1\48 scale why going back

Modeling Subjects Armor
21

my aircraft are 1/48 and my armour is 1/35, due to speace and budgetary constraints, but also because it just “feels” right.

if i move out of these it will be to upscale into say 1/24 aircraft on a one off basis or larger armour eg trupeter does 1/16 armour, but i am not sure if this is the mainstream here (i have seen 1/15 stuff around and would be v frustrated to have things off by that really tiny amount).

personally, i i know the economics are against tamiya re competition from china, but their prices just really get me; if they wanted to lower them they could, but they don’t.

now i only buy tamiya selectively on ebay or occasionally at at online sale eg Great Models etc.

i will not be buying any 1/48 armour.

kind regards,

Nicholas

22

THe announcement of one kit in 1/35 scale hardly shows their continuing commitment of this scale, when they have announced quite a few kits in the new range. Whether some of these kits have allready been represented in 1/35 by someone else is not really an issue here I think. The issue of the same vehicle by several companies seems to be a norm when it comes to some kits, especially popular items from WWII. COnsider the Hetzer. Ok, so Dragon has one. It’s far from readily available, and I know with a strong sense of certainty that if tamiya were to release one in 1/35, most of their fans would jump right in and get it. The market is far from saturated, and certain kits are needed. And plus it IS Tamiya. No matter what they release in 1/35, there’ll be plenty of people lining up to get it. Also, the prices they charge for these smaller scale kits are outrageous. I was at my LHS a couple of days ago and saw the new range going for between $30-$40 CAD, which is comparable to MOST of their 1/35 kits, and pretty much all other 1/35 kits by manufacturers other than Tamiya. Granted, I can agree with you that a release of any new kit is good news, but to me, some of these just don’t add up. Business, the market state, and simple customer loyalty would indicate that Tamiya didn’t quite think this one through enough, IMHO.

23

Again, their 1/48th scale launch hardly has anything to do with that. Like I said, it’s not like they were releasing gobs of 35th scale kits before. Their release of 35th kits has been quite limited for at least three years now.

The new release of their 48th line OTOH is a launch of a new line, so naturally they would want to release lots of new kits to pique interest. That hasn’t affected their 35th line, as far as I can see, as they are releasing a new kit in 35th, just like in previous years.

That’s just the point, and it really is the issue. Devoting money and resources to make a kit that other manufacturers have out in highly regarded kits doesn’t make any sense from a business perspective. The fact that it’s become the norm just underlines what a good idea it is for Tamiya to initiate a new scale.

At this point, kit selection is market driven. It’s not as if these companies don’t do research to find out what people want. That’s why there are a billion Tigers and not one decent AMX-13, a tank that has seen tons of combat since its production.

I can’t speak for Canada, but the prices for the kits in the US and particularly in Japan are substantially lower than these charged for new 35th kits. If the Canadian distributors are charging more, that’s more of a local issue.

24

SOme things to consider here. I think we can all agree that tamiya makes some of the finest kits around, in both fit and finish. People are calling for a hetzer, which tamiya has a good portion all ready aviable with the marder. However, how many kits would they have to seel to break even on the new molds, let alone make some real money.
Seeing a successful hetzer out there, dragon would probally re-release their kit, witha few extra goodies and make tamiya look like a jerk for charging 50.00 for a basic kit.
I for one have welcomed their entry into the 1/48 scale market. I have built three of these kits and they really combine the detail with size that the others are lacking. I have plenty of 1/35, and 1/72. Hoever what really caought my eye was the hetzer and the stug d. Both subjects that are a little bit harder to come by in 1/35. Heck the tracks on the stug even have sag modeled in.
Personally, if this brings more people into the fold, i’m all for that. Tamiya is the best introduction to the new modeler, their kits practially fall together. And this just opens the door for new barrels, pe sets, and track sets in this scale.
I’ll keep them, warts and all. Bill

25

Bill, I think Dragon actually is re-releasing the Hetzer soon, although I may have that mixed up with with Eduard, which I think is releasing one soon too.

Anyway, Dragon did do a Hetzer and it didn’t sell all that well. That’s the thing. Kits that sell well are kept in production.

That’s why I salute Tamiya for releasing one at all – in 48th. Hetzers are not giants with massive guns, so people seem to be less interested in them, but I love em.

26

Something I’ve never been able to figure out…is the logic behind releasing the same kit from 3 different manufacturers. I’m a ship modeler by trade, and we recently had 3 new 1/700 Bismarck models released within a year. Aoshima, Pit-Road and Trumpeter all saw it necessary to release one. All three are decent kits, all have their own individual flaws, but why do I need 3 kits of the same subject? I think armor has the same problems in many instances.

Right now I have 4 Tigers sitting on my shelf…a late war Tamiya, a late war Academy, the Dragon 3-in1, and the new late war AFV Club. All of these kits are awesome…nice detail, easy to build (having done the Tamiya once before and hearing feedback on the others). But aside from getting an interior, why do we need 4 companies producing this one tank, when there’s lots of subjects that aren’t being touched?

Back in the old days of 1/700 ships, all the major players at the time, Aoshima, Hasegawa, Tamiya, and Fujimi, all got together and divvied up the subjects between them. For a long time, that’s the way it was…and everyone was basically happy.

It’s a corporate mindset that I just don’t understand…especially when there’s other things out that that could be done…show me a Dana SPG in 1/35 plastic!!! Or a G6!!! How about a nice Studebaker 6x6, or a CCKW-based wrecker? Oh well, back to the Tigers…

Jeff

27

sorry guys do not mean to cause a stir but just my opinion on the 1\48 scale and the 1\35 scale kits my applogies to all but also I with not be buying any 1\48 scale armor either have to many 1\35 th kits to build again my applogies.

28

I suspect my re-entry in the hobby was timely. Unlike many of you, I am able to make a fresh selection of scale in which to build. I do not have hundreds invested in 1/35 kits . Looking at the scales objectively, 1/48th is clearly the prudent option,… for me. I am looking for demintional accuracy , and fidelity of detail. I believe those qualities are clearly demonstrated in the new Tamiya releases. Judging from the pics of the soon-to-be released SkyBow Tigers that standard will be agressively pushed. Forthcoming releases from these two manufacturers alone will result in a projected field of some 70 kits! Tamiya has said their selection will include softskin and support vehicles as well as armor. We will see both a Panther and PzIV variant from them before the end of 2005. These are exciting times for someone like myself who doesn’t have an investment/kit stockpile in a particular scale, and can start a “clean” program of building a quality collection. If, on the other hand, I were one with a closet full of unbuilt 1/35 stuff stacked up,… I’d likely say the new 1/48 scale doesn’t appeal to me. ( What else can you say when your only other practical option is to dump the stuff on eBay for half it’s original worth.)

29

Heck, it’s exciting for me too, 28juni14. And I do have plenty of 35th armor. It just doesn’t bother me to have models in different scales. I’ve got 72nd, 144th and 35th now, as well as 700th ships. Scale is not a religion, it’s just a convention.

30

I for one am glad to see 1/48th scale come back out of the closet and back onto the store shelves. Any new model breeds new opportunities for smaller manufacturers to provide decals, photo-etched and resin parts and new figures. I have to agree, the 1/35 market is saturated and Tamiya as the strength of name and know-how to make this dormant scale work. It is also a market that can be crossmarketed to both 1/48 scale aircraft enthusiasts and the 25mm/28mm wargame market (anyone pricing resin 25mm/28m wargame tanks will agree that Tamiya prices are really not out-of-line)

Doug

31

bottom line guys is the dollar sign, Tamiya and the rest have done it all in 1/35, so why not start over in 1/48, reselling to all us “model junkies” the stuff we’ve done before only in a different scale. The potential market is there, but, as mentioned earlier, they’ve got to keep the quality up to 1/35 standard

32

Tamiya has no one to blame but themselves for their lackluster 1/35th performance. It seems as though they’re unresponsive, period, to anyone but those they hire to do “consulting” work for them. The proof, as the saying goes, is in the pudding, that being their latest efforts.

The evidence of this is easily seen in the 1/48th scale kits. The Sherman STILL has the open sponson/see-through-the-kit affliction that its 1/35th counterpart has. That’s lazy. They used die-cast hulls; why? Now I have to use superglue or some special non-styrene glue just to have an out-of-box build? Just silly.

DML, on the other hand, sets the standard for listening to customers, it seems. The line of German halftrack variants proves this, as does the inclusion of correction parts in kits such as the SU-100 (mantlet), one of the Sherman kits (resin hull along with original), the shovelful of parts in the Sherman Ic Hybrid kit, separate parts for T-34 engine hatches so it’s easier to use PE screens without cutting, and some corrections made to the curent halftracks. I venture to guess that almost all of these actions were done based on feedback from reviews in magazines, and more frequently nowadays, the WWW.

Tamiya would never do that. Tamiya couldn’t even muster the “business courage” to combine their lousy Panzer IICF/G kit along with the lower hull sprues from their Wespe kit to make a “more accurate but still needs some work” Panzer IIC. If they lack the foresight to maximize two existing product lines in such a manner, then why should great leaps of creativity and “business courage” be expected now? Because it’s a new scale?

There’s another saying that fits here too: No matter where you go, there you are.

33

I’m thinking more on the lines of $39, much like their Marder III’s, Wespe, and Panzer III. You could probably get it online for about $30. I would nab it up in a second. I’ve built the other three and they are gems. Tamiya may be pricey, but they are great builds.

34

the price in this country is disgusting
there 1.48th tiger is £19.99 Dragons 1.35th Tiger is £22.99
Tamiyas 1.48th kubelwagen is £9.99 there 1.35th version is £10.99

now thats a bad price to get kit

now there is a story i read on Armourama uk saying Mr Tamiya was opening the new headquaters for the UK importers of Tamiya, its rumoured that he was disgusted with the price of his kits in this country being too expencive

Dragons kits used to cost £35 over here now they have a new importer they cost around £22

lets hope you cant hide greed

35

That is indeed a horrible price Jon. With the pound at about 2:1 to the dollar, that makes the Tamiya 1/48 Tiger about $40 US. I can get a 1/48th here for probably less than $20 and a 1/35th off of Ebay for low $20’s. Ouch, I feel for alll my friends in the UK.

36

Don’t understand – what are you gluing the PE and the metal barrels of the new Dragon kits on with … ? [;)]

My basic response though would be that I don’t think Tamiya are unresponsive cowards because they did not repackage the Panzer II kit with the Wespe bottom parts, or give you sponson covers. They just decided not to.

And they did inaugurate a whole new range in 48th scale, so I guess my answer would be yes – they did show business courage by striking out into new territory.

37

First of all, the DML 1/35 kits include plastic parts to use in lieu of the metal parts. Even the older DML releases like their first Shermans had two sets of parts; one etch fret, one set on the styrene sprue. Haven’t seen a plastic hull put in with the die-cast one for Tamiya’s 1/48th line; haven’t seen any extra parts in 95% of Tamiya’s kits, to be frank about it.

Second, the Panzer II C F/G and Wespe was just an example of an opportunity missed, an easy one at that because all the molds are done, just produce parts and repackage as appropriate; heck use Panzer II C F/G packaging and slap a sticker on it like they did with their “bonus” kits of the Tiger I with figures. It’s one of many opportunities missed, because Tamiya appears unreachable or off-limits about such ideas. The Panzer II C F/G and Wespe combo type kit isn’t even my idea, nor is it new; it’s been floated out there for years since the Wespe came out. Should Tamiya redesign every kit after a couple bad reviews? No of course not. But when an overwhelming majority of reviewers say “open sponsons make kit look bad”, one would think they’d get the hint…and yet…

Third, I wouldn’t give all the credit to Tamiya for “inaugurating” anything in 1/48th armor. It’s been out there for years, but only as resin, e.g. Gaso.line, Tarmac, and many others. It’s a pretty popular scale in Europe actually. Academy has been producing modern armor kits in the scale for some time, most of them of the simplified detail/RC variety. But they were there, and there’s evidently a market somewhere because they still produce them…at about half the price of the Tamiya offerings. Furthermore, Skybow announced a 1/48th line, and there was a Chinese/Taiwanese company that started popping out modern US and Russian armored cars in 1/48…Kitech or some such i think…

Finally, given all of the above and that all of these announcements of going to 1/48, or expanding the line as in the Academy case, occurred almost simultaneously, and I get the feeling that Tamiya’smove to 1/48 isn’t at all groundbreaking. Going with the flow, to be positive, or grasping at straws, to be pessimistic, sums up my spin on it.

38

I jusat finished my third tamiya 1/48 scale model, the hetzer. I’ve also built the stug and the sherman, allow me to critique.
Sherman, molded on tools, open sponsons, some knock out pin marks on the inside of the tracks. However you can’t see the knock out pin marks. THe rest of the model is typical tamiya quality,and basicly shake the box and a nice model falls out.
THe stug was second, a couple of molded on tools, and open vents where there should be screens. However it captures the squat look of this little monster. Looks good, and the sponsons are filled in on this one. I think, i have to check in the morning.
THe hetzer is by far the nicest to date. No molded on tools. Great detail. and falls together like a dream. I am painting it tommorrow so i will have some pictures by the end of the week. But if they keep following this path, they will look great.
So there you have it, three quick kit reviews by someone who has built the kits. Tamyas 1/48 are a welcome offering for a forgotten scale inn armor.
Bill

39

A couple of thoughts to add on to this long thread…

Firstly to the Canadian modeller who is bemoaning the high cost of Tamiya, why don’t you ask why Borgfeldt, the exclusive distributor of Tamiya in Canada charges so much? Hobby stores can’t move their stock b/c of the ridiculous distributor situation. High costs in Canada aren’t Tamiya’s fault. You can see that the cost in Yen is reasonable, in my opinion (That’s the number in blue next to the stock number on the boxtops – I’m looking at an M3 Lee box and it’s 1200 Yen. How much would this be marked on the shelf in Ontario?)

Secondly, I’ve heard that Tamiya’s main target audience is their domestic model building public. Without a doubt, aircraft builders outnumber treadheads everywhere. One of the mainstays in the aircraft realm is 1/48 scale. The 1/48 releases have captured the attn of many previously exclusive a/c builders. Plain and simple. It seems to be paying off very well for them.

Tamiya, due to its size and many product lines may not seem as responsive as others. We’ve got to face the fact that 1/35 AFV modelling is only a very small niche in the Tamiya universe. Although we enjoy the commitment that Mr. Tamiya himself has to the 1/35 line (therefore the extremely high quality of kits), it should not surprise us if the bulk of resources is geared towards RC models, their extensive aircraft lines, and other stuff. If we step back and think of it, it’s a business miracle that something like the Dragon Wagon was produced by a company immersed in a culture that adores anime figurines, RC toys and miniature electronic gadgets. I’d bet that the DW was a loser for Tamiya but I’m also equally sure that Mr. Tamiya is very proud that his company was able to produce it. You can’t run a company by pushing pet projects though.

Finally, as for Tamiya retooling oldie-moldies. Let’s take a look at this list:

Panzer IV ausf H (and then the ausf J and Mobelwagen)
StuG III ausf G
Panzer III ausf L
Tiger I series
Tiger II series
Panther (albeit ausf G)
Jagdpanther
Willys Jeep
Schwimmwagen
Kubelwagen

All of these appeared before in the 70s and 80s. Tamiya is the king of the re-tool as far as I’m concerned.

And let us look at some other completely groundbreaking products of theirs in 1/35:

T-55 Soviet MBT
Japanese LAV
JGSDF T-90 Tank
Leopard II A5 MBT
Challenger II
Famo w/SdAnh 116
Cromwell & Centaur
GMC truck
Steyr 1500A and Kommandeurwagen
M8 and M20 armored cars
Marder III (both versions)
M26 Pershing

I have nearly everyone of these on my shelf. If I built these for the next ten years, I won’t be “suffering”. Quite the opposite: it’ll be a thoroughly enjoyable building experience at every turn.

40

For retools, don’t forget their M4A3 (75) and M4A3 (105) from the old M4A3 (75). They’ve also retooled their Abrams tank for the third time and has given us the best, most modern Abrams kit on the market. And, BTW, the only kit that allows you to build an M1A2, US Army M1A1 or USMC M1A1 OOB.

For all new kits, their M1025 and M1046 HMMWV series raised the bar for the omnipresent American tactical vehicle.

Good points Roy.