Scale Model And Hobby General - 1/35 with new tooling

[Judge Dredd]

A thread about scale models and all things hobby related. RC, train sets, minis games, whatever you want. There are specialist threads for other topics, but some crossover is likely. Pictures are always welcome even if it's a cross post.

40k and Games Workshop

https://kiwifarms.st/threads/warhammer-40k.2482/

Non-GW minis games

https://kiwifarms.st/threads/miniatures-games.205149/

Gunpla

https://kiwifarms.st/threads/anyone-into-gunpla.76117/

@W'rkncacnter asked about such a thread but never made one I can see. So here it is.



I'm new to model making. I never bothered for years, sticking with Warhammer off and on, in part because World War 2 aircraft have no appeal for me. Recently I've learned that models cover a wide range of subjects these days. Gunpla is an obvious one, but recently I heard of a Chinese company Border Models who, among other things, have been putting out (what I assume are unlicenced) Red Alert models.


These kits appear to be expensive with spotty availability, making me think they have to be imported from China, further adding to my "unlicenced" theory.

There's also this car model I want to find. I can find it online no problem, but not seen it locally.

Many kei cars/jap economy shitboxes are of interest to me. I know they exist, but again, I don't see them locally.

I have no idea if these kits are any good.

The more I dig into this the more I find things I want. I have limited space so have to be choosy, and have a Gunpla kit I've not built yet so I'm in no hurry.

Edit: Typo.

 

[Anti Snigger]

My older brother used to buy and send me model vehicle kits while he was in the military and I never built them. Feels bad man.

 

[Shig O'nella]

I have no idea if these kits are any good.

Revell is probably the best kitmaker now - Tamiya was always second rate castings (poor detailing, casting cavities and warps, misaligned pegs and sockets, sprue you could build bridges out of) and Airfix has gone from absolutely brilliant to complete shit over the course of the 2000s.

 

[Meriasek]

I still have a model of a sailboat sitting on my shelf that my uncle gifted me like 20 years ago. One of these days I'll build it.

 

[Easterling]

Gonna have to pick up that tesla trooper now, cheers @Judge Dredd

 

[Wahgonga]

Been building scale models for many decades now. Mostly armor, some aircraft, and a few large scale cars. For the armor kits I use mostly Tamiya acrylic paints with pastel chalk and artists oils for weathering. Airbrush is an Iwata Eclipse, and an old Paasche VL.

A few of my more recent builds-

Tamiya 1/35 Panzer III L with aftermarket Verlinden engine compartment and stowage




Tamiya 1/16 R/C Kubelwagen



Verlinden 1/15 resin Pak 37



Tamiya 1/35 M1A1

 

[BradeRunna]

When I was playing World of Tanks years ago, I got into building models of tanks. I tried 1/72 scale but that's way to small and irritating. I went with 1/35 scale instead though they cost more. I haven't done any in a while. But the Tamiya kits are pretty good. I have a few kits made by other companies. I have a T-62 made by Trumpeter that comes with a metal main gun. It has a lot of small detail parts as well. Stuff that you would have to buy separately for a Tamiya kit. I have a few small jars of Tamiya paint but most of it is Vallejo. Some of the Vallejo paints broke down over the years though and I had to chuck them.

 

[Judge Dredd]

Revell is probably the best kitmaker now - Tamiya was always second rate castings (poor detailing, casting cavities and warps, misaligned pegs and sockets, sprue you could build bridges out of) and Airfix has gone from absolutely brilliant to complete shit over the course of the 2000s.

I thought it was the other way around? Revell being known as borderline scams by putting 50+ year old kits in a new box and pretending it's modern to sucker in casuals who don't know any better. Airfix going from shit tier to good tier. And Tamiya being second only to Bandai? I could be completely wrong about that as I'm new here, and I'm basing that opinion on random YouTube videos and a guy I know who complained about Revell.

I still have a model of a sailboat sitting on my shelf that my uncle gifted me like 20 years ago. One of these days I'll build it.

I would say sell it, as a vintage kit likely goes for good money, but if it's a gift, that's different.

I tried 1/72 scale but that's way to small and irritating. I went with 1/35 scale instead though they cost more.

Why not 1/64? The selection is limited, but sounds like it would be a perfect middle ground.

A few of my more recent builds

Those are rad. I especially like the kubalwagen.

Which is/was your favourite?

 

[Wahgonga]

I thought it was the other way around? Revell being known as borderline scams by putting 50+ year old kits in a new box and pretending it's modern to sucker in casuals who don't know any better. Airfix going from shit tier to good tier. And Tamiya being second only to Bandai? I could be completely wrong about that as I'm new here, and I'm basing that opinion on random YouTube videos and a guy I know who complained about Revell.

Those are rad. I especially like the kubalwagen.

Which is/was your favourite?

I think Shig might be confusing brands.

Tamiya kits are considered state of the art and the standard by which many others are judged. I've built a large portion of their 1/35 catalog over the years and can attest to their quality. Revell/Monogram stuff can range from pretty damn good to awful depending on the vintage of the tooling.

My main complaint with Tamiya is that they cheap out on the photo-etch goodies, making you buy the frets separately, although I think enough people bitched, because many their latest kits now come with photo-etch, aluminum barrels, and link-and-length tracks.

Regarding other's quality, I have a few of the Bandai 1/60 Gundam and 1/72 Star Wars kits, and the quality and engineering of those kits is insanely good, and around 2020 Airfix kits went from mediocre to outstanding. Their newly tooled stuff is very clean and crisp, with excellent fit.

As for a favorite, I've always loved the boxy nature of the Kubelwagen, but I was an Abrams driver in my former life, so the M1A1 will always be my favorite.

 

[Meriasek]

I would say sell it, as a vintage kit likely goes for good money, but if it's a gift, that's different.

It's an old Heller Galion 1:200, it's like 30 bucks. Gotta grab some paints and stuff tho. And the right type of yarn to make all the netting and ropes and shit.

 

[W'rkncacnter]

Thanks for the mention! A gunpla kit is perfect for your first kit in a while, no painting and the engineering of them is very good so you won't have any hassle. Also, those chinese kits can be a bit of trouble, if you get one be prepared for that.

I thought it was the other way around? Revell being known as borderline scams by putting 50+ year old kits in a new box

This happened to me with their Fokker DR1 kit, the thing was completely unusable and I never finished it. Some other good kitmakers would be takom, meng and dragon (good luck finding them). Bandai don't make much other than gunpla but the few typical scale model kits they make are top notch.

@Wahgonga great models, I really like the subtle shading on them.

I'll take some pics of some kits I've made over the weekend and post them.

 

[FatMebius]

I build a lot of plastic models, so I'll share my thoughts on different brands. I mostly build a lot of Gundam and assorted sci-fi stuff, but I do build the occasional modern warplane.

Bandai: Usually pretty good. It sorta depends on what line the kit is from. Most High Grade (HG) kits are a nice bang for your buck. Pretty affordable. Really gimmick-heavy kits can somewhat disappoint, but the bright side is that you're usually not out of a ton of money. Real Grade (RG) kits are good. They're both, for the most part, 1/144 scale (When it comes to Gundam offerings. Other franchises vary in scale). Mostly. Early RGs suffer from some really flimsy joints (RG Strike Gundam and things that use it's inner frame). Master Grade (MG) kits have a ton of detail and are 1/100 scale typically. The thing here is that they make so many kits that it's easy to forget how many duds they put out. But, generally, the engineering and molding are nice enough. dalong is a great website to use when it comes to seeing what something will look like right out of the box.

And that's not counting the occasional ship model or combat vehicle from Ultraman. Generally though, you can do worse. If you want decent robot models from a pretty wide range of franchises, they're a good bet.

Moderoid: All over the place, quality-wise. They're pretty simple to build, but they try to get a little too experimental when it comes to joint engineering. Generally though, the newer the better. They're relatively new at the plamo game, but they do a really wide range of sci-fi and anime shit.

Tamiya: Really nice kits. Also make some generally high quality tools and paints and whatnot. I've only built a Tiger from them, but I was really impressed. I keep seeing those Mini 4WD kits on X though and they look like a ton of fun.

Revell: More miss than hit for me. I built an NCC-1701 Enterprise they made and was pretty let down. Granted, I'd gotten it as a gift, but still. There's generally better companies that'll produce the same vehicle they're making, but better.

Kotobukiya: Engineering can sometimes kinda suck. But, they usually have good color separation and details. I built their Jehuty Ver. 2.0 and really liked it, among a couple of SRW kits. They don't reprint stuff enough for me. I'd buy some of their Ace Combat kits if they'd ever make more.

There's a ton of little brands and franchises that I wanna try out too. Maschinen Krieger kits look really cool. I wanna try some of Hasegawa's model kits too.

 

[BlackArmada]

Ah great, a thread dedicated to my specific brand of autistic hobby. I've been building scale models on-and-off for years (and miniatures as well), so let me tell you off-the-bat that no company is either pure shit or pure gold (especially nowadays), and there are many many reboxes and recasts of the same model by different companies, so you have to look at the specific model kit to find out if it's shit or not. And to help you with that, this exists.
Also have to agree that Airfix is dogshit nowadays, Revell is very hit-or-miss, even with more expensive kits, and even Tamiya, while being generally very good, has some fucking 40 year old casts being sold (looking at you 1/350 Bismarck/Tirpitz - a fucking RC cast too). Other notable ones that i've built from memory are Italeri (kind of middle-of-the-road, usually decent at least, with some being reboxed as Revell kits, and recently Zvezda (CHEAP, but not shit imo, 25-30€ for a year or two old 1/35 tank, with pretty good detailing, and occasionally also some PE parts, and they do a lot of contemporary Russian shit too, if that's your interest).

What is really cool these days is the abundance of detailing kits and 3D-printed resin stuff becoming very common, which IMHO results in even more detail and historical accuracy on kits, with many customization options, or experimental variants being much easier to produce/detail than before (when you basically had to scratchbuild everything). Gotta hate the rivet-counting megaautists though.

 

[BradeRunna]

I thought it was the other way around? Revell being known as borderline scams by putting 50+ year old kits in a new box and pretending it's modern to sucker in casuals who don't know any better. Airfix going from shit tier to good tier. And Tamiya being second only to Bandai? I could be completely wrong about that as I'm new here, and I'm basing that opinion on random YouTube videos and a guy I know who complained about Revell.


I would say sell it, as a vintage kit likely goes for good money, but if it's a gift, that's different.


Why not 1/64? The selection is limited, but sounds like it would be a perfect middle ground.


Those are rad. I especially like the kubalwagen.

Which is/was your favourite?

I don't know of any 1/64 scale model tanks. I only know of 1/72 and 1/35. I figured a bigger model with bigger parts would piss me off less.

 

[Judge Dredd]

I don't know of any 1/64 scale model tanks. I only know of 1/72 and 1/35. I figured a bigger model with bigger parts would piss me off less.

My mistake. I was thinking of 1/48. There's also 1/56 for Bolt Action. I think 1/64 is used for matchbox/hotwheels?

I keep seeing those Mini 4WD kits on X though and they look like a ton of fun.

I tried to search for that and get little RC cars. I don't know if they're kits or what.

If you want decent robot models from a pretty wide range of franchises, they're a good bet.

There's a ton of little brands and franchises that I wanna try out too.

there are many many reboxes and recasts of the same model by different companies

That's what makes me an outlier when it comes to gunpla, model kits in general, and even anime. I'm a fan of 80s-2000s era anime. Ghost in the Shell, Bubblegum Crisis, that kind of thing. Gundam and Macross missed me back then. I like Jap economy shitboxes over sports cars and SUVs.

I say this because my interests fall outside the usual model fare. I see dozens of different Tiger tanks and wonder how many versions of the same tank people could want. Same with gunpla, with RX 782 and other seemingly identical gundams. A model making friend/neighbor has three different Tornadoes in his pile of shame, and others he's built. I guess I can't really criticise because I might do the same if something appealed to my autism that much. But it's not like a war game where you get to play with them, and I doubt the various manufacturers would lead to a consistent display.

And yet, there is evidence of companies branching out. Supposedly one company (Airfix I think?) is making scale model space craft. I mentioned the Red Alert stuff in the OP. Supposedly there's a Daicon 4 kit doing the rounds, but I've never seen it online, let alone in person.

Gotta hate the rivet-counting megaautists though.

I saw a video from a US museum about their World War 2 half track collection. It goes through the different vehicles and variants. Then he gets to one and basically says "We don't know what this is." it's war vintage, but appears to be a non-standard variant, having elements of both. They theorise it was a field refit. I can imagine the existence of it driving rivet counters up the wall.

 

[BradeRunna]

My mistake. I was thinking of 1/48. There's also 1/56 for Bolt Action. I think 1/64 is used for matchbox/hotwheels?

I forgot about 1/48. That's still a bit too small still. I mean the size of the tank is fine. But it's all the smaller bits tend to irritate me. Al the really cool model kits are in 1/35th. My plan was to build my own tank museum. But I don't have the space for that or the time right now.

 

[Verdun_Salient]

Is Trumpeter good or crap? I see a couple of models from them that look interesting

 

[FatMebius]

Is Trumpeter good or crap? I see a couple of models from them that look interesting

They seem like they've somewhat improved over the years. But they are Chinese, so. Be wary of quality control and maybe a toxic chemical or two slipping their way into the plastic.

 

[W'rkncacnter]

Is Trumpeter good or crap? I see a couple of models from them that look interesting

Their older kits can be hit or miss, but the newer ones are really nice, especially for the price.
I've got a pershing made by trumpeter which wasn't great, wonky parts and poor decals. Bad engineering too. I've also got a bf109 from them and a 1/35 hind helicopter that came with super nice plastic parts and lots of high quality photo-etch parts.

Basically just do your research on any kit you're buying from them, they tend to be good though.

 

[W'rkncacnter]

Apologies for the double post.
Here's some models I made a while ago, the green fellow is obviously from 30k but the tiger is one of the many 1/35 tamiya tiger kits out there.