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1/72 - Dassault Mirage III/5 Nesher/Dagger family by Special Hobby - MIIIC & CJ released


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It's possible the release of the Modelsvit kit might have had an impact. As the IIIC/B only had a maximum of four users, unless your building an example of every unit that operated the type, most people would, I suspect, only buy one or two kits at most.

 

I'll be honest, if I had purchased the Modelsvit IIICJ beforehand, I wouldn't have bought the Special Hobby example I did.

 

Mike.

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6 minutes ago, MikeR said:

It's possible the release of the Modelsvit kit might have had an impact. As the IIIC/B only had a maximum of four users, unless your building an example of every unit that operated the type, most people would, I suspect, only buy one or two kits at most.

 

I'll be honest, if I had purchased the Modelsvit IIICJ beforehand, I wouldn't have bought the Special Hobby example I did.

 

Having built both the Modelsvit and Special Hobby IIIC kits, I can say that the SH is a far easier build.  It's also 60% of the price of the MV kit. 

 

There will no doubt be a similar price disparity between SH and MV IIIE kits although in this case the MV kit is not as tricky to build as their IIIC.  The only other modern competitor in the IIIE arena is the PJ Productions kit, but that is also expensive in comparison to SH and will become increasingly difficult to find. 

 

Other options are the RV Aircraft kit, which again is tricky to build, and the venerable Heller kit. 

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For anyone comparing  SH to Modelsvit, I am guessing one does know that Modelsvit botched fuselage width by a large margin, to put it in simpler words-Modelsvit has very chubby/ inaccurate fuselage.

 

 

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22 minutes ago, Overflow said:

For anyone comparing  SH to Modelsvit, I am guessing one does know that Modelsvit botched fuselage width by a large margin, to put it in simpler words-Modelsvit has very chubby/ inaccurate fuselage.

 

 

I didn't know that.  Thanks for the information.

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4 hours ago, Enzo the Magnificent said:

 

Having built both the Modelsvit and Special Hobby IIIC kits, I can say that the SH is a far easier build.  It's also 60% of the price of the MV kit. 

 

There will no doubt be a similar price disparity between SH and MV IIIE kits although in this case the MV kit is not as tricky to build as their IIIC.  The only other modern competitor in the IIIE arena is the PJ Productions kit, but that is also expensive in comparison to SH and will become increasingly difficult to find. 

 

Other options are the RV Aircraft kit, which again is tricky to build, and the venerable Heller kit. 

 The price difference was a major facter in my decision to "curb my enthusiasm" and wait for the SH kit! I still went ahead and bought a MV IIIB as I wanted a two seater, though. Not sure I want to try and graft the MV IIIB nose onto an SH kit, so I'll just have to live with any visual dissonance between the two kits!

 

Mike.

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10 hours ago, Overflow said:

For anyone comparing  SH to Modelsvit, I am guessing one does know that Modelsvit botched fuselage width by a large margin, to put it in simpler words-Modelsvit has very chubby/ inaccurate fuselage.

 

 

Hmmm. That is interesting. Do you have any photoes to show the difference between Modelsvit and SH?

12 hours ago, Enzo the Magnificent said:

MV kit. 

Does MV stand for Modelsvit? It should be MS because Modelsvit is Model-Svit meaning Model World translated from Ukrainian.

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35 minutes ago, Dennis_C said:

Hmmm. That is interesting. Do you have any photoes to show the difference between Modelsvit and SH?

Well this would illustrate the difference between the two and not which one is right/wrong.

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1 hour ago, Laurent said:

Well this would illustrate the difference between the two and not which one is right/wrong.

That's my point too. I would never blindly bet on SH as being more accurate. They have a number of recent kits with quite serious geometric distortions - Vampire with almost half centimeter wrong wing chord being the most known. Also their Huey Cobra has too small fuselage width around the engine area. 

 

P.S. You know what - I'm looking at the real thing photoes and assembled photoes of Mirages from SH and MS and I feel the chubbiness of the real thing is more resembling Modelsvit kit. Special Hobby seems too straight to me around the area where bulkhead transitions into the tail. In fact on real thing fuselage spine slightly overlaps with the tail exactly like on Modelsvit kit, but on SH such overlap does not exist. 

 

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Modelsvit

2022_0524_mirage_Hellcat_462bl.jpg

Special Hobby

ambYvTw.jpeg

 

But again for naked eye it's probably barely noticeable millimeters. So would be nice to see an actual side to side comparison to at least understand what exactly to look at on real thing photoes.

 

The sooner Special Hobby releases the Nesher - the sooner I'll make such comparison myself :) unless they fix the error as likely Nesher would need a new sprue with fuselage parts. 

Edited by Dennis_C
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I think neither SH nor MSV have any serious shape issues. There has been some talk about the MSV nose cone shape being wrong, but it is very subtle error. Surface detail is much nicer and finer on MSV with rivets. They also have PE and masks out of the box, practically no need to buy aftermarket, except maybe metal pitot. MSV decals are Decograph screen printed, so top quality. Unfortunately decal numbering and instruction sheet is usually full of errors with MSV. I believe SH decals are printed by Eduard so if you don't like new style Eduard decals that could be a problem. Construction wise, MSV is typical short run kit, so needs some experience and careful dry fitting, tolerances are tight, etc. If you get it right, minimal filler is needed. I also like the way MSV intakes are assembled, as it leaves you with no internal seam to worry about. With SH you have to take care of the seam. Adding the MSV vertical tail was always a stressful task for me since it has very fine raised detail near the base where the join line is. SH overall is easier and more carefree construction though.

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6 hours ago, Dennis_C said:

That's my point too. I would never blindly bet on SH as being more accurate. They have a number of recent kits with quite serious geometric distortions - Vampire with almost half centimeter wrong wing chord being the most known. Also their Huey Cobra has too small fuselage width around the engine area. 

 

P.S. You know what - I'm looking at the real thing photoes and assembled photoes of Mirages from SH and MS and I feel the chubbiness of the real thing is more resembling Modelsvit kit. Special Hobby seems too straight to me around the area where bulkhead transitions into the tail. In fact on real thing fuselage spine slightly overlaps with the tail exactly like on Modelsvit kit, but on SH such overlap does not exist. 

 

5f442ad5c2ee111a0b7d2ff42d923c3fe70f86d6

Modelsvit

2022_0524_mirage_Hellcat_462bl.jpg

Special Hobby

ambYvTw.jpeg

 

But again for naked eye it's probably barely noticeable millimeters. So would be nice to see an actual side to side comparison to at least understand what exactly to look at on real thing photoes.

 

The sooner Special Hobby releases the Nesher - the sooner I'll make such comparison myself :) unless they fix the error as likely Nesher would need a new sprue with fuselage parts. 

I'm not sure you could compare an IIIC and IIIE, they haven't the same reactor. The IIIE is very different from IIIC, look at the air entries.

Edited by manuel
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On 22/02/2024 at 20:10, drake122 said:

 

Mr. Riedel was quest on a Czech modeling livestream a few months ago and I believe he mentioned sometimes this summer or autumn a new Mirage III boxing will be out, but not a new variant just new decals for Argentina and SAAF.

I remember their original plan was to release new variants much quicker, but I suspect sales might not have been what they expected and so other subjects took over (Thunderstreak and such).

 

If indeed that's the case, I hope SH revisits that decision quickly.

 

The Mirage III/V family is so vast, with so many variants, subvariants and users, that if they moved forward with it, I think that sales would be the least of their concerns. :) 

 

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https://www.specialhobby.info/2018/10/special-hobbys-new-172-mirages-iii-5.html

 

Edited by CharlieGolf2009
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3 hours ago, manuel said:

I'm not sure you could compare an IIIC and IIIE, they haven't the same reactor. The IIIE is very different from IIIC, look at the air entries.

Yes - IIIE has longer fuselage right behind the cockpit. But I think middle section of the fuselage stayed the same. There are other differences of course between C and E. Anyway it is necessary to see side to side comparison of IIIC from SH and MSv to start looking at the questionable areas on real thing photoes. So if anyone could make side to side comparisons - that would help any further discussion :)

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Flooding the market with 5, IIIRs and IIIDs? Where there is “flooding” of the market is with Israeli subjects.  Even so they keep coming! Hmm .... The Mirage is, by far, the most saleable of the French jet fighter types, so I would have thought that expansion of the range was obvious!?

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15 hours ago, Piotr Mikolajski said:

 

SH does not want to saturate the market with one type of jet. This is why the release of more boxes of the Viggen goes so slowly.

 

They didn't seem to have that problem with the Mirage F.1 family, although we're still waiting for the F.1CT to be released.

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4 hours ago, CharlieGolf2009 said:

They didn't seem to have that problem with the Mirage F.1 family, although we're still waiting for the F.1CT to be released.

 

Mirage F.1 is from 2016, so it is already 8 years old. If, 8 years after its premiere, still not all versions have been released, it means that the F.1 is not some kind of exception after all. Same with Viggen - Tarangus released AJSF/AJSH five years ago, Special Hobby still hasn't released these versions.

 

Jets are selling worse than WWII aircraft and this is not some recent trend, it's been like this for years. Which means that all these versions will be released for a long time to come. I won't be surprised if we wait until the 2030s for the last one.

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Excuse my ignorance, but I’m getting the feeling some people are a bit pessimistic the IIIE-5 versions will ever hit the market. But: - has Special Hobby actually announced a development pause for the Mirage IIIE? Or is this just speculation just based on Mr Riedel not mentioning the project during the above-mentioned livestream? The Mirage F.1 took ages to emerge from its pipeline, and it took even longer before everyone’s favourite variant was on the market.

 

So I’m thinking nothing definite points to a pause at all. There do seem to be quite a few impulsive choices in Special Hobby’s development and announcement strategy which cause delay upon delay. I imagine the design process goes a bit like this: the Mirage portofolio is probably part of the job of just one designer in the team, who keeps getting urgent projects shoved in their way (“I have an idea! The Bugatti racer! Can you have that done by Friday?” “What - this Friday?”:)), so that Mirage keeps getting pushed further into the future - and when the designer gets back to the Mirage, they’ll probably have to get their head back into the project again and remember what and how and where everything went. More delay. (Then from the adjoining room: “Oh no Look at what KP is planning!”)

 

The IIIE, R and most 5 versions are highly similar but for the nose. It is a rather safe investment to have all the ‘longer’ versions, as part of a set of common sprues like the F1, ready to hit the market in whatever boxing the company chooses. Will it take too long to come to fruition? Oh yes, and it’s taken too long already. 🤷‍♂️

 

Jay

 

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11 hours ago, CharlieGolf2009 said:

 

I know Andre, thanks. I skipped the Duo Pack because I have over a dozen F.1s, and so I'm still waiting for the CT. ;)

 

 

Well, since I have two of those dual boxings I might be persuaded to let one CT decal portion go. ;)

 

Cheers,

 

Andre

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