Been playing IL-2: 1946 and am getting quite fond of the Bf-109.
What do you recommend? (Any scale will do.)
In 1/48, my vote would go to Hasegawa.
Regards, Rick
[#ditto] although with a little extra work, the Tamiya Emil can be turned into a nice lil’ kit.
I agree with the hase opinion. Nice kits, good details, fun to build.
regards, Mac
Depends which vesion and which scale. Generally, in 1/72, Fine Molds are best, if you can find and afford them. They do a -F, -G and -K. For a -E, probably Tamiya, though the ICM kits are not bad and slightly cheaper. There again, ICM decals are reliably rubbish, so probably best to go with the Tamiya, even though it’s slightly more expensive.
If you balk at shelling out the best part of USD30.00 for a 1/72 WW2 single-seat fighter, most of the competition is, sadly, less than impressive. It’s a question of which one is least bad. For the F, we’re probably looking at the Italeri, but nothing fits and scale accuracy isn’t wonderful. It does, at least, have a decent decal sheet. It’s more-or-less the only game in town.
For the G, I’d go for Revell Germany. It has a number of fairly minor shape issues, but most of them you’d only notice if you knew what you were looking for. Detail and decals are excellent, and, in the UK, it’s less than USD8.00. Of the others, the one to avoid at all costs is the Airfix 1/72 Bf.109G-6.
For the K, there isn’t a lot of choice. The only one that’s at all widely available is the Heller kit (which Airfix also re-boxed, several years ago). You can still find them in LHSs with slow-moving stock. Shape’s OK, detail and decals aren’t.
I’ll let others cover 1/32 and 1/24. In 1/144, Sweet do a very nice Bf.109F,
http://www.hsgalleries.com/gallery04/bf109f144ym_1.htm
but, in Europe at least, it’s not easy to find
Cheers,
Chris.
Hasegawa had the best 109 kits out right now. Their 1/32 G/K kits are excellent. The 1/48 kits are the best in terms of both accuracy and fit that I have seen. Trumpeter 1/24 G series are good but the K has some issues. I don’t built much in 1/72 and smaller.
Well I’ll pipe in with my thoughts on 1/72:
Dora: The Heller kits is old, raised panel lines, sparse cockpit, etc. but still a decent little kit.
Emil (E-3, E-4, E-7): Tamiya and ICM both are good kits. Tamiya goes together easier though.
F-2, F-4, G-2, G-4, G-6, G-10, K-4: FineMolds, don’t bother with anything else unless you’re not interested in accuracy. FineMolds are way ahead of everyone else in 1/72 by a wide margin.
Hasegawa and Academy G-6 and G-14 are less expensive but are reasonably good. The Revell G-10 is OK but needs some serious work to bring it up to par in terms of accuracy.
Kits to avoid: Italeri F and G, Academy E and just about anything else I didn’t list.