In all my years of model building, I have never built a Tamiya car kit, though I am sure I built Tamiya military stuff years ago…I picked up a Tamiya '66 VW 1600 1/24 scale kit at a yard sale recently…only the engine is assembled; the rest is still on the sprue and untouched.
How are Tamiya kits rated relative to Revell or AMT; just not at all familiar with the brand…this particular kit looks pretty detailed… amazing you can build kits for over 40 years and not be familiar with the Tamiya name, beyond the brand recognition…
I’ve built some Tamiya motorcycle kits years ago, but never a car kit, except for a Kubelwagen in 1:48. I’ve heard that some of their kits are “curbside” kits, in other words no engine, but other than that the detailing and engineering is superior to AMT or Revell. I’ve only seen F1 kits at the LHS. If I ever find a Lotus type 43 from the 60’s it’s MINE! I’ve built some of the aircraft and armor as well and would definitely try out a car if I found the right kit.
Tamyia are the company most other company’s would like to be ,Yes their 1/24 cars are curbside but don’t let that put you off .The detail on their kits are by far the best [^],But there are A/F parts out there that you can add to make a very well detailed kit,Some even scratch build the engineI have never built any other because I like kits to go together with out to much fuss ,then again go uot and get one ,get all the p/e parts ,c/f and anything else you find and have as much fun as you like (just don’t let wife/girlfriend find out or she will do the curbsiding[:-,][swg]
Mind you that is just my opion and others will/may disaggree with this,have only been making 1/12 bikes,1/24 gt and rally cars for last 12-18 years mybe longer cannot remember, can’t even remember when started it was that long ago
Shayne[:D]
You can’t go wrong mate. I’ve got so many 1/24 WRC & 1/20 F1 Tamiya kits, I’ve stopped counting. I never tire building them & even though I’ve already got 6 Subies finished with another, I don’t know 10 still to go, I always find ways to improve a little niggle I came across on the last one. Same applies to all the Corollas, Evo’s, Pugs, Focus’ yet to be built. Just wish they would hurry up & release this year’s Impreza + a bang-up Xsara. Or maybe the Fabia.
I can honestly say that I have never had a Tamiya kit give me fit problems! Well, there was that one jet with the superglue problem, but its not Tamiya’s fault [:D] I was amazed the first one I built, I had it done in only a few hours time, and seeing how I was only a beginner… again… it looked pretty good.I will put my vote in for build it, you will like it!
But the Ferrari 360 Spider has the engine because it’s advertised as having it?
DANG… for the extra money it cost do to better details and added parts (sometime PE & carbon fiber decals), you’d think the engine would be included. [:(]
How the heck are those race & sports cars going to win any races? [:P]
Yea I got two of those special edition xanavi GT-R ktis. With all the extra bells n whistles it came with, an engine would have really been the icing on the cake.
Most of the older Tamiya cars came with the engine though. Then again, there really aren’t that many exotic sportscars at an auto show have you seen with the hood up.
I have several Tamiya race car kits, and all of them have engines. I’m not sure why some do and some don’t, maybe cost or patent rules or licensing? I really wish the skyline had the engine in it, but at least somebody makes a good Skyline kit! A lot of Japanesse kit manufacturers don’t include an engine with their kits, why, I can’t say for sure, but I can personally look past it for the quality of the Tamiya kits!
Well, I guess having some cars on display with the hood latched down would be fine. Especially since everyone is saying the detail level is of high quality.
Ryan, all the auto shows that I’ve been to… every hood is up. [;)]
Jhande, thats cause hotrods use chrome, and tuners use lightweight stuff that isn’t as pretty, well, except carbon fiber [dinner] The only problem with the stuff is that it doesn’t add horsepower like chrome does[:D]
There are aftermarket engines you could buy to put in your kits, I know there is the RB26DETT and the RB20DETT for the Silvia and Skyline.
i pretty much only build tamiya cars, have built the odd amt/revell/monogram kits, but tamiya walks all over them. i think the main reason that the race cars don’t have engines are the fact that most of the engines are covered by large carbon fibre panels, and also that most teams don’t want to give away their secrets!!! if you want an engine ofr your subarus, i have built a studio 27 engine for the rally car, makes a great kit even better!! it seems that most of the modern kits are molded with bonnets shut is tooling costs and manufacters not wanting trade secrets out!! just my two cents worth
I tried building a variety of different manufacturer’s cars over the years and i’ve also pretty much lazily settled down on Tamiya bikes and cars now, but mostly because they seem to release racing cars and bikes that i’m personally interested in. However, the direction that they are heading, and the competition from other manufacturers might steer me back to the other companies.
Over the past couple of decades, Tamiya’s quality has made them the king of plastic models, but in recent years has faced increasing competition from some other Japanese and Chinese model companies. Fujimi and Hasegawa has come out with nice street imports and rally cars to make you seriously consider how you should spend your precious hobby dollars.
I’m sure that modelers are definitely more interested in building a Tamiya engined model over curbside, but then those kits will certainly cost more, perhaps more than what their customers are willing to spend. The direction that Tamiya is going is certainly making me feel more worried too. The tooling of new kits are featuring diecast chassis, mostly to prepare a masterwork completed model for customers to buy right away. Sure the assembly seems easier, but I feel i’m sacrificing some of the detail that I want to have. Their marketing of increased realism in a heavier chassis is baloney, and it increases my own shop’s freight costs in getting the unbuilt car kits to my customers. As well, an increasing number of kits are sold that require their detail parts sets, for example slotted rotors, tiedown hooks, etc. I personally enjoy seeing some flashy PE rotors, but to remove the slots on their plastic counterparts should I only have access to the stock kit, irks me.
I hope that my post did not really take this thread off topic. Thanks for reading!
tamiya must cater to the world market and not the usa, so many of their cars
1 are something you may never see here in the usa
2 may be of limited interest to some usa buyers
i agree their quality is great but if your interest is in cars that you see on usa streets or american cars ie; mustangs,camaros etc it is clear you must go with the lesser quality companies like amt, and revell/monogram
Absolutely, the 1/12 bike kits or even the older 1/12 F1 cars such as the McLaren MP4/6 is incredible… I recently finished the 1/12 No.65 Loris Capirossi MotoGP Ducati Desmosedici bike and it made me go nuts. I’m working on the 1/12 Laguna Seca '05 YZR-M1 and this kit impresses me further…
ditto to that. those 1/12 big scale beasts were some of the coolest automotive models ever to hit the salesfloor. too bad the whole thing just kinda stopped around the MP4/6 and FW-14 (two of my favs when it comes to F1 since i grew up watching Senna). the price does reflect that though, as I am sure there are lots people out there who’d rather build 5 newer 1/20 F1 kits for the same price tag of one 1/12.
It would awesome if Tamiya could get their ball rolling again on the 1/20 F1 kits. I guess F1 developmental secrecy kind of puts the cars out of reach for Tamiya photographers and engineers?
For now, I must go for the older kits such as the mp4/5b, mp4/7 and make it look complete with Tabu decals. I wonder when i’ll ever hit on my 1/12 mp4/6. I’ll probably be dead before I get around to it…
