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Hannants is listing a Revell Spitfire IXC


RBrown

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I will probably pass on this kit. I have PMC kits (great decal options) and a couple of Tamya kits. I would however buy two MK I kits (he waits with Watts propeller in stash). Someone mentioned a FW -190A-8. I would buy that. I need Fly to push out a Mk I Hurricane.

 

Rick

 

Fly is doing the MK. I.

 

Regular and Finnish boxings.

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I was under the impression that this was the same basic core mold as their Mk.II??

 

Depends upon Revells approach, I suppose, but I know what you mean.

 

They took a bit of a pummelling - rightly - over the Mk.II, but I suspect they still sold shedfulls of them. So, in terms of making money, its reasonable to assume they could just go with the same basic mold and make minor, relatively cheap, changes.

 

They don't need to make big changes in order to sell, so I suppose I'd be surprised if they addressed the rivet issue.

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I am normally fairly relaxed about this sort of thing, but the HB Spitfire was completely beyond the pail for me. I gave it away. To a good home mind, I am not heartless.....

 

It's really interesting what you say about how the CAD approach resulted in a messed up Spitfire kit from Hobbyboss.

 

If they'd taken more cross sectional data points, I assume that would have improved the situation somewhat?

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Dean, yes, And with the Spitfire, this data is easily obtained, as the Montforton drawings are perfect for this. Heck, you can even buy them in dxf format so they can go straight into a CAD program. Of course, you would have to clear such use with the publishers if it was for a commercial project, and no doubt pay a license fee for the privilege, but that would be much better than just fudging it. Even if you didn't go that way, the amount of reference material on-line alone would put you straight on how a Spitfire is constructed, let alone published material, museum visits etc.  I just don't understand why companies who are in the business of producing scale models, presumably aimed at customers like us, shortchange themselves by skimping on the very first stage of the process, and then commit to spending VAST amounts of money cutting mould tooling, without knowing it is sufficiently accurate for the job.  I don't mean to brag, but if I can do it on my silly little tank model kits, why can't they?

 

A34_CAD_07A.jpg

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Dean, more to answer your question, there is an issue with using the CAD data too. Just sweeping between some sections will certainly give you a surface, but it might not (probably won't) reflect the actual surfaces of the real thing. Unless it is made from CAD that was prepared in that fashion!!  Some sections might be made from sheets formed over a mould, some curved in a single direction, some fabric stretched over an underlying framework, some just bashed until they fitted where they touched. These are going to have to me modelled in CAD in a way that s accurately reflects the original methods, not just allowing the CAD to create a mathematical 'best fit' solution. If I have 5 minutes I will do some examples....

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I suppose manufacturers look to sell in quite high volumes, at least with injection moulding (Wingnut Wings seem oblivious to this rule, thanks to Peter Jackson). We "anal" modellers, who go to the extreme, must represent quite a small percentage of sale, possibly even vanishingly small.

 

So the Hobbyboss Spitfire will be bought by parents and grandparents for little Johnny for Christmas. Little Johnny will spend a weekend building & painting it. People will point & the more knowledgeable will say "Oh, a Spitfire jet!". (There was an article in the Telegraph concerning the "Spitfire Jet".  A Mark 11 Spitfire jet.)

 

So accuracy comes behind marketing, boxing & distribution, I suppose.

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Once upon a time maybe. But not now. And having done a fair bit of CAD, I can assure you that knowing what the shapes should be makes the work much easier than having to guess, adjust, fudge, adjust again...... and then still still get it wrong!! Talk about spoiling the ship for a ha'porth of tar......!!

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I'm not sure that bit of current conventional wisdom is all that correct.  Just look at the retail availability of model kits to the average Joe on the street.  It's almost nil.  If you want a model aircraft, especially something like Trumpeter or Tamiya, you have to search for it, and you're not going to find it at Wal-Mart or the local hardware store.  The number of LHS's world wide is in drastic decline (the one down the road from me that was mediocre at best just closed up in the past couple of weeks).  You can't just make a casual model purchase in most parts of the US anymore.  I would maintain that the die-hard or semi-die-hard modeler like most of us probably represents the vast majority of kits that are sold nowadays.  

 

Interesting conversation. 

 

I'd say that Revell, for instance, sell all over the place. Very easy to get hold of. For them, affordability and availability are the keys.

 

Look at Amazon - Tamiya 1/32 stuff abounds. EBay has everything you could want. Lots & lots of online stores, but I'd agree that LHS have all but disappeared.

 

We'd have to see sales figures for manufacturers, which we never will, in order to settle the argument. I feel that we are small in number. You tend to see the same people on different forums, the same core group of people on each forum. Model shows are comparatively few & far between. 

 

Maybe it's a mixture? Revell selling mainly to the retail market, with the likes of Tamiya, Wingnut Wings & HK aiming at proper modellers (with deeper pockets!) and Trumpeter, Hasegawa, etc looking at the middle market.

 

I'd love to know if we are the market, or if we just represent a very noisy, very small minority.

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