Worst model quality?

[Tim R-T-C]

1 hour ago, Seahawk said:

 

(is this beginning to sound like the Four Yorkshireman sketch?)

 

Yes.

 

And all the more entertaining for it! 

[tomprobert]

Anyone built a Combat Models vacform?

 

I personally feel that nothing comes close in regard to the ultimate title of “challenging kit” until you’ve built one of those...

[Giorgio N]

1 hour ago, Seahawk said:

Pah!  Andy Pack beats that even on box-art.  They were adorned with amateur watercolours in what I believe is properly called the naive style (and the rest of us call not being able to draw).
 

(is this beginning to sound like the Four Yorkshireman sketch?)

 

I have only seen pictures of the Andy Pack kits, and sure do look pretty bad...

However I've seen this kit in person and I feel this may be a contender:

 

https://www.scalemates.com/it/kits/firefox-04-yak-28pm-firebar-interceptor--626740

 

Now the picture linked doesn't look too bad, but the copy i was offered for sale was much worse and that day I discovered a totally new definition of flash... flash was so bad that had made the whole sprues look like one single slab of plastic from which some parts emerged. The thickness of the flash was such that it was hard to understand where the wings ended and the flash started. fuselage halves also looked different enough in size to promise some interesting fit challenge... unless of course the flash around them was there to help aligning everything. Now maybe that particular kit was an unlucky one that had slipped through quality control, but for some reason I feel that what I saw was not that uncommon with that kit.

In the end I thanked the dealer and I preferred to buy a Contrail Albemarle for the same money since I concluded that cutting all parts from the backing sheets of a vacuform and scratchbuilding most details would have been a much easier job than freeing the Yak-28 parts from that sea of plastic...

Edited August 12, 2021 by Giorgio N

[Paul Thompson]

29 minutes ago, Giorgio N said:

 

I have only seen pictures of the Andy Pack kits, and sure do look pretty bad...

However I've seen this kit in person and I feel this may be a contender:

 

https://www.scalemates.com/it/kits/firefox-04-yak-28pm-firebar-interceptor--626740

 

tic...

     Including the plastic colour, that looks a lot like a Hit Kit production (awful plastic, very nice PE, extensive multiple decal sheets that might or might not perform like decal sheets). Since they covered several WW1 subjects that weren't much touched by anyone else at the time I've made a few, but the Albatrosses, for instance, could vary from looking okay-ish on the sprue to  the bits-sticking-out-of-a-sea-of-flash Giorgio describes. So long as you could identify which bits weren't kit and remove them, fit wasn't too bad, although the parts breakdown (and I'm mostly thinking Breguet 19 here, and trying to forget........) was off the wall to say the least. I pressume it was all done on a limited performance table-top machine, like Veeday and Merlin. Eventually several of the Albatrosses started turning up very cheaply second hand, and I collected them as a cost-effective source of PE and decals for Blue Rider conversions, with the benefit of a free kit that may or may never get built. But unlike some of the Merlins, all the Hit Kit stuff could be turned into good looking models, albeit with far more effort than the sane would consider expending.

 

Paul.

[tempestfan]

On 8/9/2021 at 9:36 PM, Beermonster1958 said:

The aforementioned Ju-287 is intriguing. I seem to recall kit bashing article for one of those from an article in one of the Airfix annual modelling guides!

Fuselage that was half He-177 &  half balsa. Engines from the Me - 262, Ju-87 undercarriage for the nose wheels......! Can't remember where the the rest came from! Happy days!!😉😂

 

John.

Maybe B-24 wheels as in the original? And as the rear fuselage and tail was from a Ju 288 (or 388?) in full scale, maybe from a Matchbox 188 - that would have been at least one purpose that kit could usefully serve except from going to the bin... Huma did a 287 too, but wouldn't fit in this thread really. Sadly the Huma moulds seem to have been lost. 

On 8/9/2021 at 11:23 PM, AWFK10 said:

I think the worst kit I ever bought was a 1/72 Yak 7. I've no idea who made it, except that they were presumably Russian as the murky polythene bag that was the only packaging contained a smudged instruction sheet in Russian, printed on something with the texture of ancient, browned newspaper. The kit itself was moulded in psychedelic bright green, with abundant flash. Needless to say the fit was awful, while the canopy was a scale foot thick, semi-opaque and shot through with moulding flaws. The decals were of a similar standard to the first batch of Novo kits, i.e. completely useless as they shattered on exposure to water. Around the same time (late 1980s) I also bought a Wellington 1 of similar provenance, produced from the Frog mould - though I don't think Frog ever managed to release the kit before they went bust and it ended up in the Soviet Union. It was atrocious, with shot-shot parts and unusable transparencies

I have both of those - it's been a long time I had a look at the Yak, but I don't think it was worse than most other late Soviet cottage kits. The Wellington mould indeed does not seem to have been finished by Frog, but the Soviets produced the regardless. With adapted Airfix instructions that do not really correlate with the kit parts 🙂

On 8/10/2021 at 8:53 PM, SafetyDad said:

 

I'm not sure that folks criticise 21st Century kits that much? (I presume you mean the short-lived and now OOP manufacturer?). I recall a few reviews when they originally appeared stating that the decal sheet alone was worth the price of purchase. They were available originally in outlets such as Home Bargains here in the UK for the princely sum of £2.99  each... 

 

Yep, that's a 1/32 kit for £3.

 

The decal sheets for the Ju 87 Stuka, Macchi Mc 205 and the Bf 109 are first class (but they would be, having been overseen by Roy Sutherland). The Stuka sheet (with the snake markings) reflects the current state-of-the-art findings as revealed by Axel Urbanke in Luftwaffe im Focus. It's the best set of markings available for that particular airframe - much better than any aftermarket sheet.

 

I agree - they're great kits

 

Indeed the reviews are generally very favourable (Brett Green IIRC praised the 109), and 3 quid gives value for money a very solid meaning. I would have wanted to buy one or the other, but they were not on general sale here AFAIK, and the few that may be found these days usually have a tag starting at 40 €, plus s&h. I'm mad but not THAT mad.

54 minutes ago, tomprobert said:

Anyone built a Combat Models vacform?

 

I personally feel that nothing comes close in regard to the ultimate title of “challenging kit” until you’ve built one of those...

Never even attempted to build one, but I have a number including the Cutlass, which really would be a tempting subject. They are certainly demanding as so much will have to be scratchbuilt, but I wouldn't dare to put a "bad" tag on them just for that reason.

 

Returning to ***bad***, there was a Czech producer named Dubena who did some really atrocious vacs, like Yak 15 and 17. I had a go at the 15 but the fuselage is much too narrow (and no, I didn't sand too much - I guess it would have been alright in breadth without any sanding). And then there was some Polish manufacturer (late 80s, I think) who did a Hurricane and a Spit IX UTI - at least the Spit also was decidely slimline.

[Max Headroom]

7 hours ago, Tim R-T-C said:

 

Yes.

 

And all the more entertaining for it! 

Flash?

 

We used to dream of flash!

 

Trevor

[SafetyDad]

12 hours ago, Seahawk said:

Pah!  Andy Pack beats that even on box-art.  They were adorned with amateur watercolours in what I believe is properly called the naive style (and the rest of us call not being able to draw).
 

 

Wonderful!

SD

[SafetyDad]

20 hours ago, tomprobert said:

Anyone built a Combat Models vacform?

 

I personally feel that nothing comes close in regard to the ultimate title of “challenging kit” until you’ve built one of those...

 

 

In the 1970s, as a teenager, I bought a vac from a company called Battledec - it was a 1/32 vac Ho 229 - the stuff of dreams back then. It was awful!  The plastic was paper thin, no surface details, no detail parts at all, just the two wing halves and a canopy. 

Bit like Combat Models I suppose...    I don't have one, but I've seen pictures.

 

SD

[bentwaters81tfw]

22 hours ago, tomprobert said:

Anyone built a Combat Models vacform?

 

I personally feel that nothing comes close in regard to the ultimate title of “challenging kit” until you’ve built one of those...

Tom, you are giving me nightmares again. This thing haunts me from the shelf just over my shoulder. Perhaps I should commission you to fight build it for me.

[HansReggelsen]

I once tried - TRIED - to build the Red Hurricane 1/72 Yak-28. 

Lots and lots of flash so thick one couldn't make out where the trailing edge of the wings stopped and the flash began. 

It's still up there in the attic never to get down again unless I really, really want to feel sorry for myself (and I don't ) 

Life is just too short for some kits! And I have some others in the stash! 

 

Cheers

Hans J