Welcome to the Silicon Valley Scale Modelers Website. SVSM is a Region IX chapter of IPMS/USA.

Winner of the Region IX 2002, 2003 & 2006 Chapter of the Year Award
Winner of IPMS/USA 2006 Webmaster of the Year Award

SVSM is a club dedicated to the promotion of the hobby of scale modeling. Our meetings feature modeling subjects and programs covering all areas and genres of the hobby. Our meetings are open to visitors (see the meetings page for directions and maps) and frequently feature a monthly contest.

What's New?


08-15-2008
Today's aviation update is dedicated to the American aggressor training squadrons  We've added Northrop F-5E Tiger II, General Dynamics F-16B Fighting Falcon, McDonnell-Douglas F/A-18B Hornet and Bell UH-1H Iroquois (Huey) to the Aircraft album.  All of the aircraft were photographed at the Capital City Air Show.

08-13-2008 We've posted over 2300 model photos from Virginia Beach IPMS Nationals.   We've also posted the 2008 Nationals Category Award Winners Slide Show.  On the slide show The winners are posted in the reverse order - after the slide with the name of the category next model is the third place winner then second and then first.

08-06-2008 It's been a while since an armor update so today we've added photos of the 4 tanks from the Patton Museum - US 1918 Ford 3-Ton Tank, Iraqi T-55 Enigma, US M3A3 Bradley IFV and US M32A1B1 recovery vehicle.  All have been added to the Armor album.

One of the webmasters is going to the IPMS USA Nationals, so please stand by for the updates from there in the next week.

07-30-2008 Coming back to our regular updates, we posted the photos from this year's Pacific Coast Dream Machines.  We've added walkarounds for Curtiss P-40E-CU Warhawk, Yakovlev Yak-18 and Cessna 208B Super Cargomaster to the Aircraft album.

07-24-2008 In the last update of this round of cleanup effort we've added a large naval update to the site.  First of all we posted a huge (over 600 photos) walkaround of the SS Red Oak Victory AK-235 - a Victory ship berthed in Richmond, CA.  We've also posted last 4 albums from Honolulu's USS Bowfin Park - Goodyear UUM-44 SUBROC, US Mk14 Torpedo, US Polaris A-3 SLBM and BGM-109 Tomahawk Cruise Missile.

07-18-2008 Today's aviation update has three walkarounds from the Western Aerospace museum - North American F-86H Sabre, Grumman S2F-3 Tracker Cockpit and Curtiss Robin C-1 and one walkaround from a Vertical Challenge 2008 Air Show - Sikorsky UH-60A BlackHawk.

To the Members' Models Gallery we've added photos of the T-34 prototype A-20 in  1/72 that was made by converting  Dragon T-34 Model 1940 by Vladimir Yakubov

07-12-2008 Clean-up continues.  Today we posted all of the photos taken at the IPMS Santa Rosa Hobby Expo 2008.  We've added German 10.5cm le FH 18 Field Howitzer to the Artillery album and PTRD-41 Anti-tank Rifle, MG34 Machine Gun and PanzerFaust to the Infantry Weapons album.

07-06-2008 More cleanup brings us four albums that were taken by our contributor Matthew Flegal in the National Museum of the USAF.  Caproni Ca.36, Northrop B-2A Spirit Landing Gear Details and Kugisho MXY7-K1 Ohka Trainer were added to the Aircraft album, while Midgetman ICBM Transporter was added to the Missiles album.

06-30-2008 In another clean-up update we've posted last three albums from the US Army Museum of Hawaii.  We've added the Japanese 70mm Type 92 Howitzer and Chinese 12.7mm Type 54 Anti-Aircraft Machine Gun to the Artillery album and Japanese 20mm Type 99 Mark 1 Aircraft Cannon to the Aircraft Equipment, Engines, Armament and GSE album.  In addition we've also added photos of the 2006 Ferrari Enzo from 2006 Palo Alto Concourse d'Elagance to the Automotive album.

06-24-2008 The next couple of updates will be dedicated to cleaning up of leftovers from various sets of walkarounds.  Today we've posted the last 4 albums from Aerospace Museum of California.  We've added photos of McDonnell Douglas F-4C Phantom II, Lockheed F-80B Shooting Star, North American F-86L Dog Sabre and General Dynamics FB-111A Aardwark Cockpit Capsule to the Aircraft album.

06-20-2008 May's Meeting photos have been added to the Gallery.

06-18-2008 One of the webmasters went on a very interesting trip to a Patton Museum in Fort Konx, KY and brought back about 3500 photos.  We are going to start posting them slowly and today we've added first 3 new albums from there - XM1 Abrams prototype, M50A1 Ontos and M1127 Stryker RV.  All have been added to the Armor album.

06-11-2008 An aviation update today comes from two different times.  From 1990 we posted photos taken by Rodney Williams of the McDonnell Douglas AH-64A Apache at the Moffett Airshow and of the Hughes HK-1 Spruce Goose taken while it was still in Long Beach, CA.  From 2008 we posted photos of the Mikoyan-Gurevich Mig-21F-13 and Fairchild C-119G Flying Boxcar taken in the Aerospace Museum of California.

06-04-2008 After a very interesting hiking trip last weekend we've added photos of various military installations located in the Marine Headlands, the area located just north of the Golden Gate Bridge.  We've added photos of various batteries and installations of Fort Cronkhite, the northern-most of the San Francisco area coast defense forts.  We've also added photos of the Command Post that belongs to the unfinished 16" battery - Construction 129.  And finally we started the new sub-section of the Fortifications & Military Installations album about San Francisco Area Nike Missile Batteries and added two locations there - former radar sites SF-87C Hawk Hill and SF-88C Wolf Ridge.  The most interesting is SF-88C as it is relatively inaccessible and while abandoned and falling apart it has been preserved in more or less original state.

05-29-2008 Trying to clean up the backlog of photos we've posted the last 3 albums from Kubinka Armor Museum in Moscow - JS-2, MkV Heavy Tank and T-37B.  We've also added the photos of the Morris Commercial C8 taken on the streets of Moscow by one of our contributors Yuri Pasholok.

05-22-2008 Today we've added two walkarounds from the Capital City Air Show 2008 - Lockheed U-2S Senior Year and Northrop T-38A Talon, both used by the 9th Reconnaissance Wing from Beale AFB.  We've also added photos of another of San Francisco's coast defense forts - Fort Funston.

05-15-2008 With our hosting problems finally cured, more photos from the SVSM Kickoff Classic 2008 show have been posted.

We've also added a theme armor update dedicated to the Soviet light tanks of WWII.  We've added photos of T-40S, T-50, T-60 and T-70.  The first three come from Kubinka armor museum in Moscow and the last from Victory Monument in Velikiy Novgorod.  All have been added to the Armor album.

And lastly we've added a new model to the Members' Models Gallery we've added photos of the Scratchbuilt Soviet River Monitor Udarnyi in 1/700 scale by Vladimir Yakubov

05-14-2008 We finally got fed up with our old host and moved on to the new one. The site has been uploaded to the new location and everything seems to work.  If you find problems, like missing galleries, please email the webmaster.

04-30-2008 The results from the record setting 2008 Kickoff Classic have been posted.

04-25-2008 Today's aviation update is dedicated to the NASA research aircraft based at Moffett Field in Sunnyvale, CA.  We've added walkarounds of the civilian version of the C-141 - Lockheed L-300-50A Starlifter KAO - Kuiper Aerial Observatory, Boeing 747SP-21 SOFIA - Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy and Lockheed ER-2 NASA - a civilian version of the famous U-2 spyplane.

We've also added two more albums of the contest photos from the 80s from Rodney Williams - OrangeCon 1987 and Central Valley Model Contest 1988.

04-21-2008 First part of the photos from the SVSM Kickoff Classic 2008 show have been posted.  Stay tuned for more photos and the results from the event.

04-18-2008 The armor update today comes from Littlefield's museum.  We've added photos of the very early M60 prototype (possibly one of the technology demonstrators with soft armor hull) and updated the Matilda MkII Series 4 album with over 50 photos of the interior.  Both of those were added to the Armor album.  We've also added photos of the Tracked Rapier anti-aircraft missile system to the Missiles album.   And finally we've added the photos of the 1938 Buick Model 41 w. Sidemounts brought to the museum by one of the visitors to the Softskins album of the Gallery.

04-10-2008 In today's theme update we've posted photos of the equipment used by the 129th Rescue Wing stationed at Moffett field in Sunnyvale, CA.  We've added photos of the Lockheed MC-130P Combat Shadow and Sikorsky HH-60G Pave Hawk to the Aircraft album.  The photos of the Honda Foreman ES ATV were added to the Softskins album and the photos of the Rigid Inflatable Boat were added to the Miscellaneous album.  All photos were taken during Capital City Air Show 2008 in Sacramento, CA

04-02-2008 We posted another look back in time to the 80s courtesy of our own Rodney Williams.  We've added photos of the San Diego Aerospace Historical Center taken in 1987, 1988 Madera Air Show and 1989 Moffet Field Airshow.  We've also posted photos of the 1987 Region 9 Regional in Fresno.

03-28-2008 The armor update for today comes from Kubinka armor museum in Moscow.  We've added albums of the rare German PzKpfw VI Tiger I heavy tank, soviet copy of the French FT-17 light tank - Russian Renault (Russkiy Reno), one of the very few surviving unmodified early T-44 MBTs and KSP-76 Experimental Wheeled Self-Propelled Gun.  All have been added to the to the Armor album.

To the Members' Models Gallery we've added photos of the Soviet Su-85M SPG, 1/72 Dragon by Vladimir Yakubov.

03-20-2008 Today we have an unusual update.  One of our club's long time members Rodney Williams was kind enough to give us some of his photos from the old IPMS events. We've uploaded photos from the 1988 IPMS Nationals in Dayton OH and 1989 IPMS Nationals nationals as well as 1988 and 1989 San Jose Shows.

03-16-2008 From Aerospace Museum of California we've posted the walkarounds of the Sikorsky CH-3E Jolly Green Giant, Composite Engineering BQM-167 Skeeter Aerial Target Drone and Pratt & Whitney J58 Engine used on SR-71 Blackbird.  We've also added photos of the Ferrari Mondial from Palo Alto Concourse d'Elegance.

03-08-2008 Trying to clean up some of the archives we've posted three different albums from US Army Museum of Hawaii located at Fort DeRussy in Honolulu.  We've added Japanese Type 95 Ha-Go light tank to the Armor album, US 105mm M3 Airborne Howitzer to the Artillery album and US M1A1 Flametrower to the Infantry Weapons album of the Gallery.

03-01-2008 Today's update has a theme - US "century" series fighters.  We've added 100+ photo walkarounds of the North American F-100D Super Sabre, McDonell F-101B Voodoo, Convair F-102A Delta Dagger, Lockheed F-104B Starfighter and Republic F-105D Thunderchief to the Aircraft album.  All of these walkarounds come from Aerospace Museum of California.


Another totally meaningless counter!