Trumpeter's quality apparently depends on which department's products you look at. Their recent 1/35th armor kits have been top notch, like their excellent KV-1 tanks, Karl Mortar, Japanese Infantry Fighting Vehicle and Italian Arete MBT. Other subjects, like warships, have been less well-served, based on the reviews I've seen.
snipped-for-privacy@earthlink.net wrote: for the OOB builder
Tamiya's later 1/48 aircraft do very well OOB.
Hit and miss on the ships, unfortunately mostly miss. The early Gato is decent but needs some scratch work and the DE USS England isn't bad. The Sullivans was almost total trash being very akin to Dollar Store toys in finess of detail. Hornet had accuracy and engineering issues, Lexington accuracy and engineering issues (no excuse for the accuracy there as they turned down the correct information from 3 separate sources), North Carolina accuracy and major engineering stupidity...........
And that's the truth. Core business rules and will always rule.
In terms of Trumpeter I think most of you miss the point about them. Think back on Academy's history. When they first came out their products were not even good enough for scrap, they were a waste of good polystyrene. Now however I (personally) think they are a pretty good product at a reasonable price - BUT it took them years. Give Trumpeter a chance and time and the same might happen with them, as long as models are their core business.
My only experience with Trumpeter comes from their new Gannet AS4. That's a very nice kit. The cockpits are a little bare and if it is built with flaps down, there is no detail whatsoever in the flap wells. But then, we're supposed to be modellers, aren't we? That sort of thing should be relatively easy to fix. The rest of the kit is very nice indeed and seems to be accurate. If this is going to be the standard for Trumpeter kits, then I'm happy with it and I'm looking forward to the forthcoming F-105.
Ohh anotherone who likes the older Revell kits, there's not to many of us around, but I like the Revell kits tto, mainly they have been easily available here in Denmark, but also at a price where you don't worry to much to try out something new, or cutting one up for something else. Also the Revell kits basicly have a decent shape and can be build out of the box without the great experience, while there's room for adding some details if you're up to it. Their newer kits are pretty goos too, but are far more detailed and a little more demanding, but don't need so much detailing. Just look at their Hawker Hunters.
Now that Revell have given us a Hunter F6 and FGA9 in 1/32, I'd like to see them do the same in 1/72. It wouldn't take too much to add a new tailcone and a selection of armament to their nice F6 kit, with maybe a new nose to provide the FR10. If they *really* felt generous, they could do a third variant (smaller tailcone and wing leading edges) to provide earlier marks as well.
Well, there you go then...
I don't have any idea about the percentage but I'll bet that a lot more car modelers don't go to shows simply because there _are_ a lot more car modelers. ;)
Revell-Mongram car kits aren't making it to US shores?? As for the others any good full-line hobby shop will carry them. I've even seen all those brands (except Fujimi) in Hobby Lobby.
Like I said in my initial response, you need to lurk on the HHMB for a while...
That's 'cause you're always wrong! ;-p
Nah, I'm pretty much burned out on politics. Even stopped following the political newsgroups I was subscribed to and cut way back on my blog-reading. It just gets old after a while...
=== Do they really have to? Do they really care? Why risk your quality for the sake of mass production of new kits every other day. Reminds me of the American auto industry - Volvo, Audi, BMW, Mercedes produce one car, their namesake. While on the other hand, Ford, GMC and Chrysler/Dodge produce such a wide variety of cars to compete with both the European and Pacific car makers that their quality is worst today than it was several years ago.
My two cents.
Ray Austin, TX ===
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