Browsing Hobby Link Japan I found that 1/48 Hasegawa F/A-18B I’ve been bugging everybody about, so now I can start my Blue Angels No. 7, the one that had my butt strapped to its back seat and my hand on its stick (with which I performed aviation’s most unworthy Split Ess on record). The rub is, they want $53.00 plus shipping for this kit. They are calling this NASA-marked reissue a “limited edition” which somehow makes it worth an extra $20. So, I won’t be building this for a while. By the time I can afford it on my free-lancer’s income, it’ll be out of production again. Thanks, guys, for letting me cry on your shoulder.
Tom
I know how you feel, I am a huge fan of the P-47, and when Tamiya came out with there kits I about had a heart attack I was so happy but then I saw the price tage and I did have a heart attack, That was about a year ago. So about a month ago I finnaly get up the courage to buy this thing and unwillingly dished out the dough. So I cry with you.
Yeah, todays high quality, well detailed kits are great, but they do come at a price. As much as I love the Tamiya 1/48 P-47D kits, I’ll still build Hasegawas for a lot less $ and save the Tamiya kits for that " special " build.
I shouldn’t tell you about the price of the ‘U.S. Navy Test Pilot School’ issue then! More than $53.00… There have been a couple of Hasegawa B’s around here for less. The key to those Hasegawa Hornets is to find the one with the right decals (the less expensive ones)
Well, I can’t remember the last time I built a kit with the decals that came with it (stencils don’t count), except Accurate Miniatures. It’s just over time become against my religion. So I could care less about a “limited edition” NASA bird. If I wanted to build a NASA bird, I wouldn’t use those thick Hasegawa markings anyway. Oh, well, I picked my hobby, I gotta live with its little eccentricities.
One of my pet peeves with Tamigawa over the past several years has been their habit of putting a kit on the market for 4 to 6 months, then pulling it off the market for 3 to 4 months then re-issuing it with a new box, new 3-view drawing in the instructions and a new set of home brewed decals (which is usually to thick to be used). and then raise the price of the kit 3 to 5 bucks per kit. That’s idiotic considering that I spent maybe 12 bucks total for the origional kit and a set of after market decals and now the same kit and after market decals are going to set me back 25 bucks.
Lordy, how many times have we seen that?! Drives me nuts!
Paul
Time for my two cents worth…
I love Tamiya and Hasegawa kits but I really don’t like buying them unless they are on sale. Sometimes the LHS has half price sales and I’ll get a $65 Tamiya P-47D for $32.50. I’m building Tamiyas razorback at the moment but only because I got given it.
Hasegawa isn’t quite as bad as Tamiya (in regards to pricing), but I still don’t like paying for one kit when I could buy another two of slightly less quality for the same price. And as qmeister said, most of there range is the same kits with different decals.
Well, from Revell to Lindberg to Monogram to (name manufacturer), they have all done it since the beginning of plastic kits, its just that the two major Japanese firms have taken it to ridiculous, unhelpful and, in my opinion, greedy lengths. Of course, they aren’t in the business merely to provide us with hours of hobby fun. But I wonder, since they cater to savvy, serious, primarily adult modelers, how many people could possibly be taken in by this. “Oh, I have last months $36.00 F-18. I won’t be happy until I can get this months $53.00 version with different decals!”
I really can’t see many of us thinking that way. Let alone affording to think that way as hobby budgets go.
Here’s a B on Ebay. The price is about what they go for. It’s definately not a kit you see sold for much less anywhere, unless of course you come across a complete moron with one. [:)]
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=50298&item=5907710278&rd=1&ssPageName=WDVW