Airfix 2019

[Andre B]

Can't be a problem for Airfix to found out new kits to produce in 1/72.

 

There are no decent or correct P-51B/C or metallving Hurricane Mk.I. in 1/72. And what about a new F-86D Sabredog? And there are still no Scimitar...

 

Cheers / André

[RussellE]

12 hours ago, Meatbox8 said:

Unfortunately there's no MkXIV at Biggin Hill, or a MkVc as far as I know. 

EE602 is listed as a MkVC

 

and TA805 is listed as a MkIX🤔

Edited May 28, 2018 by RussellE

[VMA131Marine]

14 minutes ago, Andre B said:

Can't be a problem for Airfix to found out new kits to produce in 1/72.

 

There are no decent or correct P-51B/C or metallving Hurricane Mk.I. in 1/72. And what about a new F-86D Sabredog? And there are still no Scimitar...

 

Cheers / André

Agreed on the P-51B/C. The modern kits almost all have the wing from the D. The old Monogram 1/72 kit is quite accurate, but, of course, lacks a lot of detail.

 

We need a new metal wing Hurricane Mk.I and a new series of Mk.II/IV in 1/72.

 

There's nothing wrong with the Hasegawa F-86D, other than its availability, and the K/L are pretty well covered by Special Hobby I think.

 

Scimitar in 1/72 would be nice, but not before a new 1/72 Buccaneer series including the Gyron Junior powered S.1s.

 

Figure on Airfix scaling down their Sea Fury to 1/72 at some point and hopefully adding the two seater.

 

A 1/48 scale Gannet would be nice, including the AEW version announced but never released by Classic Airframes.

 

The 1930's RAF does not get much love from any kit makers. We have decent Gloster Gladiator kits, but the Hawker biplane fighters and bombers are crying out for decent treatment.

[RussellE]

12 hours ago, Meatbox8 said:

I wonder whether it is actually becoming quite difficult for Airfix to choose a subject these days, certainly in 1/72.  Thinking about it it is possible to acquire a kit of just about every British produced aircraft ever built, no matter how obscure, in one form or another, whether that be from a mainstream manufacturer or a short run or resin kit.  I would imagine the same applies for US, French and Soviet aircraft and I know it applies to WW2 Luftwaffe.  I've been harping on about a two-stage Merlin Mosquito on this thread, and I'd love to see one, but it is possible to build one using after market parts without Airfix releasing a new tool.  We even have a new Buccaneer on the way.  The one area that seems to be slightly less well represented, certainly with mainstream manufacturers, is the between the wars period.  Maybe Airfix will take inspiration from that era.  Having said that I don't expect to see a Handley Page Hinaidi any time soon (then again, with Valom around who knows).   

Still some left to retool that I'd like to see in 1/72 from Airfix: Yak 3, Yak 9, Ju88, Walrus, Arado Ar196, Metal wing Hurricane, Sea Fury, HP Hampden, Short Stirling, HP Halifax

🤔

[VMA131Marine]

1 hour ago, RussellE said:

Still some left to retool that I'd like to see in 1/72 from Airfix: Yak 3, Yak 9, Ju88, Walrus, Arado Ar196, Metal wing Hurricane, Sea Fury, HP Hampden, Short Stirling, HP Halifax

🤔

Lots of aircraft left that could use a new kit: Avro Anson (C.19 and T.21 please); Fairey Barracuda; Fairey Albacore; DH Hornet; DH VENOM; Vickers Warwick; Avro Lincoln; Supermarine Attacker; Supermarine Seafire (any Mk); Douglas TBD Devastator; Grumman TBF Avenger; Douglas SBD Dauntless; MiG-19; MiG-17; MiG-23/27; Su-15/21; Su-17/22; Douglas A-20 Havoc/Boston; BRISTOL BEAUFORT! (PLEASE!); oh, and a Spitfire XIV!

[vppelt68]

11 hours ago, Ratch said:

We really need a Ju88A-1 for the BoB theme. Perhaps Airfix could Lidar the one being restored in Norway 🙏

The best part is that it wouldn´t even require over-engineering to produce almost all Ju 88 A, C and D variants from 1940 to 1943 in one kit. I´m 🙏ing too! V-P

[fightersweep]

8 hours ago, VMA131Marine said:

Lots of aircraft left that could use a new kit: Avro Anson (C.19 and T.21 please)

Ah! Now that will happen as soon as I crack open my Aeroclub Anson and get about halfway through the build!

 

[Vulcanicity]

I'd say there are still plenty of subjects to chose from. Even in 1/72nd and limited to British-operated subjects, there are several major and many minor types which have no modern kit, apart from unobtainable or poor-quality limited run kits. There are some nice, recent high quality kits of some types from our Eastern European or cottage industry friends (Skua, Whirlwind, Vampire fighters, Kittyhawks, Bombay, Wellesley, Albatross, Sycamore, Provost, Canberra, Vega Gull/Proctor, Wapiti, Scout/Wasp and Barracuda all have recent or forthcoming kits). However the following are crying out for something which isn't 1960s, hideously inaccurate, unobtainable, a pig to build, or some combination of those factors:

 

Anything WW1, Lincoln, Hudson, Harvard, Lysander, Anson, Rapide, Master, Albacore, Firefly, Fulmar, Baltimore, Beaufort, Maryland, Valentia, Warwick, Scimitar, Javelin, Jaguar, Attacker, Vulcan, Hart series, Bulldog, Fury/Nimrod, Walrus, London, Stranraer, Heyford (not quite yet please - let me finish!), Whirlwind and Wessex helicopters, Dragonfly, Belvedere, Botha, Lerwick, 

 

Now some of those are definitely too obscure for Airfix - and I didn't even mention the postwar large transports! Still, even things which have been done several times in scale may still have no kit that looks the part, either because of fit issues, detail quality or inaccuracies (Sea Vixen, Venom/Sea Venom, Halifax, Sunderland, Stirling, Hunter).

 

Plenty to chose from - without even touching on other countries' stuff!

 

[Meatbox8]

It seems my post has been misinterpreted. 

[Geoff_B]

I wonder if another aspect of introducing the Classics Range for the nicer older tooling's may also be a ploy to keep the workbench clear of 2019 items till later in the year, they started announcements early last year on the new tools and had t pull the reveal of the new Hunter at SMW in November as they had nothing left for the trade release and catalogue otherwise. I think they do get torn between the phased release news via the website and mags or the traditional annual reveal and can't decide which is best for them.

 

Be interesting to see if any or how much 2019 new tooling's pop up from now on ?

 

[Denford]

19 hours ago, Vulcanicity said:

I'd say there are still plenty of subjects to chose from. Even in 1/72nd and limited to British-operated subjects, there are several major and many minor types which have no modern kit, apart from unobtainable or poor-quality limited run kits. There are some nice, recent high quality kits of some types from our Eastern European or cottage industry friends (Skua, Whirlwind, Vampire fighters, Kittyhawks, Bombay, Wellesley, Albatross, Sycamore, Provost, Canberra, Vega Gull/Proctor, Wapiti, Scout/Wasp and Barracuda all have recent or forthcoming kits). However the following are crying out for something which isn't 1960s, hideously inaccurate, unobtainable, a pig to build, or some combination of those factors:

 

Anything WW1, Lincoln, Hudson, Harvard, Lysander, Anson, Rapide, Master, Albacore, Firefly, Fulmar, Baltimore, Beaufort, Maryland, Valentia, Warwick, Scimitar, Javelin, Jaguar, Attacker, Vulcan, Hart series, Bulldog, Fury/Nimrod, Walrus, London, Stranraer, Heyford (not quite yet please - let me finish!), Whirlwind and Wessex helicopters, Dragonfly, Belvedere, Botha, Lerwick, 

 

Now some of those are definitely too obscure for Airfix - and I didn't even mention the postwar large transports! Still, even things which have been done several times in scale may still have no kit that looks the part, either because of fit issues, detail quality or inaccuracies (Sea Vixen, Venom/Sea Venom, Halifax, Sunderland, Stirling, Hunter).

 

Plenty to chose from - without even touching on other countries' stuff!

 

In listing ones wishes (which some of the more recent posts seem to be) it MUST be remembered:

- Airfix won't tool anything for which there are is not either an extant example or manufacturer's detail design drawings.  So from the above alone, no Whirlwind, Wellesley, Albatross, Valentia, Warwick, Botha, Lerwick, Stirling and a few more.

- Hornby Hobbies are in the business of making money, or at the moment repaying their debt.  They have to convince their bank to lend them money for which there will be no return at all for at least 2 years.  In choosing their subjects they have to show, based on past sales, that a similar subject was profitable enough to help reduce the debt: breaking-even is no good.  For example good Me262 sales might bode well for a Me410, or Wellington for a Hampden.  That a subject is 'iconic' or 'no line up would be complete without it' is utterly irrelevant.  Likewise that the competition from possible subjects that are '... hideously inaccurate, unobtainable, a pig to build...' had no significance whatever.  Whatever is chosen has to make money well beyond its initial costs.

 

As the above post shows, there are many, many, subjects from which to choose.  However, in the short term, there still has to be a variety of subjects: there couldn't for example be a successive release of, say, Venom, Thunderjet, Panther and other early cold war single seat jets, all in the same year as some seem to think/wish.

 

Looking at subject recently chosen, they favour those for which multiple variants can be produced from the same mould: Hunter, Wellington, Mitchell and others.  Exceptionally the Sea Fury (essentially only variant) can be seen at airshows and has a wide range of users.  International appeal seems to be another factor: all the foregoing were operated by many nations: one of the many reasons (discussed ad nauseam) why the Scimitar won't 'make it'.  And one should mention the 'jokers': who would ever have guessed 'Kate' (but good for sets) or Walrus?

 

So, even with the above limitation, there is still too large a 'pool' to accurately predict which subjects Airfix are, even now, working on for 2019.  For my part I'm hoping for an Avenger with folding wings.

[snowen250]

3 minutes ago, Denford said:

In listing ones wishes (which some of the more recent posts seem to be) it MUST be remembered:

- Airfix won't tool anything for which there are is not either an extant example or manufacturer's detail design drawings.  So from the above alone, no Whirlwind, Wellesley, Albatross, Valentia, Warwick, Botha, Lerwick, Stirling and a few more.

 

This is, as has been pointed out before, a slight mis-quote.

 

Airfix wont produce a model if they cannot guarantee that they can get the shape correct. So for the Victor they wouldn't have proceeded if the original drawings hadn't been available. They weren't for the Whitley. But as it is a corridor with wings, this wasn't such an issue. 

So for something like a Stirling it would be ok. 

And drawings exist for the Whirlwind so that's probably ok too.

[Rabbit Leader]

Put simply a T-6 Texan / SNJ / Harvard family is every scale from 1/144 to 1/24 would seem to fit the bill then. Why look elsewhere? 

 

 

[Albeback52]

On ‎5‎/‎26‎/‎2018 at 1:15 PM, GrahamS said:

1/24th TSR2 with full weapons load.

 

I’m going to be disappointed again aren’t I?

 

Graham

Probably putting it mildly!!

😁

Allan

 

Edited May 30, 2018 by Albeback52

[Denford]

24 minutes ago, snowen250 said:

This is, as has been pointed out before, a slight mis-quote.

 

Airfix wont produce a model if they cannot guarantee that they can get the shape correct. So for the Victor they wouldn't have proceeded if the original drawings hadn't been available. They weren't for the Whitley. But as it is a corridor with wings, this wasn't such an issue. 

So for something like a Stirling it would be ok. 

And drawings exist for the Whirlwind so that's probably ok too.

I'll agree (in part) with the above: but the only way to get the shape correct is by following drawings or copying an extant example!

I'm not sure when this policy was adopted.  Regarding the Whitley I'm told there is a fuselage and rear turret extant: not sure how much accurate data there is on the wings.

Don't agree at all about the Stirling: would not be OK.  Aside that Italeri have only recently tooled one, why produce another for which the accuracy couldn't be confirmed.  At the very least their resources would be better deployed elsewhere.

Re Whirlwind (in the context I'm assuming the fighter was the subject), I must admit I haven't checked this with Westland, but I cannot believe that after 70+ years they still have a complete set of drawings.  In any case this Whirlwind was something of an 'also ran' but then so was the Defiant....!

[IanC]

1 hour ago, snowen250 said:

They weren't for the Whitley. But as it is a corridor with wings, this wasn't such an issue. 

 

 

'A corridor with wings'.. I like that. :-)

[Vulcanicity]

Don't get me wrong  - I fully appreciate that most of the things on my "back-of an envelope" list in #408 aren't happening, for many of the reasons listed. I just wanted to respond to the suggestion that Airfix might have "done" most of the likely subjects (including caveats of accessibility of surviving examples/drawings), which is how I (wrongly, I assume) interpreted Meatbox8's post. There's plenty out there that they could, theoretically, cover.

 

Even filtering out the extinct types (and I wouldn't like to comment on accessibility of archive drawings, BAe/RAFM etc have large archives), and those which are obviously financial black holes due to obscurity or whaetver, I'd still say there's plenty of choice for the toolmakers, and as Denford says, probably too much to predict. But that's all part of the fun, isn't it?

 

[sniperUK]

8 hours ago, snowen250 said:

 

And drawings exist for the Whirlwind so that's probably ok too.

As long as it is the proper egg beater that would be brilliant

[Aeronut]

Quote

but the only way to get the shape correct is by following drawings

Airfix did that with the drawings of the Fairey Battle given to them and look what happened.

I'd also be cautious of a modern CAD copy of an old drawing. The temptation is to scan and digitise the old drawing instead of using the old dimensions to create a new drawing.

I've had personal experience of a young CAD designer getting it wrong by ignoring the words 'DO NOT SCALE' on the original drawing as well as being clueless as to what 'NTS' meant next to a dimension.

The lad was also not pleased when I produced the 'Draughtsman's Licence' card that I drew (and shamelessly used ) for myself in the late 70's. 

[Denford]

39 minutes ago, Aeronut said:

Airfix did that with the drawings of the Fairey Battle given to them and look what happened.

I'd also be cautious of a modern CAD copy of an old drawing. The temptation is to scan and digitise the old drawing instead of using the old dimensions to create a new drawing.

I've had personal experience of a young CAD designer getting it wrong by ignoring the words 'DO NOT SCALE' on the original drawing as well as being clueless as to what 'NTS' meant next to a dimension.

The lad was also not pleased when I produced the 'Draughtsman's Licence' card that I drew (and shamelessly used ) for myself in the late 70's. 

First it was in the 60's (others may know better) that the then Airfix tooled the Fairey Battle.  Today everything has changed except the name.  Current design practices would be unrecognisable to what was then routine.  I think (and again others may know better) that they used drawings for the Battle prototype rather than production machines.

 

It's not a case of 'copying old drawings in CAD format': it is the type of drawing that is rendered in CAD.  No longer are 3 view GA's from, say, Aircraft of the Fighting Powers anywhere near acceptable.  Instead manufacturers' engineering drawings are used: for example outline drawing of ribs (to be used for the preparation of fabrication drawings, stress analysis, press shop tooling requirements, manpower for assembly, floor space etc) along with their dimensioned placement that together give an accurate depiction of the 3 dimensional shape of a wing.  Factors such as 'washout' would automatically follow from this.

 

The young CAD designer who didn't know what NTS meant was either wrongly recruited and/or should not have been assigned such work.  It's like blaming somebody for not knowing how to use a slide rule.

[Rabbit Leader]

What happened to the 1/72 Wildcat spine then? If I recall correctly, there were numerous posts when this kit appeared to suggest that (like the Battle) the wrong drawings ‘may’ have been used in order to design this kit. Trust me - I am an Airfix fan rather than an Airfix mocker, however in this case seems like history in modelling design may have repeated itself almost 50 years on. 

 

Cheers.. Dave 

[Dave Fleming]

35 minutes ago, Rabbit Leader said:

What happened to the 1/72 Wildcat spine then? If I recall correctly, there were numerous posts when this kit appeared to suggest that (like the Battle) the wrong drawings ‘may’ have been used in order to design this kit. 

 

 

I'm reminded of the old adage "to err is human, to really screw up you need a computer". They have made a few errors over the years, sometime just because there comes a point where you have to say 'it's finished' or because information comes along later or just because of an error in understanding (Harrier GR3 fin height for example). Sometimes this can be caught and changed - Martlet IV kit, where initially they hadn't realised it had an extended fuselage, often the little errors aren't picked up until later.

 

I have friends who know some of the Airfix design team and whilst I have no insight into what they plan to make (I don't ask and they wouldn't tell anyway),  I have seen some of the effort they go into on their research and they are as thorough as they economically can be. And the bar is raised so much higher than in the Trevor Snowden era

[occa]

Yes Airfix were given the drawings of the Wildcat prototypes which had a more bulbous fuselage (resembling the barrel type design of the F3F and earlier incarnations) and different spine contours.

 

Actually it's the fault of Grumman then but they should've been checking what they received.

[GreenDragon]

RE the Whirlwind I seem to remember an article in The Aeroplane or some other magazine that someone is building a full size one using some original parts as patterns for new components and all drawings that have survived. Airfix could have a chat with them maybe?

Also as they are in financial trouble they could concentrate on small 1/72nd fighter moulds. They could probably churn out three or four fighters instead of another big kit much as I'd love a new B-29!

 

Paul Harrison

[Albeback52]

On 5/26/2018 at 1:37 PM, Scimitar said:

Anything but another Spitfire??  

Oh please,PLEASE let it be true!! A Spitfire - free 2019? Bliss!😉😂😂

Allan

Edited May 31, 2018 by Albeback52