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matchbox kits?


modelfan

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I'd add one more reason to Giorgio's list -- the satisfaction of taking a Matchbox kit and making something you're proud of from it. It doesn't have to be "like being a beginner modeller". It doesn't matter what you start with -- surely any model that you've enjoyed making and got a result that you're happy with is worth doing? I'm pleased with that 109 -- it's one of the best models I've made, IMHO -- and I'd have been pleased with that result if the plastic I'd started with had been the Eduard "Weekend" Edition as well. As it is, I had other reasons to start with a Matchbox kit, but that doesn't make me any LESS happy with the outcome!

On the "kits that Matchbox actually did well", I'd add the 1/32 cars to the list -- they are as good or better than any other 1/32 car kits that I've seen (up there with Airfix's best 70s vintage cars like the Magnette and Prince Henry). And the variety of subjects is pretty impressive...

bestest,

M.

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The matchbox Boston is not one of their good kits. It's very crude, no representation of the engines, wheels and landing gears are a joke, panel lines a mix of trenches and raised... The shape is also quite bad, with nacelles that are bloated, intakes of totally wrong shape and so on....

A few years ago a Russian modeller built a great model out of for Model Aircraft Monthly, again showing that it's possible to make a great model out of a very poor kit. However the number of parts that he modified, scratchbuilt or replaces was such that in the end very little remained of the original kit. A modeller with those skills could well start from a lump of plastic and make a model.

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Oh I don't know. I don't think it looks so bad.

http://airfixtributeforum.myfastforum.org/viewtopic.php?t=7846&start=0

Main issues are the fat nacelles, the "plug" for the turret (it looks better without) and the centre-split glass nose option. I'd still prefer to build the Matchbox warts and all rather than the MPM because modelling is supposed to be enjoyable and not the equivalent of trying to complete one jigsaw with pieces from several others. And I really detest MPM's "vinyl" plastic which seems to be impervious to many forms of cement. If you really want a challenging build then the High Planes family offers that with proper plastic.

The old Revell is about the best of the historic mainstream. but hopefully Airfix might give us a new one.

Nick

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As a recent returner to model building after a long time away, and tackling it properly for the first time as an adult, I thought I'd add my two penneth.

I agree it's down to what you want from the hobby, the individual kit and how good you are.

I currently own 3 kits of the Me410 in 1/72 and one of those is the Matchbox kit from 1974. When I first looked at it I was horrified that I'd purchased a child's toy rather than a serious model, but when I compared it to the Fine molds and italeri kits, the level of detail for something that was made before I was born impresses me.

Perhaps I'm a bit pathetic but to me, inside that box is a gem just waiting to be built. Whether or not my skills will do it justice is down to me, but is part of the fun. For me, each kit has a story and so, if I can make it work OOB then that's what I like to do. Either way, it has to be better than it ending up in landfill, having never even been started.

Richard

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The thing about Matchbox was they often tended to get some sniffy reviews as if they were kits somehow not worthy of "serious" modellers - but but a six year old in 1973, Matchbox were about the most exciting kits out there at the time with their exciting and informative artwork, coloured plastic, interesting decals and alternative parts, and they were cheap!

Which is why they are my default choice for some stress-off/fun-on modelling.

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X-kit the Revell fuselage with the MB nacelles to get the best!!

Their pre-War Biplanes are excellent, and most haven't been surpassed yet.

Agree about the biplanes. People who just dismiss Matchbox kits are either foolish or determined scratch builders.

X-Kit ≠ OOB

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I have built several of this kits, both aircraft and armor. As has been said some are better than others, and they can lack some important details, but if you want a kit of some things they are it.

They are still the only ones to have done a plastic Char B1 in small scale, and their Ft 17 was the only plastic one in small scale for years.

I have built their He-115 in the middle 80's and have another one under construction, and I find it a nice kit.

They are fun kits, and with a little work most can be built to produce very nice looking display models, maybe not show winners, but still some thing to take pride in.

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I built an Academy Spitfire XIV a few months ago and was very disappointed with its overall shape. So, even though it went together well, it didn't really look like a Spitfire to me.

Matchbox did a Spitfire IX but I wouldn't bother with it today.

Their best kits were the inter-war biplanes. Most of these have not been produced by anyone else - even 30 plus years on.

Just acquired a Matchbox IX/XVI version on eBay. I'll be interested to see how it compares with the other Spits I've got.

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It's not one of their better ones.

These are the native-tool Matchbox kits which from personal knowledge I am still prepared to pick up at the right price (and have done!).

All the 1/32 cars.

All the AFVs as far as I know, which is not very far because I know three-fifths of very little about armour. But theyare small and cute and come with lovely little diorama settings (in some boxings at least).

All the biplanes, and that's a lot of kits!

Lysander - way better than the Airfix one which has upside-down wings

FW190A - it's very simple - but was the first basically shape-accurate 190A kit

Strikemaster

Tempest II/VI

T-2C Buckeye

Percival Provost (the piston-engined one)

LTV Corsair (the jet)

Beaufighter - funny cowls, but fixable

Buccaneer

Ju 188

Me 410

Hunter

F9F Panther

Meteor night-fighter

Norseman

He 115

Wellington

Twin Otter

Spey Phantom

English Electric Lightning

Do 18

1/32 Sea Venom (not easy to build)

1/32 Lysander (not easy to build)

1/32 Bf 109E

H-P Victor

Privateer / Liberator VI

Halifax

1/48 AD-5 Skyraider

1/48 FJ-4B Fury

Through slightly clenched teeth, the 1/32 Spitfire 22/24 - there is no modern replacement for this but it's a bear to build and the windscreen is glaringly wrong, but I really ought to just man up and crash-mould a new one.

Ones that have been superseded but may still be worth building if you have them already:

Gnat

Lancaster - useful for the bulged bomb bay, otherwise go with the recently superseded Airfix kit which is often available cheap in bagged shots

Ones I would avoid because the have accuracy issues which annoy me or there are better low-cost kits available (note especially that for some reason I have never understood, Hasegawa kits in old boxes are vastly cheaper second-hand than the same plastic in new boxes):

Spitfire IX/XVI - buy Heller for the XVI, new Airfix for the IX

Hurricane IIc - buy Heller instead

Mustang IV - buy an old Hasegawa kit instead

Hellcat - buy an old Hasegawa kit instead

Bf 109E - buy new Airfix

Me 262 - buy Revell

P-38 - buy old Hasegawa

P-47 - buy Revell or Academy or old Hasegawa

Brewster Buffalo - buy Revell or possibly Airfix

Bf 110 - buy Fujimi or Revell-Monogram

B-17 - buy old Hasegawa

The many kits not mentioned either way are ones where I don't know enough the kit to say, or don't know enough about the subject to say, or both.

Edited by Work In Progress
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Interesting thanks. Also on my recent after pub attack on eBay I got a Curtiss SBC-4 Helldiver and a Beaufighter X. I also went a bit mad on Frog kits

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I'd avoid the Ju 188 too - the Italeri one of similar vintage is far superior. The Me 410 has also been superceded by Italeri also.

The Hunter is passable if you want a trainer.

The Tempest II is a beauty, although the front cowling needs rounding off a bit, the canopy replacing and the cockpit detailed a bit. Even at inflated ebay prices, you can get them for at least half the price of the MPM/Special Hobby kit which is a nightmare to build thanks to all the ill fitting resin - especially the wheel well bay insert.

Edited by The wooksta V2.0
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The Tempest II is a beauty, although the front cowling needs rounding off a bit, the canopy replacing and the cockpit detailed a bit. Even at inflated ebay prices, you can get them for at least half the price of the MPM/Special Hobby kit which is a nightmare to build thanks to all the ill fitting resin - especially the wheel well bay insert.

Agreed fully on the Tempest!

One of the nicest Tempest II models I ever saw was the Matchbox kit cross kitted with the Heller/Smer kit.

Knowing the frustrations of the later MPM Tempest II first hand, I'd sooner buy a Matchbox and Heller/Smer kit and do my own kit bash did I want to do a Tempest II again.

One of the most important things to remember about Matchbox kits is that while most of them were quite spartan in finer details, many of them are still quite respected for capturing the lines of the original quite well.

The Percival Provost T.1, which was mentioned in a few other posts, is one of those kits which is known to have got the external shapes pretty much bang on. If you don't want to put out for the new CMR resin kit of the piston provost, which I understand has some accuracy issues, then the Matchbox one is the only game in town and likely to remain so.

I so wish Revell would reissue that kit, I have so many ideas for it.

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I have built several of this kits, both aircraft and armor. As has been said some are better than others, and they can lack some important details, but if you want a kit of some things they are it.

They are still the only ones to have done a plastic Char B1 in small scale, and their Ft 17 was the only plastic one in small scale for years.

I have built their He-115 in the middle 80's and have another one under construction, and I find it a nice kit.

They are fun kits, and with a little work most can be built to produce very nice looking display models, maybe not show winners, but still some thing to take pride in.

Not the only producer of a 1/72 Char B. Trumpeter make one, too.

http://www.trumpeter-china.com/a/gb2312/product/armor/1_72xilie/2010/0907/730.html

Chris

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The matchbox hunter is IMHO a disaster shapewise, particularly the front where the fuselage sections are too wide while being of the correct height. The result is that every section that should be round becomes oval. The canopy suffers as well as a result, being too wide at the front. The two-seater parts are better but again the shape of the forward fuselage is not good and the fairing behind the canopy is really too square in section. Aeroclub used to do a couple of vacform corrections for both single and two-seaters that dramatically improved the shape of the models.

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I have the Wellesley in the "slowly being built at glacial pace" pile right now. I've always been a modeller who preferred an accurate outline to gobs of internal detail so several old Matchbox kits fit neatly into my way of working. The fact that so many kits were unusual is an added bonus - Seafox, Heyford, Wellesley, Fury, Siskin.

My first memory of modelling was my Mum buying me 2 Matchbox kits - a Gnat and an F4B - at Woodford airshow in about 1974. She built them for me. A few months layer, I built my very first model - a Frog Mosquito. Halcyon days!!!

Edited by mhaselden
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