Wingnut Wings Lancaster to be released by Border Model

[Thunderbolt]

On 12/24/2021 at 10:54 AM, Gary Needham said:

If you want a HK 1/32 Lanc, I would be tempted to hold back until Border release theirs (assuming it goes ahead of course) as I am sure there will be a (relative) glut of HK ones dumped on the market to subsidise purchases of the Border / WNW one.

 

It happens with lots of kits just like happened with the Z-M  P-51 and HK  Mosquitos when modellers learnt that Tamiya were doing both subjects in the same scale.

 

Gary

ZM’s P-51 was released before Tamiya’s? 

[Gary Needham]

9 hours ago, Thunderbolt said:

ZM’s P-51 was released before Tamiya’s? 

 

Yes it was but news of Tamiya's pending release even as an' in progress' project significantly ( I suspect) affected the overall numbers it sold post release. I had a a HK Mossie and also had a ZM P-51 on order and then sold and cancelled the order respectively once I learnt Tamiya were doing them both. Having had all 4 kits in my hand and since built the Tamiya P-51, I'm glad I did on both counts.

 

Ultimately, there are choices and it is up to the modeler to decide what suits them best but my own take is, if I only ever build one in that subject, then buy the best available.

 

Gary

[Pup7309]

14 hours ago, Gary Needham said:

 

My best guess would be about 80%+ will never actually get built but will simply be stash queens or passed around like currency between modellers. I think I read somewhere that an estimate had it that something like 70% of all the large Monogram/Revell 1/48 4 engine heavies (B-17, 24 and 29) have never been built - and those have been around 40 years now - and are much smaller in overall size. I am as bad as the next bloke for buying these large models and envisaging how it will look when finished.

 

If only I had multiple houses and lifetimes to build and display them all in that I (mentally) intend to do..!

 

Gary

Ha. I’ve got a Monogram b-24 on the shelf of Doom- still hoping someone, anyone,  even Trumpy Boss, will bring out an updated kit ( But Trumpy please re do the turrets etc) Is prefer HK brought this out because they seem to have got the Lanc and B-17 correct 

Edited December 27, 2021 by Pup7309

[Markjames1968]

2 hours ago, Gary Needham said:

 

Yes it was but news of Tamiya's pending release even as an' in progress' project significantly ( I suspect) affected the overall numbers it sold post release. I had a a HK Mossie and also had a ZM P-51 on order and then sold and cancelled the order respectively once I learnt Tamiya were doing them both. Having had all 4 kits in my hand and since built the Tamiya P-51, I'm glad I did on both counts.

 

Ultimately, there are choices and it is up to the modeler to decide what suits them best but my own take is, if I only ever build one in that subject, then buy the best available.

 

Gary

the initial ZM mustang was released a year after the initial Tamiya one 

[Gary Needham]

You may be right Mark as it was over 10 years ago and back then predominantly modelled armour and wasn't up to date on new aircraft releases. I wanted a 1/32 P-51 and ordered a P-51 by Z-M which I then cancelled when I learnt Tamiya had one. Who released what first is now academic as I built the Tamiya P-51 kit and never regretted the decision. Having now built in 1/32 their Spitfire IX, F-4U (the best engineered kit I have ever built in any scale) and their Zero, I would always choose anything Tamiya did in 1/32 over anyone else....inc. a 1/32 Lanc if they ever announced one!

Gary 

[Chek]

5 hours ago, Gary Needham said:

 I would always choose anything Tamiya did in 1/32 over anyone else....inc. a 1/32 Lanc if they ever announced one!

Gary 

 

To be clear Tamiya significantly upped their game for that run of prop fighters from the Zero to the Mosquito.

It's a shame they haven't revised their big jets from the 90s such as the Phantoms and Eagles to the same standard.

Their 1/48 F-4B indicates what they could do, but with less size limitations.

[Violator1991]

On 12/28/2021 at 4:40 PM, Gary Needham said:

I would always choose anything Tamiya did in 1/32 over anyone else....

So would I !!

The problem is, at least for me, Tamiya seems to have given up producing big size aircraft in 1/32 (and they are not alone considering Trumpeter and Hasegawa doing the same and Kitty Hawk already gone). Most WW2 fighters are smaller in 1/32 than many popular jets are in 1/48, so I guess Tamiya is trying to keep moulds to a certain size.

With too many 1/32 subjects remaining untouched by large manufacturers until today makes me conclude that the market is not that deep enough to justify the tooling.

 

 

[Dave Williams]

44 minutes ago, Violator1991 said:

So would I !!

The problem is, at least for me, Tamiya seems to have given up producing big size aircraft in 1/32 (and they are not alone considering Trumpeter and Hasegawa doing the same and Kitty Hawk already gone). Most WW2 fighters are smaller in 1/32 than many popular jets are in 1/48, so I guess Tamiya is trying to keep moulds to a certain size.

With too many 1/32 subjects remaining untouched by large manufacturers until today makes me conclude that the market is not that deep enough to justify the tooling.

 

 

I still can’t believe that Tamiya never released a glass nosed Mosquito bomber.  I understand that maybe the Mosquito FB boxing may have lost money overall, but releasing a bomber would just seem to be the incremental cost of new parts (the molds for which may have already been cut), new decals, and new packaging.  It would seem like a bomber release would at least make back the incremental cost, and any excess would go to reduce the overall loss of the series.

 

Similarly, why not reissue the F-16 Thunderbirds kit as a regular Block 32?  That’s just decals and packaging.  Again, it seems like the incremental cost would be more than paid for.  But, Tamiya has always worked in mysterious ways.

[Violator1991]

2 minutes ago, Dave Williams said:

I still can’t believe that Tamiya never released a glass nosed Mosquito bomber.  I understand that maybe the Mosquito FB boxing may have lost money overall, but releasing a bomber would just seem to be the incremental cost of new parts (the molds for which may have already been cut), new decals, and new packaging.  It would seem like a bomber release would at least make back the incremental cost, and any excess would go to reduce the overall loss of the series.

 

Similarly, why not reissue the F-16 Thunderbirds kit as a regular Block 32?  That’s just decals and packaging.  Again, it seems like the incremental cost would be more than paid for.  But, Tamiya has always worked in mysterious ways.

So true, especially for the F-16 Block 32, one of my favourite of their products. That true too, Tamiya has its mysterious way of working. But I guess that is now am industry practice, working this way. I have never been able to read their minds and obviously the manufacturers' noses work better than us modellers for money.

It must be like walking on thin ice in today's world. Wrong steps may be very costly and can easily end your business life, Kitty Hawk being a very sad but most recent example.

A Lancaster or a B-17 in 1/32 from Tamiya would be selling like hot cakes, we would think. But apparently that is not how Tamiya sees it and with so many decades of market leadership, they must have real business reasons behind it.

[Zola25]

23 minutes ago, Violator1991 said:

 

A Lancaster or a B-17 in 1/32 from Tamiya would be selling like hot cakes, we would think. But apparently that is not how Tamiya sees it and with so many decades of market leadership, they must have real business reasons behind it.

I wish that would be true but I believe that such a model would be even pricier than the Border Model version..

 

However I also find it really strange that a few simple re-boxings from Tamiya have not appeared. It seems like very low hanging fruit to me. I am sure a re-boxing of the F-16 Block 32 would easily outsell the P-51 Korea re-boxing for example. Its really hard to read the minds of the good people at Tamiya

 

That being said, there is also a limit to how much re-boxing you can do - did we really need 7 versions of the Blackhawk / Seahawk from Kitty Hawk?

But it is a bit worrying that some of the very productive manufacturers like Trumpeter are also not releasing much in 1/32 anymore.. Good thing I still have a big stash to dig into 

[Grizly]

I know the discussion has deviated from Border Model's Lanc but in keeping with the current thread, I truly hope Tamiya would produce a 1/32 P-38 J/L as a companion to their Mosquito. Yes, I know, Trumpeter has a kit (which I have), but..... wait, maybe Great Wall will produce a 1/32 P-38J/L. After all, they have already mastered the Allison engine. Just think, a 1/32 P-38 with an easily viewed cockpit, two nacelles with detailed Allison engines (OK, I'd settle for just the one opened up) and a detailed nose gun bay.

As for the Border Model's Lancaster, I'm sure it is an amazing kit/model and the detail offered is outstanding but despite being a died-in-the-wool 1/32 modeller, the size of a 1/32 Lanc is just too much for me. Accordingly, my two Tamiya 1/48 builds and 1/48 HKM conversion to a late Canadian B.X  project will be just fine for me.

[ScoobyDoo]

3 hours ago, Dave Williams said:

I still can’t believe that Tamiya never released a glass nosed Mosquito bomber.  I understand that maybe the Mosquito FB boxing may have lost money overall, but releasing a bomber would just seem to be the incremental cost of new parts (the molds for which may have already been cut), new decals, and new packaging.  It would seem like a bomber release would at least make back the incremental cost, and any excess would go to reduce the overall loss of the series.

 

Similarly, why not reissue the F-16 Thunderbirds kit as a regular Block 32?  That’s just decals and packaging.  Again, it seems like the incremental cost would be more than paid for.  But, Tamiya has always worked in mysterious ways.

Tamiya doesn’t always make sense expanding on what they have.

[Citadelgrad]

4 hours ago, ScoobyDoo said:

Tamiya doesn’t always make sense expanding on what they have.

Not just Tamiya.  Hasegawa’s 190D9 has a separate tail, undoubtedly so they could issue a metal tailed TA 152 or other variants, but they never did.  Similarly, their Raiden (iirc) has unneeded machine gun troughs in the cowling that need to be filled to depict the markings issued, again, undoubtedly to permit another version.  This, too, never happened, and i am no expert on either type, but this seems like a minimal expense to issue the next step.  

[Dave Williams]

7 hours ago, Citadelgrad said:

Not just Tamiya.  Hasegawa’s 190D9 has a separate tail, undoubtedly so they could issue a metal tailed TA 152 or other variants, but they never did.  Similarly, their Raiden (iirc) has unneeded machine gun troughs in the cowling that need to be filled to depict the markings issued, again, undoubtedly to permit another version.  This, too, never happened, and i am no expert on either type, but this seems like a minimal expense to issue the next step.  

Hasegawa’s 190D was released with the larger TA152 tail in at least one Hasegawa boxing.

 

https://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10316473

 

The Revell rebox of the kit also included both tails.

 

https://www.scalemates.com/products/img/1/9/7/103197-72-instructions.pdf

 

Hasegawa released their Raiden kit twice as the early J2M2, which had nose guns.

 

https://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10519757

 

https://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10183015
 

[mozart]

This thread seems to have wandered a long, long way from discussion about Border Model's Lancaster! 

Edited December 30, 2021 by mozart