Hello all, just curious to know what brand models you prefer to build and why, which ones you dislike and why or does it not matter at all, do you cross brands at all? Thanks in advance for your insights.
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Itās not necessarily the brand I care about, but rather the model subject.
I tend to focus more on what models look good to me and what piques my interest.
But if thereās a brand I really go for right now, it would probably be TAKOM.
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I mostly do tanks. I gotta say, Tamiya is my favorite! (Probably about everybody says that.) Maybe they do lack in some details, but the ease and simplicity of building means you can have more time detailing. And for me, their detail is usually about enough!
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I lean toward Tamiya and Dragon,but it really depends on who has the subject,I have built and enjoyed Meng,Takom,and Border also.When I want to build something,I will first see who has it I will search reviews and build blogs,and make my decision.But really,all manufacturers have some dogs,you got to research.
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So far Iāve only done cars. I like ICM because they have the antique models I prefer - Model T, Model A, Renault etc. - and the molds are very clean and detailed. For muscle cars I like Revell - great variety and clear instructions.
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I have no favourite. I have had great kits and horrible kits from many manufactures.
āBrandā when it comes to model kits, can often be a confusing rabbit hole.
Far more often than we realize the ābrandā on the box did not make the original molds or even many of the sprues.
Tamiya for example uses old Italeri kits as a base and add a few parts.
There M109 series of kits are all Italeri sprues with extras.
Some are marked as such but some are not.
They also collaborate with or use molds from ICM and several other older or smaller companies. In this case the truck is ICM and the gun a very old Tamiya.
The wonderful Accurate Miniatures line of kits are now sold as Academy or Italeri
Many MANY kits packaged by some mainstream makers today are actually very old molds from companies like FROG, Heller, MPC and even Revell and Monogram.
If you donāt know what you are getting you may be disappointed (or overjoyed) when you open that ānew releaseā kit from Super Duper Models to discover a 60 year old kit inside.
To be sure you know what you are getting it is best to check reviews or Scalemates to see what actually is in your preferred Brandās box.
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I am not brand particular or brand averse. I choose my kits to fill gaps in my collection subject areas. If there are multiple kits of the same subject, it usually boils down to two criteria for me, complexity and price. I donāt care for the approach of some companies who like to over engineer their kits and have oodles and oodles of parts, many of which will not be visible once the build is complete. But then again if there is also an older kit of the same subject, and that kit is overly simplified, Iāll choose the mid level kit. Something of a Goldilocks rule for me, not too hard, not too easy, but just right. Other times, one kit is all that is available of a given subject in my preferred scales. You gotta go with what youāve got.
Every now and then, the nostalgia factor kicks in and Iāll want to build something that I built ages ago, but did not turn out satisfactory by my current standards due to my skill level at the time of build. Or it was a kit that I never built back then, for one reason or another and I want to overcome that shortfall. Oh to have a Time Machine and go back to those 70ās era prices 
. Not to mention the molds at that time were new and the fit of the kits better than a current reissue.
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I am like many of the others here and have no brand loyalty or aversion. All model companies have great models and duds. No one company is the best nor worst. I pick a model based on the subject and who has the best kit of it for me. I look for the most accurate and best detailed.
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Here is my list:
Tamiya - Easy, pleasant builds with excellent engineering.
Airfix - For going through the British aircraft catalogue and giving us modern kits that build nicely.
DML - When the armor detail dial must go to ā11ā.
Amusing Hobby, Hobby Boss, Meng, Takom, Trumpeter and the other Chinese manufacturers for giving us all those weird tank kits. And thank you, World of Tanks, for making it happen!
The Goodsmile Company for giving us the Moderoid series of pretty much any mecha subject that is not owned by Bandai. Their catalog aces Bandaiās Glitches from Mercury and Gqwacks kits. Patlabors. Giant Robo. The Power Loader from Aliens. Robocop. 'Nuff said.
Even though I am a die-hard Gunpla fan, Bandai does not make my list because I think they have gone lax in recent years and have lost sight of the ball.
My āun-favoriteā brand is Mach-2. I know it is a small (one man?) operation, but the quality of the kits have not improved one bit for literally decades. No excuse really, as former Sov-Bloc companies like ICM and Modelsvit make super nice kits today compared to what they did back in the 20th century.
I suppose my harsh attitude is partially due to Mach-2ās ironically great selection of subjects that no one else does, like the Seamaster, Dea Dart, Ar-232, Ju-252, LeDuc ramjets, and so on. If only they improved their products - or someone else did them to 21st century standards.
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I have some favorites like others have posted but Iām all over the board. From my scalemates page (stash)
Academy (2)
Academy/Minicraft (2)
Accurate Miniatures (3)
AFV Club (1)
Airfix (7)
Amodel (1)
AMP (2)
AMT (8)
AMT/ERTL (1)
Aoshima (1)
Aurora/ESCI (2)
BPK (2)
Bronco (2)
Clear Prop! (1)
Dora Wings (1)
Ebbro (4)
Eduard (1)
ESCI (1)
ESCI/ERTL (1)
Fine Molds (1)
Flightline Engineering (1)
Fujimi (1)
Great Wall Hobby (2)
Hasegawa (26)
Heller (1)
HobbyBoss (6)
IBG Models (1)
Italeri (8)
Kinetic (4)
Kitty Hawk (3)
KovozĆ”vody ProstÄjov (1)
Lion Roar (1)
MACO (1)
MasterCraft (1)
Meng Model (3)
Midwest Products (1)
Minicraft Model Kits (1)
Model Factory Hiro (1)
Model Shipways (1)
Monogram (5)
MPC (5)
NuNu Model Kit (1)
Pegasus Hobbies (1)
Revell (26)
Revell Monogram (3)
Roden (3)
Salvinos JR Models (2)
Signifer (1)
Skyline Models (1)
Tamiya (29)
Tommyās War (1)
Trumpeter (10)
TwoBobs Aviation Graphics (1)
Williams Brothers (1)
Wolfpack (1)
Zvezda (2)
Completed
Academy (1)
Accurate Miniatures (1)
Airfix (2)
AMT (1)
AMT/ERTL (1)
Bandai Spirits (2)
Eduard (2)
Encore Models (1)
ESCI (1)
Fujimi (2)
Hasegawa (13)
HobbyBoss (2)
Hobbycraft (1)
IsraCast (1)
Italeri (6)
Meng Model (2)
Minicraft Hasegawa (1)
Minicraft Model Kits (5)
Moebius Models (1)
Monogram (2)
MPC (2)
Polar Lights (1)
Pro Modeler (1)
Revell (11)
Roden (1)
Skyline Models (1)
Tamiya (21)
Trumpeter (3)
Verlinden Productions (6)
Wolf Model (1)
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Subject and scale determines my interest and purchase preference. However, when I was first starting out as a youngster I thought Tamiya was the best for all reasons. Then I saw Testors and Italeri box art and ventured out to them. That LHS only carried, military: Tamiya, Italeri, and Testors. Cars and trucks: Tamiya, Monogram, and Ravell.
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Great topic! In terms of completed kits and works in progress Iāve done:
- Airfix (Armour - 5)
- Bandai (Sci-Fi - 4)
- Trumpeter (Armour - 1)
- Tamiya (Armour - 1)
In terms of the stash / on-order however:
- Airfix (Armour - 1)
- Airfix (Aircraft - 1)
- Dragon (Armour - 1)
- Hasegawa (Aircraft - 1)
- MPC (Sci-Fi - 1)
- Tamiya (Armour - 3)
I still consider myself a bit of a beginner, so have mostly been working up the skills profile with some relatively cheap Airfix kits at 1:72 and 1:76 scale before I attack the vastly more complex and detailed Dragon kit that set my return to scale modelling in motion. Tamiya have presented some user-friendly entries into larger scales, but being gifted I want to make sure I do them justice rather than āruinā them as practise runs like my Airfix stuff. The Bandai kits are just pleasant distractions which are rich in detail, go together amazingly well, and are a different topic to 20th century warfare.
Long term, Iād like to be able to take on more expertly crafted kits with the confidence that Iāll do them justice so Iām keen to see how the brains trust replies to this topic.
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Aircraft:
- Tamiya: Excellent detail, and fit of parts
- Academy: Slightly cheaper, excellent detail, and great engineering of sub-assemblies.
- Trumpeter: They offer a wide range of subjects in 1/32nd scale.
Armor:
- RFM: Great details. Most of their subjects offer full interiors.
- Tamiya: Excellent detail and engineering. In my opinion, the largest selection of armor subjects to choose from.
- Dragon: Relatively inexpensive.
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I mostly build Tamiya models for now, but I dabbled in Revell and currently Eduard.
As a relative beginner, Tamiya got my vote : sturdy, generally clever and well engineered, clear instructions. They can be a bit pricey, however.
Revell almost made me quit this model folly
Eduard is annoying me to no end. They are definitely more advanced than Tamiya : there are many caveats and pitfalls Iām diving into headfirst ! My most recent misadventure : parts got soft on the holding sticks and broke upon retrieval. I understand why and how it happened, but it never did with Tamiya. On the other hand, what incredible details, and in profipack they come with masks and PE sets.
I want to sample the brands just to get a taste of their philosophy, but as it was mentioned already, we donāt always have a choice. One of my next kit is going to be a ki-46 dinah type 100, and in 1/48 there really only seem to be Tamiya.
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I have no particular favorite companies, just favorite models. But Iām pretty confident that a Tamiya kit will be well engineered, an AFV Club kit will be chock full of detail but also itsy bitsy parts, and a Amusing Hobby kit will have simply awful tracks but some wild subjects.
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Tamiya tops the list easily. The engineering is outstanding. Better with newer kits of course. But because they donāt make every aircraft I want in very scale, Iām forced to buy and build other brands. Academy and Trumpeter are next. And interestingly enough I find the older Trumpeter kits to be better designed and engineered while simply. Newer ones have so many pieces that arenāt key locked and simply just attach the pitot to the side of the aircraftā¦
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I really have no particular favorite brand, but I build mostly automotive subjects with a little bit of armor, aviation, nautical and sci-fi thrown in to break up the monotony. I buy and build what interests me at the time.The majority of my kits that I have are from either AMT or Revell. MPC, Monogram, Aurora, Testors, and Tamiya are in there too, just not to the same extent that the first two companies are. Most of my Tamiya are armor kits, but there are a few cars in there. Fujimi, Italeri, SMS, and Starter as well. The last two are specialty small scales from France if I remember correctly. I think that they did race cars mostly.
Iām with the others that donāt have favorites really, when I see something I like I get it, some are fun, some are frustrating, some take more work, but Iāve never not grabbed a kit because of the manufacturer.
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Now, I HAVE not grabbed a kit every now and again - previous misbegotten adventures mean I wonāt buy Panda kits even though they (used to) kit subjects I really like. Itās just not worth the hassle. Only reason I bought my one missing 'Hawk helicopter from the late unlamented Kitty Hawk is that I can get 3d printed main rotorheads from RESKit that solve the ācut the bad rotor apart and rebuild itā issues.
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This was only on the initial SH-60B kits, no others. It was also an easy fix.
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