Ok, You all have done it! I am going bananas over here #:-) and I am at a point that I will throw in my towel in the ring.

How the *** can someone now witch kit he should by from witch company?

For example: I recently bought a Tamiya M3 Stuart on a modeling show, I looked at the kit and I imagined a little dio in my tiny little brain. it had a fair price so I bought it.

After looking things up and asking you guy's I found out that the Tamiya kit is almost 25 years old and totally out of date and I had the option to spent a lot of money (4x the price I paid for the kit) on aftermarket kits or to buy the "new" Academy kit

I decided to use the Tamiya kit as a paint practice kit and (maybe) I will get a new kit on a later date.

I just don't know from witch company you have to buy these days to get a reasonable kit without needing to spending a lot of money to get it looking as you want.

The same go's for my older kits, I still have all my old kits from 15 years ago, unbuild (for example Esci Demag D7 kits), I am starting to get afraid of building them and looking ridiculous

Does other people feel the same?
#:-) #:-) #:-)

I know how you feel. I've got several Ertl M1's & Lindberg T-55's laying around.

Kit quality varies dramaticly. (age manufacturer etc.)

Matt

I too know how you feel. The only suggestions I can give you is do your research online ahead of time if you can. Ask here in the forums about a kit or look-up a review somewhere (if Sabot can't answer your question then your in trouble!). Most people will tell you to check the kit number as this will give you an idea of the 'newness' of the kit. Sometimes that doesn't help either as the codes can be confusing too. I personally think the manufacturers should annotate on the boxes when the kit was made (if they don't already), whether it's an update or a rebox of someone elses plastic.

Problem for me is that I mostley buy my kits on sight. I mean that I buy them on shows, and since I like all WWII (US, UK, German, Russia,...) armor I don't have a big library

Roadkill,
Based on the way you buy your kits you have to go on the reputation of the manufacture and then hold your breath. Hopefully you won't run into many 25 year old molds.
You can have a fair idea of what you're getting into by manufacture. Tamiya, Dragon, Acdy are the typically good ones.

As far as the research goes I think Yoda Mans push to get reviews in would be a big help. Ok -now I'm holding up a mirror telling myself to start writing

To be honest, a well built kit will receive kudos regardless of the accuracy of the mold. Most builders worth their salt will look at what you've done with what you started with. Feel free to spend a small fortune on aftermarket, but enjoy building what you like. Most old Tamiya kits are motorized toys in od molding, but can be built into decent looking kits out of the box. With a little sheet stock work, motor holes and those pesky open sponsons, they are decent kits. Are they 100% accurate, no. The most recent big releases (Pershing and Honey tanks) are being nitpicked by the bolt counters. So what? Do you like the M3/M5 Stuart but don't feel like spending a lot of time on an interior, get the Tamiya kits and enjoy the representation of the vehicles they represent. Remember, they's almost always an oput of box award and the super detailers are automaticaly disqualilfied from that.

Roadkill,
Good rule of thumb. Look at sites like this, read modeling publication reviews and then make your choice.

Tamiya is like dealing with a person with a split personality. Their early kits are toys but their later kits are for the most part really good. DML, Dragon, Later Italeri, Academy, AFV Club are just but a few names out there.

Do your homework and you will be happy.

GSP

With Tamiya you can look for a copyright date on the side of the box. I try to avaoid the older kits (pre 90's) but some are nice and may be the only kit available of a certain vehicle.

Best thing to do is search the Internet or ask a question about a particular kit here on Armorama.

Personally, I really like DML (they have some real dogs and re-boxed junk too though) and new Tamiya is nice. New Academy and AFV are great too.

But, if you have good modeling skills, any kit can be improved if you are willing to put in the time.

Steve

Sometimes with Tamiya you have to be a little careful with the copyright date and kit number as they will release an old kit with new figures and call it a new release. An example is their Churchill. I'm talking about the one with the three crew members, farmer, and wagon (I think the copyright date is 1996). The figures are all new and very well done, but the Churchill is the same model Tamiya produced in the late '70s. I thought it was not a bad model, but it still wasn't new, despite what the box suggests.

I also have to agree with AJLaFleche. There's no reason why you can't make a good looking model out of this without spending a ton on AM stuff. With a cheaper model, you might want to try a completely new technique, but you shouldn't view it as a scrap model from the outset.

Nic

Best bet is to ask. Get a certain tank type in your mind and then ask which is the best out there. You may get an answer like "Brand X is the only one on the market", or "Brand Y is more accurate, but Brand Z is an easier build", or "Brand X is a rebox of Brand Y's kit, and one is cheaper than the other...", etc.

You can't bet your money on brand name alone. Tamiya has the best Leopard 2A5 around, but the Marder 1A2 stablemate they released at the same time was a rebox of their old kit with a new sprue addition. DML/Dragon has some of the best WW2 German armor around, but if you look at some of their early modern Soviet stuff, it leaves much to be desired. Italeri too produces some great middle of the road kits, but then kicks out dogs that aren't as good as the older kits of the same subject matter made by someone else.

The reboxes will drive you nuts and we will never solve that problem. Someone has to spend hard earned money on a "new" kit then let the rest of us know that it is a rebox of an "old" kit. On the plus side, people were paying collector's prices for the old Esci M60 tank kits, now that Italeri reboxed it, we can all enjoy it at less than $20.

Hi Ronny,
the old Tamiya M3 Stuart builds up into a nice basic kit.....it fits together pretty good, looks okay....the question is how accurate do you need your plastic kits to be???....I'd trade fit for minor inaccuracies any day....I was thinking of building a old Monogram Me-262 as my first of the 6 Dragon Me-262 I had was giving me nightmares with poor fit...I heard a rumour about a year ago that Mr T was going do the 262....my 5 remaining 262's were ditched on eBay (all for more than I paid for them)...face it, some older kits (Airfix comes to mind) are not worth the effort but usually Mr T's older kits (after 1976) are not too bad...

Old kits are generally not up to todays standards but dependent upon the manufacturer can be jewels.

It's all to personal taste...are you a rivit counter? I'm not...if it fits good, looks reasonably good I'm happy.
cheers,
Dave

Dave,

It hase to look good and (if possible convincing). I am not a rivetcounter, I consider myself to be a story teller.

I want to place my kits on diorama's, but I recently dicoverd that even in dio's there seem to be a tendency to superdetail the armor, that makes it so hard to keep in line

It's all in what you like personaly. Everyone has their own favorites.These are mine.......
Aircraft-1/144 DML,Minicraft-1/72,48 Italeri,Hasagewa,Hobbycraft,Revell(monogram)
1/32 Tamiya,Hasagewa
Ships-1/350 Tamiya,DML
Figures-1/35,16(120mm) DML,Verlinden

Remember, Everyone likes different things.. Have fun!!!

I normally go for the tamiya kits. After trying out several manufacturers like dragon,italeri, acadamy and revell, i found that in terms of fitting and details, tamiya is still the best. Same couldn t be said about their earlier releases though.