I read so much around here about filler and sanding being needed on certain models, I feel way too many. Of course I’ve dealt with this too but shouldn’t models fit properly without all the tweaking? Do some model makers make their models a poor fit on purpose? Do they think we enjoy or need an extra challenge? Sorry guys, maybe this makes me not so much of the fraternity but give me a Tamiya type quality fitting kit every time. I guess I’m not ashamed to say I’m a shake and bake type builder. I have kits in my stash that I have put off in favor of others that I have purchased much more recently because I dread the hassle it’s going to take to make them look right. I’ve even bought a handful of the Pegasus snap kits just to build something that fits nice. Speaking of Pegasus I think they’re not bad at all. The builds look pretty darn nice after they’re painted up. Sorry for the rant but the post about the P-61 got me going. That’s one I really want to build but have kept putting off. I think it’s been in my stash at least a year. P.S. The poor fit on an old Revell 1/32 scale P-38 really required lots of filler and sanding. I love that plane and want so bad for it to be perfect. Wish Tamiya made one, I’ll bet they would get it right.
Well working in a factory myself, I can probably comment on this a bit.
It’s not necessarily a question of whether or not they did their job properly. To maintain a certain level of quality requires measured efforts to do so. Every level of quality above and beyond requires either changes to machinery(which requires money), changes in process(which can be free, but might also just take more time. and time=money), hiring more personnel to do the QC, or buying different materials from different vendors(which can cost money, not only because of changing vendors, but also for retooling for a different material).
A factory is not trying to gouge you by charging you so much money for a faulty product, they are trying to set the absolutely lowest price they can(to beat out the other guy) while still maintaining what they have decided is an acceptable level of quality.
Is it possibly to make models that fit together perfectly? Absolutely. Would you pay the price that they would have to charge to make sure that they can live up to that standard? Maybe you would. But A LOT of people wouldn’t. Especially since so many model builders take a certain amount of pride in making a difficult model work.
Every factory and company has it’s niche. Revell could certainly if they put their mind to it, make models with as good a fit as Tamiya or anyone. But then they would have to raise their price. They stay in business by not directly competing against Tamiya but rather making slightly more budget models for the budget minded model builder.
I guess this is kind of a weird first post. But there you go 
I’m Rains_on_parades everyone.
Hey, Rains:
I’ve often wondered about this myself. Especially in the age computer-aided design that measures tolerances almost to the atomic level, I just don’t understand why/how any kit made within the past ten years can fit poorly.
Is it really more expensive to manufacture a well-fitting kit as opposed to one that isn’t? If so, where exactly does the extra expense factor into the manufacturing process of a kit that is well made? In my mind, having Part A fit snugly into Part B is no different that having Part A fit loosely into Part B, expense-wise, but obviously that’s not the case.
Thanks!
PB
For me, it would depend on how badly the poor fit is. It would have to be extremely warped and/or out of alignment before it would anger me. Only one kit has been that bad for me - the 1/48th Testors OV-10 Bronco. All others that I’ve had with fit problems were good challenges for me. Those kinds of challenges help me with my modeling skills. I use them as a learning experience, not as something to anger me. And those types of problems also help me with my attention to detail, which, in turn, carries over into my job. Attention to detail is a great benefit for anyone doing anything. Just turn the negative into a positive. What’s that old saying? “If someone gives you lemons, make lemonade.”
Mr. Rains pretty much nailed it. As I work for a small model making company (we build movie prop reproductions for collectors and also our own boxed multi-media kits), I can attest to the measure of work which goes into every component. When one considers that model kits aren’t exactly a mainstream consumer product, there’s a break point where the product eventually becomes a money loser, if one goes too far with the tooling and pattern making. In short, it’s a compromise.
I used to dread a crummy kit, but now I actually look forward to the challenge a substandard kit presents. I like to push myself and see if I can take that turd and polish it to a high shine. 0ther times I have been pushed to produce and market my own resin improvement parts for a bad kit I’m working on, because I know others can benefit from what I have learned from my build. Such is the case with Lindberg’s old, old Goshawk, Academy’s outdated I-16, and more recently, Monogram’s dreadful P-61.
But to think how my grandfather, a prolific modeler, started with the old Strombecker wood kits (before plastic kits were available), I really can’t find too much to complain about with today’s kits.
Along with scratchbuilding parts, I find correcting errors in kits to be one of the most rewarding aspects of this hobby. Sure, you get that sinking feeling when you first dry-fit parts that just dont match up, but its compensated by a feeling of accomplishment later on.
I generally agree with this point of view.
Currently I have Revell’s recent reissue of Matchbox’s old T-2 Buckeye slowly on the go. I’ve filled the trenches that passed for panel lines, canibalised another kit for cockpit goodies and am in the process of modifying the seats from the canibalised kit to look more like the T-2’s actual seats.
I’m doing a lot more to the kit too, just to see how good I can make something so basic, because it’s not actually a bad kit form a shape and dimension standpoint.
Poor fit does occaisionally bother me if I’ve paid a large mount for the kit. I’m willing to be much more forgiving on a kit if I spent less.
Other things bug me more like if the overall shape and dimensions are out to a noticeable degree. Those are much harder to fix.
I’ll more or less bite my tongue on the habit of a particular Asian manufacturer of reissuing their older kits as “limited edition” with nothing more than a new decal sheet and charging a new kit price for them. That really gets up my nose more than any poor fit issue could.[banghead]
Well I do not work in the model kit business, so I can’t comment on the specific factors which create a well fitting kit. But I’m betting that making an accurate mold is the least of the problems. After that is choosing a quality of material that is going to hold to shape, and then a cooling/curing process that doesn’t cause warping as well as just a proper QC process that gets rid of the faulty components. And perhaps there are also decisions to be made. For instance if you used a mold that used .5 ounces more styrene then the two pieces would fit together no problem, however shorting that .5 ounces saves them millions and leaves a model that generally works if the modeler is able to make it work. In fact I would guess that is where most of the ill-fitting pieces come from. Decisions that had to be made between perfect fit vs budget. Perhaps that, as well as molds just getting old and not doing what they should anymore.
I guess for me it depends. If the kit is known to be bad, but thats the only offering and it fills a key gap on the shelf and its not too expensive and only requires a little putty then I may not mind. If its really expensive and bad I may have to pass. If I have a choice between a bad injection kit and a gem of a vac/resin kit Ill go that route everytime. It really depends on the kits available and how badly do I want to build a particular plane.
Keep in mind, that I’m not saying it’s totally cool for a company to make an ill-fitting kit. I’m just telling you the probable reasons.
If you personally as a consumer do not think you are getting your money’s worth from a kit, then don’t buy it. That’s the surest way to get the message to the company that they need to improve their QC.
But by the same token be prepared to pay the extra moolah should they decide to retool and bring out a higher quality kit.
I’m an IT guy in my day job and I’ve come to think that older molds as well as some modern ones are made the craftsman method – take a set of plans, and then carve some soft metal with a hard metal bit until it’s pretty close. The cost is the labor and tooling is somewhat inexpensive.
With today’s CAD tools it’s possible to instead invest in the CAD expert who can take the set of plans and put them into a 3D model inside cyberspace. Lot’s of gamers do this for their personal mounts online, but not to a high level of detail. If done properly (and there’s no reason it couldn’t be) then a good model company can break down the sections of the 3D model into a buildable solution for us modelers. From that it’s a short step to a computer aided manufacturing (CAM) setup that auto creates the molds/tooling in a very hard mold. Harder molds allow higher pressures which equal higher detail. It all takes an investment as rains says in computing hardware, software, people and ultimately the CAM tooling to create the molds. Once that’s done the second kit becomes much cheaper.
I believe, but cannot confirm, that some modern companies are doing just this with their high quality and somewhat low cost kits. Hobby Boss & Trumpeter come to mind out East; in Europe I think of CMR.
When we as modelers get to “open source” our work, we’ll get model kits down pretty cheap. I’ve certainly considered learning a CAD program in order to create the 3D models online, posting them for anyone to use. Someday we may get to models-on-demand similar to publishing-on-demand or video-on-demand.
While I dream I’ll continue to enjoy the challenge of making a kit fit. I actually avoid the shake-bake kits because they’re so easy. I enjoy making a silk purse from the sow’s ear as that’s what modeling is all about for me.
Tim
Hello there.
I find that when i build a tamiya kit i need very little effort to get a top class model out of it as the parts just fall together and you get very little satisfaction from that kit. but when i build a kit like the old Frog Shackelton you put hours into it as it is just a dog of a kit but when you get it to look just as good as the Tamiya kit that is when i am really satisfied. You also get what you pay for , but i like it when a kit is more of a challenge .
Mike
Most of the time fit isn’t an issue with me. Since my modeling is done on a budget, I tend to buy older kits of subjects that fill a spot in my collection and it’s a fact of life that that will mean that I’m going to be doing a lot of fileing, filling, sanding and scratch building. But I’ve been building plastic models long enough that all of that is part of the process (in fact, I often find that a modeling session spent doing nothing but sanding is often very relaxing)
Having said that, I find myself getting PO’d when I do break down and buy one of the latest and greatest, overpriced releases and 50% of it DOES Not fit. Open the kit and it looks gorgous, perfect (apparently) molding, engraving looks like a monument to the engravers art. So you start on it only to discover that you are going to have to have a 5 lb tube of putty to correct all the fit problems (and then have to rescribe almost the entire model to replace the engraving you removed). I expect this to happen if the kit is a limited run kit of an esoteric subject, but not in a long run version of a common subject.
The Daco-Skyline 737 300,400,500 were cad designed.
I’ll add my quick two cents here. For me I think it is outrageous that a model airplane can cost upwards of $70+ and have fit problems. You get what you pay for?!? For $60-$70 I expect to get a kit that fits like a glove. If I wanted to have fun fixing problems that the manufacturer couldn’t fix then the kit should be a heck of a lot cheaper. With costs continuing to rise the detail and fit just is not keeping up. In todays age of computer design there is just no reason why two plastic parts that should fit together, don’t.
Consumers speak with their money. But, like most, I will continue to pay for these kits because it’s my hobby.
I do have to admit getting some satisfaction when I finish a kit I see many just throw back in the box in disgust. I’ll never get to the level of building some here do, but I do seem to be able to manage to make ill fitting kits look halfway decent.
Zar,
I think you’re being a little unreasonable expecting Tamiya fit from a 30-40 year old molds with many thousands of shots throught them. That being said an ill fitting modern kit from a major manufacturer might give me pause, unless it’s a limited run kit but then I know what to expect. Don’t dread the ill fitting, use it as a chance to work on your basics. Eventually you’ll run out of shake and bakes. Judging from your post, you build 1/48 and up. If you build 1/72, the mistakes are smaller and you don’t use as much putty.[(-D]