As per title… Has anyone bought and made these kits… I bought a Honda cb400 super four kit from them and on opening the box I’ve never seen such a poor quality kit… Excessive flash everywhere scratched and damaged parts… I took out the 2 halves of the petrol tank and tried fitting them together and when I say tried I mean tried… They didn’t line up properly… There is a huge gap between the 2 parts… So have I just been unlucky or is this the usual quality of their kits?
I think I have one Aoshima and a few Hasegawa bikes in my stash. I don’t recall the Aoshima being that wildly bad, but I think Tamiya has spoiled us all. The engineering on a Tamiya motorcycle kit - especially lately - is so good that everyone suffers by comparison. I’ll go look in the box and see if my Aoshima matches your experience.
thank you that woukd be appreciated… I knew they wouldn’t be on par in quality as tamiya… But I was expecting a little more than what I got… I’ve had to sand literal gouges out if some parts…
I haven’t done one - but thanks for the heads up! I’ve done a couple Tamiya kits and as said, they are a joy to build. I have 6 more in the stash. I just recently bought a hasegawa bike as it’s close to the bike I had when I was 18 - KZ400 - the kit is a KH400, the hotrod version but it’s as close as I’m going to get. Inspecting the sprues it looks pretty nice.
Post up a build thread and share your pain [:P]
yes this is why I bought the kit as it was a model of the first big bike I ever owned… Thought it would be a pleasure building it… But so far nothing but heartache… I have made a start… But its slow going… The instructions are vague and not very clear unlike tamiya kits… For example I’m used to bulding an engine block in full… But this seems that you build half then install it in the frame then add the rest… And unfortunately my knowledge and experience doesn’t give me the artistic license that I’d like to just go… Nope I know better I’m going to build it like this lol
Took a look at my Aoshima cycle - it looks great in the box. No flash that I can see, parts look sharp. Not engineered like a Tamiya kit and I didn’t look at the instructions, but it is up to Hasegawa quality at least.
Finally finished my 4th model the Aoshima cb400 super four… Considering the kit was in poor condition its not turned out to bad… This was also my first time using detail up and PE parts… That was more challenging than I thought… I even built and fitted the front brake discs to the wheel before realising there was no pre drilled holes for the axel to go through… I’ve certainly learnt to pay more attention… Anyway just thought I would share the result.
Turned out great. Nice job
Foxy,
That turned out well! Aoshima has been making kits for a long time and it is possible that this is one of their earlier offerings. From what I have seen, their new stuff is very good.
Protar made a number of big scale bike kits. I recently built the Italeri rebox of the Norton Commando in 1/9.
Revell of course had a bunch. The Triumph drag bike with the big fat slick was a good one.
I have a Tamiya RC 166 kit in 1/12. The 4 cam, 250 cc, 6 cylinder inline that Mike ran at 20K rpm all over the Isle of Wight.
damn the thing has pistons, rods, crankshaft and cams.
Scares the piss out of me.
Bill
nice build… I fancy trying one of the bigger scale bikes at some point as I’m assuming the will be far more detailed?
Yes it does sound a bit daunting with pistons etc… But I’m assuming that’s where the challange and the fun(and frustration) of model making comes into its own! 