gorby
Maybe the high prices in the US are down to the importer rather than Dragon. In Britain Hasegawa kits are ridiculously expensive and I read it was due to the European importer. The Asian modelling market is so huge the European market is tiny in comparison so some manufacturers don't care if they don't sell many here. I would have thought they would be more interested in the US market though.

Tony May
The only armor kit I've built purely by myself was ESCI's old 1/72 Pz.Kpfw.I; However I can relate as an aircraft builder. Outlandish prices from Asia are pretty frequently the norm unless we're talking Takom, some Trumpeter & many from Hobby Boss.

Japanese brands though, my son & I need to stack up our modeling budget for a couple of months & just make a big order from Japan. They're pennies on the dollar practically but you'd have to buy a fair amount to get the costs to fall well below Western hobby shop prices. Oh, as far as DML/Dragon/Cyber-Hobby being top of the line? Yeah, I do remember those days, I still have some of those kits in the stash waiting for me - though most of them have long since been surpassed by other brands.

The days I REALLY miss? When Tamiya actually cared to release new WW2 aircraft in 1/72! Aside from a small goof with a panel line issue Eduard has taken the crown from Tamiya's P-51D. I believe Hasegawa's de Havilland Mosquitos surpassed Tamiya's 1/72 Mossies, didn't they? You still can't beat their Zeroes, Jugs or their Hamp though.

Mina Ro Author
Have to agree with you Tony. Tamiyas aircraft kits, even the old ones are outstanding today and cheap. The Japanese zeroes are dirt cheap, the rufe, etc and the P-51( was even copied by ICM, probably illegally) I want Tamiyas Marine F-35 bad but its not cheap!

Tony May
I don't build anything that modern but my son wants it badly! My concern is that with his vision the fiddly parts might be an issue for him now. As it stands he's ruled out building biplanes/string-bags of any sort & he has given up on the idea to build any vac kits. He's a Tamiya fanboy though, so until he literally tries to build one & fails he'll never give up on them! I think in a collaborative effort we'd be able to make it work. 😄

You're talking about the 1/48 scale Tamiya kits though, right? I'm referring to the 1/72 scale kits they make. They're basically scaled down versions of their amazing 1/48 stuff. They are VERY cheap for what you get. Unfortunately they never got around to making the A6M2-N or A6M2-K; Could you imagine having those two in Tamiya quality?!

I wasn't aware of ICM illegally copying Tamiya's P-51! I like a lot of their work but I don't like the idea of creating unlicensed copies. I wonder if they've done that with any other kits?

Lorraine Lin
I'm not familiar with armored vehicles. Just checked some local online stores, Dragon's sdkfz 251 price range is around CNY 150-220 (USD 21 - 31), while Takom is CNY150, Tamiya is 105, not competitive even in their home market. Airfix is expensive here, 150% to 200% comparing to the same topic of Eduard. I don't know if this is a pricing strategy or because of the importer's mark up.

I haven't tried any Takom kits before, but they just started a new brand Takom Wings. As an aircraft modeller, this makes me a bit expectant.

I built many Hasegawa jets (SP series), old tools, bad fit, less detail and high price. But still cannot stop buying, just because of the beautiful decals.

Tony May
Takom Wings?! That's exciting! I look forward to that. It's interesting to hear what the prices of kits are like in the PRC. Those Tamiya prices aren't bad at all! Out of curiosity, have you any idea of what came about of Aurora Miniatures 1/72 Nanchang CJ-6? They are mostly a model railroad company but this model was apparently their breakthrough into scale modeling, scheduled for release in 2024? I can't find anything out about it through their outlets in North America...

Lorraine Lin
Hi Tony, I didn't find any information about this CJ-6 either.

Takom wings just released a 1/32 HO-229 w/ interior. While I have a Zoukei-Mura one in stach, so I will wait for their next product.

Tony May
Thank you very much for looking anyway, Lorraine Lin! I was really looking forward to that release, too. As far as I can tell nobody has ever made a model of the CJ-6 in the scale I build. I will wait a few years & hope. If it doesn't show up by then I will make an exception & build it in 1/48.

I'll be interested in seeing how those two Ho-229 kits compare to one another. I've heard a lot of really good things about Zoukei-Mura but a reasonable price is not one of the good things I have heard.

Takom traditionally has pretty good prices here in the West. I am thinking of buying the Takom 1/72 Hanomag SS-100, Meillerwagen & V-2 Missile sometime soon from a popular online shop. The price is $35.24 USD which, if I can trust this currency converter, equates to CNY 255.27. If I had bought each of these separately from Special Armour I would have spent a LOT more! In fact Revell released those 3 kits from Special Armour together. I do not know what the retail price is since it is currently out of production but a hobby shop in Canada is selling this set for CNY 383.56!

Lorraine Lin
Tony, I watched a review yesterday. It seems that the new Takom Wings HO - 229 has more details. Of course, it's not fair to compare it with the product from ten years ago (Zoukei-Mura's released in 2015). Zoukei-Mura's has transparent fuselage, which is the biggest difference.

Tony May
That's fantastic, Lorraine! I'm a 1/72 scale builder so I've never actually built any of Zoukei-Mura's kits but the reviews & build ups have left me in complete awe of how finely detailed their kits are. As you say, model molding technology continues to advance & so it was inevitable that another company would match or, now apparently, surpass their works. I must give credit where it is due though - the Chinese model industry continues to strive towards excellence.

The steady advance of technology brings to mind the progression of Vickers Wellingtons on my shelf & in my stash. The first was an Airfix Vickers Wellington, produced new when I purchased & built it, but made from molds that were literally as old as my mother. I simply did not possess the skills to make that into a decent representation of that aircraft type as a child! I replaced it with a Matchbox Wellington a few years later; I thought the differences were like heaven & earth. Then of course MPM & Trumpeter released several versions of the Wellington. These make even the Matchbox kit look like a toy in comparison.

That is another thing I really like about some of the Chinese model brands; I rarely see their kits unavailable for very long. (Hobby Boss, Trumpeter, Takom, etc.)

Meanwhile, Airfix, Italeri, Revell of Germany, Hasegawa, Tamiya, etc. are constantly rotating models in & out of production so it makes availability unpredictable. If all brands would produce supplies according to demand, rather than some arbitrary release schedule, there would be no reason to build up a model stash at all.

Modelcollect caught me off guard. I thought it would be a company like the other PRC based brands I mentioned; I did not realize that their kits were going to have a limited availability. I wanted 4 of their anti-aircraft gun kits but made the mistake of assuming they would be available for a long time to come. I managed to obtain one of the 2, not the exact version but enough to represent the type, but missed out on the other one. Two others were announced but never released.

Lorraine Lin
My first model was a Matchbox, a Victor bomber and a F-16 thunderbird. In fact, for most modelers in China, their first model was either a Matchbox or a Bandai. Around 1980 - 1990, both brands set up JV factories in China. It can be said that they introduced the model product to the country and cultivated a large number of model lovers.

Matchbox's JV factory in Shanghai was not far from my home. Unfortunately, after Matchbox was acquired by Mattel, they shut down factory in 2004. However, this didn't reduce the modelers' enthusiasm. instead, more brands entered the market. In recent years, many new local brands have emerged. The owners are the very children who were inspired by Matchbox back then. Now they've grown up and are able to turn their hobby into their career.

Mina Ro Author
I remember the matchbox kits in drugstores in early 90s in USA in 1/72 I built many of them. They were decent kits. I did the DO-17 and also did the Kaman Seasprite and many others These kits are still around but Revell Germany picked them up and has re-isssued many of them. When you open a lot of the 1/72 revell germany kits you recognize them right away. They just were not molded in the same multicolor plastics and molded in one color now.

Lorraine Lin
Now and then, there are still some Matchbox models available in the market. However, they come at high prices. Owning them is more about a memory of childhood.

gorby
Roy Huxley, the artist who painted many of the early iconic Matchbox box art died only last week.
Growing up in Britain in the 1970 Airfix had a virtual monopoly, with a much smaller number of Matchbox and even fewer Revell kits available. At the time I was a real Airfix fanboy and can only remember building one Matchbox and two Revell kits.

Tony May
Lorraine Lin: What a huge coincidence that Matchbox was one of the two brands that first really introduced the hobby to the PRC and served as the inspiration for the companies that would later appear there!

I understand well how you feel about the factory closing. I really wish that more model kits were manufactured in North America again, as it was in the past, but they stopped innovating. Workplace safety issues, toxic emissions from the polystyrene & just the cost of production has made it prohibitively expensive in the US or Canada. There is almost no way to compete on a global market. Companies starting in Mexico might be a good option though. Perhaps with the arrival of 3D printing technology things will change over time?

There are still some models from Matchbox that are definitely worthwhile to build, you know? Rather they're the only examples for several types! This includes; Dornier Do G-1/Do 18, Heinkel He-170 (actually a Heinkel He-70K,) Heinkel He-115, Handley-Page Heyford, Handley-Page Halifax in it's later versions, Consolidated/Convair PB4Y-2 Privateer, de Havilland Mosquito NF Mk.XXX, Fairey Seafox, Supermarine Stranraer, plus until just recently the Noorduyn Norseman & T-2 Buckeye were the only shows in town. Even then I'm sure I'm missing some of them. As Mina mentioned Revell of Germany have released many of them since they acquired their molds. Unlike Matchbox though those products are only available for short periods before they are again removed from production.

I bought many of these in the late 90s & early 00s from modelers. I had to replace a couple of them after my home was burglarized & vandalized in January of 2013 but I will rebuild!

Mina: I seem to remember a California based drugstore that had Airfix kits? I was visiting my grandmother for a short time & I had never seen a model of a PBY-5A before. Since it was close to my birthday she bought it for me. It was one of my earliest builds & remained on my shelf long after most of my childhood builds. That too ended with the senseless actions of others in 2013.

Gorby: I didn't hear about Mr. Huxley's passing! That's a terrible loss; It seems like all of the greats are leaving us behind. Yes, some of the modern box art is nice, but it's just not quite as dynamic as the old-school box art is it?!

I have heard that Airfix was a fixture for the UK but I sincerely thought that Frog would still have had a strong market presence in the 70s? It must be my misunderstanding.

Here in the US I couldn't tell you very much about the '70s as I was born at the tail end of the decade. In the mid-1980s though I can clearly remember the models that decorated my ceiling, built by my father & can even recall the brands. Many were Revell, some were Monogram, just a few were Italeri or Italeri released under the Testors logo, a handful were Snap-Tite kits (Bf-109, P-40, Spitfire, B-25, B-26, P-51, etc.) & a surprising number were Hasegawa though. My father thought Hasegawa was the best brand in the scale (1/72.)

gorby
There may well have been some Frog models although I have no memory of them at all. It might just be my devotion to Airfix made me blind to other brands or maybe it was true of the area where I lived. I know I only became of aware of companies like Tamiya many years later, long after I had given up modelling – the first time of course.

Ben M
In the US in the 70's, I built lots of Monogram, Tamiya (I only remember the armor kits being common), Lindberg, Aurora, Testors (Hawk reissues), and a few Matchbox, I remember thinking Revell and Italeri kits never fit together, so I built less of those. Matchbox was less common, but boy did they have some cool subjects. I still enjoy re-building a lot of the same kits I built when I was a kid, especially the Hawk aircraft kits.

Tony May
gorby: Who knows? Brand loyalty is something I'd LOVE to enjoy in the modern age but nobody makes a full range of the kind of stuff I like to build, unfortunately. 😉

Ben: I forgot all about Lindberg! I built a mess of their stuff pretty early on. I remember the Me-163 was done in something like an hour. lol You're right the Revell stuff didn't fit very well at all & I STILL have issues with Italeri stuff from time to time.

Mina Ro Author
Speaking of shoddy Lindberg kits. To be honest. 2 years ago my spouse bought me that old horrible T-55 Lindberg kit. Its been re-released many times. Its got options in it to do the Israel tiran version. I have to admit that for a pretty low detail model company, this was not a bad kit. It actually includes the 105mm barrel for the Israel conversion and other bits. All I did was add a miniart working track link set to replace its horrid rubber band tracks that really do not fit and added better after market AA machine guns from the Academy MG set and stowage. With a good paint job and wash it easily can look almost like a current expensive Miniart brand T-55. Not a bad kit really at all. I actually built this kit once before when I was a teen but my first build didn't look even half as good as the one I did recently. We did not have all of these great aftermarket parts and paint washes,etc to make models look so realistic back in the early 90's. The old Lindberg T-80 and BMP-1 kits are not really that bad either and can be upgraded to look acceptable. I think those were the only 3 1/35 armor kits that company did.