I thought this should get its own string. Oldhooker, on his C-7 Caribou thread, sent us over to the Mach 2 web page, for a look at the C-123 kit. It’s a fascinating look through their catalogue, for those who haven’t been there. Most of those kits are very, very old classics (meaning, if you build them, be warned), and some unique ones at that. The Sea Dart is a reissue of the 1965 Strombecker kit, the Caravelle is Heller and other reissues going back the 50s, and on and on. To get the kit histories, click on the word “Collection” on the individual kit pages. Thanks, Hooker. I notice, though, that there is no history for the C-123, and I forgot to look at the B-45, something I’ve always wanted to model.
Aaaahhhh, Mach2! Outrageously expensive and poor quality. I’m building the AJ savage and let me tell you, this kit has provided hours of modelling “pleasure”. Poor fit, short shot parts and even poorer clarity of the canopy. But it’s a 1/72 scale Savage!
Tom,
A few months ago I bought a model off E-Bay, the Delta2, Savoia-Marchetti S.55 X
I proceeded in building this model, which presented a challenge on every construction level, but came out as one of my all time favorite builds. I communicated with folks here on the Board at the completion of the build, and received several comments about how they would never have even started that particular kit, because of it’s history of warped, poor fitting, and flash covered plastic. Had I heard this earlier, I probably never would have purchased it.
The picture of the C-123 kit laid out, doesn’t appear to have an excess amount of flash, and good panel lines… it’s up to you, Tom, but I just think I’d go for it! I sent an e-mail to Mach2 while ago with a few questions, and also to see how quick they answer it… One of those 123’s sure would look good on my entertainment center here! [;)]
It would be nice to find a build report on it somewhere, but thanks for the heads-up on Mach2, bstrump, things like that are really good to know. [:)]
Take care,
Frank
My Mach 2 F2Y - definitely not for beginners, but it is doable:
There was a typo in my post. That Sea Dart is not from 1965, it’s from 1956! Those Strombecker kits are even before my time, and boy are they primitive. As said above, though I haven’t built them, I familiar with some of those Mach 2 reissues, and man are they overpriced for the quality of the models. All that has been done to improve them is the addition of new directions and decals. And on inspecting the various directions, not all of them have been translated from French.
And, Frank, I don’t blame you one bit for being proud of that build. I’ve always thought that would be a “fun” model to do, but you really brought me down to earth. It is a lot of hard, dilligent work, and it shows in yours. Thanks for the peek.
Tom
The Mach 2 kit is 1/72 scale so it can’t be from the molds of the Strombecker kit that was 1/60 scale, although it might have been scaled from it. There are pictures of the Rare-Plane Detective issue of it in Steve Ginter’s excellent Naval Fighters Number 23 monograph on the Sea Dart.