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AZmodel/Legato/Admiral WWII aircraft - comments, questions and wishes


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Joachim: what problem did you find with the RS D520 kit? I have completed made two - the Ki 60 and Ki 78 - and found both of them simple and straightforward. A bit too reliant on etch for the finer details, but some people like that because of the finer parts. I am having trouble with the Ar 76, but with a parasol wing that's not surprising. It has mainly been delayed because of unhappiness of the darkness of the colour I used, and I can't blame that on RS.

PS There was also a Frog, but I don't think you'd like that one either.

Graham,

Some mixup with quotes here, I think – I just mentioned that Heller also made a D.520. I've never built a French a/c and probably never will… ;-)

Kind regards,

Joachim

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Dear Dominik,

No, our new Spitfire Mk it, II, V b / Vc for KP is a completely new form.

Unfortunately, some thought into new KP boxes we put the old short run model.

It is not true. Therefore discover the bad and false information.

We are very sorry that we have a new model not finish in Telford.

Alternatively, in respect of D-520.

I think that the moment for this model is not a free market.

It's a beautiful machine, maybe sometime later.

The company Dewoitine I can tell you that we have now completed production planning the family's new D-500 / D-501 and D-510th

I think it was very successful and will be on sale around 1Q / 2016.

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Good morning

For the D 520 kits see there

https://www.scalemates.com/search-solr.php?fkSECTION[]=Kits&q=D+520+1%2F72&qs=Search

Joachim

I completelly forgot about that. It's the one reboxed by Czech Smer, isn't it? But Heller could prepare completely new D.520 (although it's a tank, their latest Sherman looks fab).

Good morning Joachim

Unfortunately Heller is not in the capacity of producing a lot a of new kits like Airfix , they should release a new Alpha jet before the end of this year , they are more oriented towards cars and AFV ..

Patrice

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Hi Petr,

Just a couple of thoughts here; a good injection-molded Piper PA-18/L-18/L-21 should sell better than the J-3/L-4 ever did...but why bother with more Spitfires? Any mark you choose will be duplicated effort...& the same can be said of most of the other war planes on this list. Who is asking for yet another Bf109, FW190D, P-51D, etc.?

-Lars

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I could not agree more.... I burned out pretty fast on the rehashing of of planes by every major kit company. I have boxes of Mustangs , Spitfires , Zeros and every other Warbird you can imagine by just about every company out there. I'm sure the market must still be good for those type of kits but I don't plan on buying more..... I would buy several PA-18's along with any other General Aviation plane that was produced. Something new would be a pleasant change and maybe even attract a new group of people to our hobby !

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On the other hands, modelling enthusiasts like us probably make up a diminutive percentage of kit buyers. Of course we think that manufacturers should release those esoteric subjects that are close to our hearts, but we are a minority at the cash register.

I guess that major manufacturers do have some sort of general market research to back up their production plans. Personally, I wouldn't mind a good Mk XIV. Early Bf 109s aren't done to death, either.

That said, I think that a 1:48th Caproni Ca.313 would sell in hundreds of thousands, so what are the manufacturers waiting for? ;-)

Kind regards,

Joachim

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Petr

One thought - early Bf 109's - that is 109A, 109B and 109C/D are well worth making. As well, 2016 will be the anniversary of the Spanish Civil War, so there will be many modellers interested in these.

Philip

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I am looking forward to the new series of early version Spitfires if they are to the standard of their Mk.IX kit as there isn't currently a good kit on the market. The Airfix Mk.I has huge trenches as panel lines and the Tamiya Mk.I and V has some shape issues.

It would also be nice if they make a Mk.Ia and not only a b.

Cheers, Peter

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Don't look now, Joachim, but we plastic modelers are a diminutive & ever-shrinking percentage of the overall population, in part due to the boring sameness of most "new" releases from decade to decade. Want early 109's? Heller did a decent C in 1:72 & Hobbycraft did it in 1:48. Tamiya is notorious for releasing the most expensive but second- or third-best in quality kit of whatever they do, but I'd be surprised if your choices for Spitfire Mk.I kits are limited to them or Airfix. Given a much lower-priced kit with better shapes, if I wanted another, I'd just fill the trenches & have at it. Why wait for doubled prices & incremental improvements?

Market research? They look at what has already sold many thousands of copies & make more. No wonder the Golden Age of plastic kits has passed; the market for "Messerspitstangs" is glutted & all too many of the majors can think to do differently is tool up for WWII Nazi airplanes that never existed, or military prototypes nobody ever heard of.

The PBM Mariner won a modeling magazine's "most wanted" survey over 15 years ago & now we have 2 IM kits, but the Mach2 release is typical for them (how sad) & the Minicraft (better quality, lower price) kit, which finally appeared a decade after first hype, represents the one version nobody was actually waiting for: the PBM-5A that never saw combat (with combat box art, of course). Market research? Pardon my skepticism. Better they should research the subjects.

I'm currently manufacturing a 1:72 vac & resin Cessna 180/185 kit &, judging by the responses I've gotten, this will be another major hit as an injection molded subject. Petr & AZ will sell several hundred for every one I've sold because a "mainstream" kit will make it more accessable to builders with less time &/or experience. This will bust me back to selling after-market floats for the thing & I'll still be glad to be a part of the process. EDO 2000 sections are worked up for the PA-18, too; they're already needed in 3 scales...but I'll likely never solid cast them at 1:32 & Revell, trying to cash in on bush plane "sex appeal", molded amphib floats for theirs that are only ever seen on pampered private weekenders.

-Lars

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Don't look now, Joachim, but we plastic modelers are a diminutive & ever-shrinking percentage of the overall population, in part due to the boring sameness of most "new" releases from decade to decade.

Well… Just now, Tarangus announced a J 32B/E Lansen in 1:72nd and a Scottish Aviation Bulldog/Swedish AF SK 61 light trainer in 1/48th. Pilot Replicas just released the SAAB J 21A-3 (an esoteric subject by any reckoning) in a mainstream 1:48th kit, following up with a J 29F and (soon, hopefully) a SAAB 105/SK 60 jet trainer/light attack, also in same scales. Hackneyed subjects? Apparently, they're selling well, too, in spite of prices around 50 quid or more.

Seems to me the plastic modelling circuit is alive and kicking. Just sayin'…

Kind regards,

Joachim

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No wonder the Golden Age of plastic kits has passed; the market for "Messerspitstangs" is glutted & all too many of the majors can think to do differently is tool up for WWII Nazi airplanes that never existed, or military prototypes nobody ever heard of.

I would say we are right in the middle of the Golden Age. Kits of almost every imaginable era, country and manufacturer are being produced. Of course, an FW-190 will sell better than a Fokker T-V but this year sees releases for both of them. The market will need those 190s to pay for the Fokkers, but in the end everyone is happy. Hundreds of new kits are released every year, far more than ever before (no I don't have hard numbers but that is the feeling I get when I look at release schedules). I'm sure we can all name a long list of kits we'd like to see (and we do, every year around this time) but I think most would agree that what the market gives you is way in excess of what you can build in many lifetimes.

Don't look now, Joachim, but we plastic modelers are a diminutive & ever-shrinking percentage of the overall population, in part due to the boring sameness of most "new" releases from decade to decade.

I somehow doubt that non-modellers, when being asked why they have no interest in the hobby, state that they feel there are too many Messerschmitts and Mustangs on the shelf and that they would have started building kits had they only found that model of a Piper L-4 they'd been dreaming of :D

As for modellers giving up the hobby, see my top comment. Even if you don't like building well-known planes, there is an insane amount of esoteric subjects in short-run, resin and vacform out there.

Edited by sroubos
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When people talk of a Golden Age, as opposed to whenever they first started modelling, it is usually the late 50/60/early70s, where kits were on sale in every local newsagents and playground talk was about the latest releases. OK, that's when I started too, but nonetheless I hold it to be true. Production runs were enormous by modern standards, but choice? Quality? Today is a different Golden Age, where production runs are low, prices high, retail distribution limited, but choice enormous - providing that you buy it when it comes out rather than putting it off for another day. Kits are also much more detailed and (generally) considerably more accurate. Quality can still be variable - depending upon how you define it, of course.

I must admit being amazed at the suggestion of Tamiya being "notorious for releasing the most expensive but second or third best in quality". To the contrary, they are certainly not the most expensive (in the UK or their home market) and I see them as usually the highest in quality of fit and accuracy. Few of their range are as inaccurate as their 1/72 Spitfire - but the fit is beautiful even there. If anything their quality is regarded as the Golden Standard for kits, perhaps to excess I might agree!

As for a diminutive and ever-shrinking proportion: isn't that an argument from the 1990s? I've certainly been hearing it since then. It doesn't fit with the boom in numbers of model shows, and their soaring attendances. Any single hobby can be defined as "diminutive" when compared with the whole population, away from the latest crazes. But somehow people carry on with crochet and birdwatching and even making models.

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we plastic modelers are a diminutive & ever-shrinking percentage of the overall population, in part due to the boring sameness of most "new" releases from decade to decade.

-Lars

Really? Do you have some evidence for that?

I have been struck by the number of people, just here at Britmodeller, who write about their returning to the hobby or taking it up for the first time. The number of companies in the market catering to the hobby is phenomenal, with a diversity of products that far exceeds anything available in the so-called "Golden Age".

Do you wear a hat? I think you must be talking out of it. :winkgrin:

Nick

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Agree totally with the last 4 posts. If you don't like new models of types that keep being done, don't buy them. As others have said, gaps are being plugged all the time. I for one am happy to see all these new Spitfires, Hurricanes, Bf109's Fw190's etc as these are my favourite subjects and if the new kits raise the quality, then so much the better. Model Manufacturers are businesses and need to sell things and make profits to survive, they can't just rely on subjects that only a minority are interested in, otherwise they won't get far.

thanks

Mike

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I like Spitfires and if me buying Spitfires means a manufacturer can produce a Westland Lysander then I'm even happier.

I'm even happy when a Bf109 or Fw190 or Mustang is released because it might mean the revenue generated will be used to make a Fairey Battle.

Generally, I'm a happy man... as long as more Spitfires are released.

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  • 2 months later...

Dear friends,

let me inform you about a big change in communication from the side of KP and AZ model - from January we will release our newsletter called AVIZO where you will find info about our new products and some facts from company life. In the near future it will be linked with e-shop to make your kit purchase as easy as possible.

Here you can see beta versions

KP - http://www.kovozavody.cz/avizo/

AZ - http://azmodel.cz/avizo/AVIZOAZ-EN-0016.pdf

Your comments what and how to improve it are welcomed.....

Jan

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When people talk of a Golden Age, as opposed to whenever they first started modelling, it is usually the late 50/60/early70s, where kits were on sale in every local newsagents and playground talk was about the latest releases. OK, that's when I started too, but nonetheless I hold it to be true. Production runs were enormous by modern standards, but choice? Quality? Today is a different Golden Age, where production runs are low, prices high, retail distribution limited, but choice enormous - providing that you buy it when it comes out rather than putting it off for another day. Kits are also much more detailed and (generally) considerably more accurate. Quality can still be variable - depending upon how you define it, of course.

As for a diminutive and ever-shrinking proportion: isn't that an argument from the 1990s? I've certainly been hearing it since then. It doesn't fit with the boom in numbers of model shows, and their soaring attendances.

I live in a town in rural Greece, population around 50.000.

When I was a teenager (25 years ago) there were about a dozen local shops selling models (two of them fully stocked with a full range of paints, tools, materials even airbrushes; the rest book/toy/newsagent type shops selling just kits). Today there are none.

Diminutive and shrinking proportion is not just an argument, it's a fact.

The main difference is that today's modellers are mostly middle aged & with apparently infinite disposable income (look at the size of people's stashes in the relevant threads here and in Hyperscale's Plane Talking.) Hence they have far far more buying power than we kids had back in the early 90s. That's what's driving the industry to release even bigger & bigger kits (1/32 B-17, 1-35 tank transporters etc) and that's the driving force behind all those small manufacturers releasing all those esoteric subjects.

I agree with Graham that this is the true Golden Age of modelling (If you have the money to buy & the time to build; I have neither).

Edited by Panoz
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When I was a teenager (25 years ago) there were about a dozen local shops selling models (two of them fully stocked with a full range of paints, tools, materials even airbrushes; the rest book/toy/newsagent type shops selling just kits). Today there are none.

The same could probably be said for bookshops, record stores, video stores and a whole host of other high street shops. The reason for this is that the internet has changed the way people shop. In particular in segments where it's hard to compete with online alternatives, high street retailers will suffer. How does a model shop compete when it has maybe 500 kits on the shelves if an online store can offer 100 times that at often lower prices?

I think it's sad that model kits disappeared from the high street just as I miss browsing in book stores and CD stores. But it doesn't mean people don't build model kits or listen to music any less than 20 years ago.

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Panoz: the situation you describe is much as I recall the UK in the 1970s, and even the eighties, although perhaps we'd be lucky to have two such dedicated model shops in a smallish town. However this had already declined dramatically by the 1990s, with the growth in computing/games devices displacing traditional hobbies such as model railways and model aircraft. That's when I saw/heard the prophets recounting the imminent extinction of the hobby. However, there has been a considerable resurgence since then, thanks mainly due to the Far East and Eastern European producers, but also I think due to the internet boosting access to more interesting subjects.

In the UK this wasn't helped because we reduced to one dominant manufacturer/supplier in itself going through a severe decline in the number and quality of new products, living on an increasingly aged and uncompetitive back catalogue. It took the arrival of new cheap higher quality products tooled and produced in China to revive the hobby - here it is perhaps clearer in the model railway side but is still visible on the model aircraft side. But no, I don't think that we'll ever go back to the boom times when everyone made models: there;s just too much competition from other hobby interests now.

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You all need to factor in Games Workshop over the past 20 years,as retail chains like Beatties ,Woolworths etc that sold scale model kits disappeared GW has opened more shops.They sell their own ranges of modelling products as well as their own plastic kits.Scale models they aren't but a strong modelling hobby presence is there.Kids today are less likely to build a Spitfire as their first model kit but are highly likely to glue together some Space Marines.300 hundred + stores worldwide,120+ in the UK ?.

As for AZ ,Allison Mustangs and those F-5A/B's .

Shane

Edited by Gwart
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GW are having their own problems at the moment as prices rocket and many veteran gamers appear to feel alienated. they feel game support is lost and the focus shift away from its original vision of games for gamers to money for the shareholders. Whilst I realise 3 Landraiders for £10 will never happen again, the costs to have a viable army, which you risk having become half useless with each update, is making it less and less attractive.

Still a little surprising that more aren't going for the cheaper (if one doesn't build up a huge stash :evil_laugh: ) option of plane/tank/ship modelling.

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