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Hasegawa newsletters 2019 - 01, 02, 03, 04, 05, 06, 07, 08, 09, 10, 11 & 12


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1 hour ago, Vicarage Vee said:

The market for re-released F3000 cars from 30 years ago defeats me.  Must be a domestic one.

It certainly had a surprisingly big following in Japan, I think becoming, ultimately, Japanese superformula. A number of the F1, WEC and other series stars of the past few decades progressed to F1 through Japan.

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Yes, absolutely Agent K. Japanese F3000 of the late 80s and early 90s was very competitive and something of a refuge for European drivers who found themselves frozen out of F1 or European F3000.  Ultimately some very big names and significant winners competed there.  It just seems odd that now all of those drivers are long since retired interest in the couple of years that these cars raced can only be from a few aged nostalgics (like me I suppose) who probably bought these kits first time around anyway.  

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  • 3 weeks later...

Has Hasegawa lost the molds for the 72nd scale American bombers ?

I mean those are hot subjects so why would anyone willfully ignore them is beyond me 😕 

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I must say I am struggling to understand their logic, but I always fail. They have huge potential in their program which they don't use or don't see.

Talking about 1/72nd scale they have huge mileage ahead of them to go with Junkers Ju 88 family with pretty low investments in extra parts. Same goes with B-24 Liberator (for example they never released B-24C which would be almost a decal variation of their B-24D). Even before this latest line, in early 90s they missed a chance with lousy Bf 109Es and non-release of Macchi C.205V which was a low hanging fruit after C.202. Of course, competition in the shape of Italeri didn't repeat the same mistake.

These days it is hard to understand why they did't round up their Japanese line with Ki-21 "Sally" knowing how MPM kit grossly missed the shape.

The F-111 family is too long out of production, while it could have surely secured a constant cash inflow since.

Grumman Avenger has numerous designation variations and possibilities, Dauntless too, B-25 reduced only to late versions, He 111 not spreading to rotating turret versions...I could go on endlessly.

 

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7 hours ago, Jon Bryon said:

Am I right in thinking the last post-WW2 aircraft Hasegawa tooled in 1/48 was the F-22? If so, it's been 10 years...

 

Jon

Yup, and the last allied WWII even longer. There was a time  a new Hasegawa release would absolutely stoke my excitement in this hobby.

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18 hours ago, MarkoZG said:

I must say I am struggling to understand their logic, but I always fail. They have huge potential in their program which they don't use or don't see.

Talking about 1/72nd scale they have huge mileage ahead of them to go with Junkers Ju 88 family with pretty low investments in extra parts. Same goes with B-24 Liberator (for example they never released B-24C which would be almost a decal variation of their B-24D). Even before this latest line, in early 90s they missed a chance with lousy Bf 109Es and non-release of Macchi C.205V which was a low hanging fruit after C.202. Of course, competition in the shape of Italeri didn't repeat the same mistake.

These days it is hard to understand why they did't round up their Japanese line with Ki-21 "Sally" knowing how MPM kit grossly missed the shape.

The F-111 family is too long out of production, while it could have surely secured a constant cash inflow since.

Grumman Avenger has numerous designation variations and possibilities, Dauntless too, B-25 reduced only to late versions, He 111 not spreading to rotating turret versions...I could go on endlessly.

 

 

 

My guess is money - Hasegawa are a relatively small firm compared to (say) Tamiya. They don't do anything else other than plastic models and accessories, so don't have capital to cross subsidise production of new moulds or even production runs. If someone else is paying for it, (like the Eduard B-24s or the Polish Beaufighters and Macchis) then they can finance it, in the meantime they produce kits they know they can sell in the to make enough money to fund the next production runs, or if things go wrell a new mould (like the lovely 1/72 F-35B).

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20 hours ago, MarkoZG said:

These days it is hard to understand why they did't round up their Japanese line with Ki-21 "Sally" knowing how MPM kit grossly missed the shape.

Alas, merely completing a line up is no basis for choosing a subject: this has been discussed at length re Airfix.  It has to make money.

Sadly, I can't see any mainstream manufacturer other than Hasegawa tooling a "Sally" and I wonder if I should build or keep my Revell rendering which some say is nearer to 1/75 than 1/72.

Another obstacle is the lack of reliable data: to describe what remains of any Sally as decrepit 75 year old wreckage would be an overstatement.  Even if anything was 'recoverable' the remains would surely be incomplete, to say nothing of the difficulty of measuring it.  I don't know if Hasegawa take accuracy as seriously as do Airfix.  That said some short-run manufacturers are producing various 'extinct' though small Japanese subjects.  Maybe improved technology and/or a brisk demand may encourage them to improve on the MPM rendering.

Hasegawa seem, more or less, to be restricting themselves to subjects that are or have served in the Japanese armed forces.  Per an earlier post on this thread, I'm hoping that they will follow their Mavis retooling with a new G4M1 Betty for which ample data is extant in Japan.

 

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Forget new tooling , they are not even interested in their existing tooling -
1. B-25 mitchell
2.B-24
2.B-26
4. So many single engine fighters of which there exists no other kit ...

These are all hot subjected , the B-26 has been missing from stands for almost three years and just a single variant of the -25 and -24 have been available since 2015 - the year when I started this hobby. They keep reboxing the Japanese bombers every month so why not release these better looking subjects ... If there is demand for Ginga or Betty , I am sure there is demand for Mitchell and Marauder as well.  UNLESS , the only demand that matters to them is strictly Japanese market demand . 

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It would be interesting to know how important the international market is to Hasegawa. My feeling is what is being charged for imported kits into the UK cannot be encouraging if you are serious about exports. I know that this has been discussed before, but the prices are beyond reasonable as far as my modelling budget is concerned. Perhaps Hasegawa might be tempted to reissue stuff like the Marauder and Avenger if they did it through a company like Revell. 

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15 minutes ago, Basuroy said:

If there is demand for Ginga or Betty , I am sure there is demand for Mitchell and Marauder as well.  UNLESS , the only demand that matters to them is strictly Japanese market demand . 

Maybe Hasegawa considers not profitable the attempt to make another run of US bombers and end up selling them at 50 to 60 USD in said market. Maybe.

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2 minutes ago, Mr T said:

Perhaps Hasegawa might be tempted to reissue stuff like the Marauder and Avenger if they did it through a company like Revell. 

A thing they did with the B-25J and should be done again.

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