sroubos

My Excel database tells me I got it at Hannants on May 1st 2011 and paid 11 quid for it. Most disappointing At least I had fun building the Airfix kit.

This happens to me whenever I grab the wooden floor cleaner and proceed to douse the kit I spent the last three months working on with it. This makes absolutely no sense to her.

Just got the Swordfish MF version last week What an incredible accomplishment in molding technology, it looks really impressive on the sprues. Looking forward to building it.

Is the Airfix really much better than the Xtrakit? It was a joy to build but also quite crude with deep panel lines.

I'm not sure how they can avoid the seam in the middle. The canopy is simply wider in cross-section in the middle than at the bottom so they need to mold it sideways rather than conventionally top and bottom or the shape would be off - as in fact it is on many fighter jet kits produced before say, 2005. I'm not sure which manufacturer was the first to do this. I agree with you it's a pain to get rid off but with some fine sandpaper, a nail polishing block and some toothpaste it will buff right out - or so I'm told

You might be able to find this somewhere if you're lucky: http://www.rising.risingdecals.com/index.php/photo-etched-parts/177-acc-004-h-6-radar-antenna-for-b5n2-kate

Yes that's what it looks like to me as well.

Sorry but I'm still missing something here I think, why is this 'airspace' not covered by the resin extensions then?

Scary stuff. I have the conversion, a KLM decal set and a brand new second hand DC-6 from Heller but they are not going to the top of the build pile just yet. What's the deal with the large gaps between the wing root resin extensions and the top wings by the way?

Going! Taking my four-year old son to his first show. He put together his first kit earlier this year and he loves planes already, so he's ready for his initiation

What happened to the '72nd scale' revolution? Since they announced that four years ago we have only had downscaled versions of the Spit IX, D-VII and Mig-21. All great kits but hardly a revolution. I was expecting a line to rival Tamiya's Warbird series in 72 scale but we're not quite there, to put it mildly. Shame, because Eduard's weekend edition kits are all fantastic value for money.

Not familiar with the type but that's actually quite a sexy-looking aircraft. I'll get one.

I believe Hasegawa is a privately-owned company which would explain why there is little financial information available on them but I have read somewhere that 90% of their products are sold in Japan. The fact that this flyer is only printed in Japanese supports that; they simply do not care that much about what sells outside Japan. From a business perspective that makes perfect sense. Hasegawa's import prices are set by their distributors and have always been very high. I doubt it impacts their profitability because the overseas volumes are small compared to the home market. I have visited Japan and was lucky enough to get some time to visit many model stores in Tokyo, Shizuoka and Osaka; the situation there is a complete reverse from model stores here and kind of what you'd expect really: Japanese brands are about the price of similar Airfix, Revell and Eduard kits here, but those same brands are completely unaffordable in Japan. An Airfix Series 2 kit was over 25 quid. I doubt you'd conclude from that that Airfix was harming it's long term viability with that price point. Most likely nobody at Airfix has even an idea of what their kits sell for in Akihabara. In the end I think we should be thankful we have so many companies releasing kits these days and at such a high level of quality. 1/48 and 1/72 aircraft kits are not exactly underrepresented with new tools in the market as a whole. Hasegawa may not contribute much to that particular segment in recent years but they are a major company that keeps a lot of people building plastic model kits of high quality and that is an important contribution to sustaining the hobby in the long run.

I too would like to see more 1/72 WWII subjects but the point was not 'they make no 1/72 WWII', it was 'nothing new'. The latter statement is simply untrue. https://www.scalemates.com/search.php?q=hasegawa*&fkSECTION[]=Kits&fkCOMPNAME[]="Hasegawa"&fkORIGIN[]="1"&fkTYPENAME[]="Full kits"&fkYEAR[]="2018"&fkYEAR[]="2017"&fkYEAR[]="2016"&fkYEAR[]="2019" 38 new tools since 2016. How many companies do that? Admittedly, I would prefer it to be more skewed towards WWII 72nd scale planes rather than vehicles and ships but I don't determine what the market in Japan seems to want. Since they make the vast majority of their profit in the home market it's not surprising they are not quite aligned with our more European focus areas. However, I would say it's rather unfair to criticize them for that. Do you criticize a chippy for not selling pizza? In the end I'm quite grateful for Hasegawa for what they give me. I like the re-releases as well, although I won't pay European prices for them. If you don't like it, leave it on the shelf.

This is what they release in a single month. You may not like all the reboxings but some will ( I like that Stratos and the Dinah) and at least with Hasegawa you know most tools will come round on a regular basis (although some seem to take longer than others). They also release new tools throughout the year, and about the same number as Tamiya, Revell and Airfix, to name a few large companies. And when they do the quality is only bettered by Tamiya. Price-wise, get them straight from Japan through any number of online sources and you will not pay the crazy amounts they go for here in Europe.