it was worth it.

I could do more rigging, but it was tough with all the little detail pieces. I kept knocking things off and having to glue them back on.

Now to decide what my next big project is!

I’m loving this piece. From the cherry finish on the base to the overlapping layers of large form stickers you use to build the skin over the frame of the plane. This piece by Joohour is a joy to build.

So far my only major mod beyond doing some painting for gaps and such is the propeller. It ships as the flat piece with a square hole that is stationary and I decided to make that hole round and shape the arms into a proper propeller. So now it spins and looks realer. Put 2 coats of sealer on that for a smooth finish and adds a little more material strength.

Happy Building All!

Bathroom in a cigar box.

Hey Reddit! Was doing some digital spring cleaning today and stumbled upon an old model I engineered for laser cutting — the iconic Willys MB Jeep. I actually cut a few kits and assembled one back then to test the tolerances (it's about 16cm long, 50 parts total, engineered strictly for 3mm plywood).

Every part features smart micro-tabs, so no lost small pieces falling into the honeycomb bed during the process. Everything fits together perfectly with zero glue required for the main body chassis.

Since it took a ton of test cuts to get the zero-glue tolerances right, I've made the clean DXF, SVG, and vector PDF layout files available as a paid project (~$12), complete with the step-by-step PDF manual straight from the CAD model.

Note: Sorry for the confusion earlier, guys! English is not my native language, so I used AI to help with the text, but it completely misrepresented my message and made it sound like a freebie. Lessons learned, I'll write it myself next time. Appreciate the honest feedback! 🛠️

It was an adventure at times. Not forgiving of mistakes, the pieces do not come back apart. I guess it will hold together well, and I got to use my little rubber mallet.

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I painted and made signs for it to get a nicer display model, think it worked well.

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Splintery wood but this has been out of production for a while, I should have found a way to hydrate.