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1/72 Hawker Tempest Mk. V by Airfix - release Autumn 2021


Bjorn

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Looks like a really nice package and IMO (save for type of plastic) it would be difficult to see what any other manufacturer could provide in 1/72 scale.

From initial impressions it looks like two types of spinners with quite large prop blade cut-outs (?) and only the large wheel hub tyres offered, which were not fitted to the earliest Series 1 aircraft.

This later feature is a little surprising considering Airfix actually provide four wheel parts on the one sprue? Besides that, I quite like what I see here. 

Cheers.. Dave 

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1 hour ago, Greenshirt said:

I assume I missed it, but what’s with the 2 spinners?  
 

Tim

Apparently the production Mk V's were fitted with either a De Havilland or Rotol propeller, and the spinners were different.

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8 hours ago, john224 said:

Apparently the production Mk V's were fitted with either a De Havilland or Rotol propeller, and the spinners were different.

Thank you very much, John. 
 

Tim

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On 7/23/2021 at 9:53 PM, Rabbit Leader said:

Looks like a really nice package... I quite like what I see here. 

Cheers.. Dave 

 

I agree Dave. I'm looking forward to getting one. And being a 1/72 fighter I may even build it as opposed to sticking it in the stash along with all the other 'too big to make and put on display' multi-engined types currently residing there - B-17, B-25, Lanc, Wellington, Whitley... 😕

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On 7/23/2021 at 2:16 PM, Johnson said:

Although I wonder if that's a Hannants typo?

I guess so. Airfix themselves have it listed as May 2022 - not quite winter, but maybe that's a fiscal year thing :shrug:

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Just to confirm that the expected release date as confirmed to me via e-mail from Airfix is now May 2022 so hopefully the SH/Eduard kits arrive beforehand for comparison as I'm expecting them to be the best of this new bunch, plus Eduard will be making a mask for them (unlike the recent KP releases).

 

Regards

Colin.

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I must be missing something here, as is a 1/72nd Tempest from Special Hobby or Eduard a definite release? I know it has been hinted at but given the backlog of promised kits from SH, is it really around the corner? 

I am slightly cynical about what is promised from manufacturers given what has been touted in the past and never appeared. 

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38 minutes ago, Mr T said:

I must be missing something here, as is a 1/72nd Tempest from Special Hobby or Eduard a definite release?

 

 

It depends on how you define 'definite release'. Release date? Catalogue number? Price? Boxart? None of the above.

 

But let's start with the fact that it's not "Special Hobby or Eduard", because from the very beginning, still from 1/32 scale, it's a project of both companies and together they released the model in 1/48. Given their now very close cooperation, it is quite obvious that the 1/72 scale model will also be released jointly and both companies will package it in boxes with their own logos.

 

38 minutes ago, Mr T said:

I know it has been hinted at but given the backlog of promised kits from SH, is it really around the corner?

 

Only Eduard and Special Hobby know which kits are "around the corner", which are delayed, which are deliberately delayed, and which will be brought forward.

 

Given that both companies are fighting with a certain manufacturer, neither Eduard nor Special Hobby will announce well in advance which kit will go on sale. Both companies have even stopped communicating with details of what stages of development their announcements are at.

  

38 minutes ago, Mr T said:

I am slightly cynical about what is promised from manufacturers given what has been touted in the past and never appeared.

 

The fact that an announcement has been given a catalogue number does not mean that it will definitely be released. No model company operates in a vacuum, competition on the market is fierce, so production plans are updated at least once a year, and often even every 4-6 months. The release of some items ceases to be profitable, the documentation to design some items ceases to be up to date, new ideas emerge requiring quick action and rescheduling, often very significant.

 

The fact that a company announced something years ago is not particularly relevant. It could have announced it and abandoned the project. It could have announced it and still want a particular kit released, but delay it. It could have announced only to lock the subject in for years. Nobody is going to disclose details like that because nobody is going to make life easy for the competition.

 

Trumpeter announced a MiG-19 kit in 1/72 a dozen years ago. Chinese development versions like the Q-5 have already come out, but the MiG-19 is still in announcements. Which one it falls into, when it will be released and if it will be released at all, only Trumpeter knows. And there are a whole bunch of such examples in other companies.

 

Both Eduard and Special Hobby have announced a new 1/72 scale project to be announced in the autumn. Whether it will be two separate themes or one common theme, nobody knows. Nor does anyone know what it will be or what stage this project or projects are at. Will it be the Tempest? Possibly. Will it definitely be Tempest? That only Mr Sulc and Mr Riedel know.

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19 hours ago, Piotr Mikolajski said:

Given that both companies are fighting with a certain manufacturer, neither Eduard nor Special Hobby will announce well in advance which kit will go on sale. Both companies have even stopped communicating with details of what stages of development their announcements are at.

 

Why? AZ fighting Eduard and Special Hobby is like a beer can declaring war on a .22 rifle.

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Good evening

 A Tempest family by Eduard / special Hobby it is a very good news but I will believe it when I will see the kits in my stash  ...

 

Best Regards

Patrice

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So SH/Eduard may or may not produce a Tempest. They are not going to say what they are doing in case AZ hop in and produce what some might consider to be an inferior product to grab market share. 

Well, at least we know what is going on and some of presumed reason for it. 

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Seems to me it's already happened, KP of course being part of AZ:

 

What am I missing? Why blame AZ/KP for Eduard/SH's "failure to launch"? The market share is already being grabbed - that train has already left the station.

 

For decades we had the Heller Tempest as the only credible option in 1/72; now suddenly everyone wants a piece of the pie. All this turmoil is just a - what's the word? A Shakespearean drama in a teapot, if you ask me. Instead of fighting, better they should do a new series of 1/72 VK-105 Yak-9s - has anyone thought of that?! NO!!! Forget about the Tempest - be first with the Yak-9 series, and wallow in unshared market share!!! :drunk: (I love that emoji...)

 

John

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This dogfighting between the Czech companies and their overseas supporters is getting tedious.  Is Airfix producing their Tempest in order to put Eduard's nose out of joint?   Or a two-stage supercharger Mosquito just to spite both of them?   Or are they just interesting subjects in a field where all the better known types have been done in multitudes?

 

Eduard make better kits than AZ, but AZ make more interesting ones.  SH used to make even more interesting ones but seem to have got arthritic in their choices recently.  Arma Hobby is better than all of them.  I only have one Eduard kit in my stash, five AH, and a great many more from the AZ family.  Which illustrates that AZ makes more interesting kits than the others, to me anyway.  If you don't like their business model, don't buy the kits.  Just don't set one up as Holy and the other as Satanic.

 

 

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3 hours ago, Graham Boak said:

This dogfighting between the Czech companies and their overseas supporters is getting tedious. 

 

Seems to me that, at one time, these companies had a sort of gentlemen's agreement among them regarding who would release what, so that no one's toes got stepped on, nor his ox gored. But these are harsh and unprecedented times, as we're constantly told by the news media, and the dogs are eating the dogs.

 

John

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I am a very patient person as I have spent most of my working life having to be. I am also cautious and I was asking a question because my perception is that there seems to have been a lot of assumptions about a Tempest from SH  with little to back it up. At 67 I have seen enough rumours about kits that never appeared to be a bit wary. 

 I would be very happy with a Tempest from SH when it appears. 

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On 7/29/2021 at 3:27 PM, fishplanebeer said:

plus Eduard will be making a mask for them (unlike the recent KP releases).

For which there are Peewit masks - often 1 or 2 bob cheaper, work just as well.

 

On the subject matter itself: that makes two older Tempest Mk.Vs (Smer & Heller boxings) and two confirmed newer ones (Airfix and KP) doing the rounds. 

Maybe we should look at planning a Typhoon/Tempest STGB for 2023? :P

 

 

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On 7/31/2021 at 10:58 AM, Meatbox8 said:

Anyone know why Airfix have chosen to include the drop tanks on the transparencies sprue? 

Great build and a little info on it here, 

Hawker Tempest MkV Scratchbuilt in 1/32 Scale pg3 | Paul Budzik | Fine Scale Modeling

In Detail - Drop Tanks (hawkertempest.se)

 

...they should be links, anyone know what I'm doing wrong here?

Edited by 71chally
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1 hour ago, 71chally said:

...they should be links, anyone know what I'm doing wrong here?

 

Not sure what you did James, but I found this link, which I think is what you meant?

 

https://paulbudzik.com/models/tempest-construction/tempest-construction-page4.html

 

Excellent link actually.

 

Terry

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6 hours ago, Mr T said:

I am a very patient person as I have spent most of my working life having to be. I am also cautious and I was asking a question because my perception is that there seems to have been a lot of assumptions about a Tempest from SH  with little to back it up.

 

Mr Riedel on the Czech forum literally said, "If we choose a model to make, we only announce it when the moulds are at least finished."

Until such an official announcement, companies will not say anything certain, at most they will give slight hints.

Times have changed. In the past, a catalogue with all the announcements was published because it didn't affect business. There was less competition, it took longer to design a model and production using traditional methods was much slower. Today it is much easier to obtain materials, the design takes faster, and the production of moulds is also faster.  On the other hand, there are fewer buyers and costs have not fallen at all, rather they have been rising recently.

 

Each company has between a few and a dozen projects in development that no one outside the company knows about. Each of these projects means several boxes with different versions or paint schemes. The investment in these projects runs into hundreds of thousands of pounds a year, and no one can afford for some inferior predatory company to rip off 20-30% of sales by making the same kit beforehand by copying some old model with redrawn lines. It may simply be a matter of whether the project was profitable or not.

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