I was browsing ebay, and found a 1/72 scale su-27 sea flanker!!! how cool is that??? I didn’t even know tamiya made modern russian planes!!! Edit: I also found a 1/72 tamiya mig-29 fulcrum!!! This is weird. I say again, I didnt even know tamiya made modern Russian planes!!!
Extremely cool as well as good news. I’ll have to look into that.
Darwin, O.F. [alien]
methinks that you might have seen an italeri rebox
nope Tamiya did make some modern russian aircraft in 1/72nd scale
are they any good? how old are they? if they’re typical tamiya i’ll pick them up probably.
That’s Italeri stuff in Tamiya boxes, folks.
Tamiya imports Italeri stuff for the Japanese market. Look for the “Parts and decals made in Italy” logo in the upper left-hand corner of the box. It’s a dead giveaway!
I didn’t know Tamiya ever did the “badge engineering” thing…I wonder if the standard of the kits is up to “Tamiya” standard.
IME, most japanese companies (if not all) state when they are reboxing other companies kits.
Which takes care of the “xyz standard” thingie.
Tamiya has not labeled these kits as Italeri, but they do indeed clearly label them as having been manufactured in Italy. So, you kinda have to pay attention, or you might think you’re getting a Tamiya-made kit in the box.
They do this with some of their armor kits, too.
Hasegawa, on the other hand, clearly labels the exact manufacturer on the box, as they do on the 1/48 B-17G, He-111 and PBY5 Catalina Revell/Monogram import kits. Actually, some of their R/M import kits are essentially the R/M boxes with a small Hasegawa logo slapped on them. No mistaken identity there!
As far as the quality of the kits in question goes, I only have the Italeri/Tamiya Su-34 Strike Flanker, and it’s a decent kit, with recessed panel lines and nice detail.
The Italeri/Tamiya Sea Flanker kit has raised panel lines, but is otherwise nice enough.
I believe the MiG-29 has recessed panel lines.
As a matter of interest, Tamiya’s issue of the AMtech 48th Ta 183 has the AMtech logo in the lower right-hand corner of the boxtop and states ‘Plastic parts of the plane manufactured by AMtech’. The logo is also on all the parts bags except that which holds the extra parts tooled by Tamiya.
Fade to Black…
The Italeri/Tamiya SU-34 is also marketed by Bilek. Same kit, all on sale now, just take your pick of which price you want! The Bilek is bagged not boxed (at least, mine is). From what I understand, Bilek make the moulds for Italeri, who then produce the items, and pay Bilek for the design work by supplying them with kits, bagged up, to which Bilek then add instructions, and put them in a bag. The header is the Italeri artwork, shrunken.
Another example of this is the A-6, which is sold by Bilek, Italeri, Revell, and I think Tamiya too. Of course, you often find Hasagawa in Revell boxes, but cheaper. Revell and Italeri also mix and match their kits.
In short, the kit manufactuers are very incestuous! Let me see, I can buy a Shackleton by Frog, Novo, Modelcraft, or Revell. Makes life fun when you buy a new kit, and then find you already have it by someone else…
Interestingly, I have the Tamiya and the Italeri Kfir, as I didn’t realise then they were the same. The Italeri box gives you the choice of C2 or C7 (correct me if wrong), but the Tamiya is just the C7. Apparently, the reason for Tamiya re-boxing Italeri kits is that Italeri found it too difficult to break into the Japanese market. The re-boxed kits are not on sale in the UK, but can be bought via ebay. There is a chap there who specialises in Tamiya stuff, and ships from Malaysia (excellent service BTW). However, it’s the same price as Italeri, so best to support your LHS, and buy Italeri!
If it’s Italeri in the Tamiya box, it was probably made by Svezhda in Russia (or the Ukraine?). There’s always something wrong in a Svezhda kit that drives you crazy.