I just picked up Hobby Craft’s new 1/48 P-40F desert hawk, hoping for a quick relaxing build after a major project. Well the plastic was soft and the parts were warped, so I put it away and pulled another P-40 out of my stock to build - the recent AMTech release of a P-40E (which, I think, is a repop of the older AMT kit?).
Guess what? Same kit. Same molds.
Better plastic, at least, and no warped parts. But it was kinda pointless to buy the Hobby Craft kit since I basically already had it in an AMTech box. It’s gotten so you just can’t tell who’s model you’re buying by the name on the box any more. [banghead]
Hey John;
what the Hobbycrafts P-40E looks to be was the old Otaki/Arii kit, and AMT ran it a few year ago before they went with the all new P-40’s that AMTech is now running with, I also seen that Hobbycraft ran a bunch of ESCI’s jet kits like the MiG 23, 27’s, but now I’ve seen they are in together with Academy and both are running each others kit in there name, IE take a look at the F4U-1’s & -2’s they are Hobbycrafts but now have the Academy’s banner and a few are opposite for Hobbycraft, but that P-40 kit is not to bad after you get through the problems
The way I heard it Academy got hold of Hobby Craft’s molds thru underhanded means - not sure how that happens, but that’s the rumor.
I wonder how I’ll note this build in my scrapbook - "P-40F, 1/48 scale, AMTech, formerly AMT, formely Esci, with decals from Hobby Craft release of AMtec/AMT//Esci…
Hey John
Don’t you like this hobby?, the major thing is trying to keep up knowing whose running what, and whose mold was shot, but all in all I just look at which is the less expensive and has the fairly desent quality, kinda like the old Monogram kits, at least back then we knew whose kit was in the box
If this “mold swapping” keeps expanding to other Manufacturers I’m not going to buy “squat” unless I can see what’s in the box! Tamiya is about the only one I trust nowdays!
Mold swapping has been done for as long as there’s been molds to swap. You just kinda have to know the scene, or find out like John did.
As for Tamiya, they’re releasing alotta 72nd Italeri kits these days. I think that they’re only releasing them in certain areas, though. Regional releases are a normal practice for such companies as Hasegawa and Tamiya.
A good example of one of these regional releases is the Tamiya boxing of the AMtech Ta 183. They added their 48th Kettenkraftrad and a few extra associated parts, a pilot, new decals, groovy-lookin’ box and ‘officially’ released it only in their neck of the woods.