How do Airfix select a subject for their models? Do you always use their decals and painting instructions?

[john redman]

Historically Airfix were quite thorough but some odd mistakes were made.

The Fairey Battle kit was designed off drawings supplied by Fairey Aviation, but of a pre-production variant, so that’s what the model ended up depicting.

The German Armoured Car was based on a captured and partly-dismantled one that had been “restored” by British army apprentices. They’d never seen a 234, but they had seen a 232, which looks very similar. So they replaced the 234’s missing mudguards with a set fabricated to resemble those of a 232. Their example was missing a coaming panel behind the cockpit and the “bull bar” on the front, so those parts are both missing from the Army's reconstruction. The Airfix model is thus an accurate rendition of an inaccurate “restoration” that never saw action.

The Panther tank is often noted to look like its suspension has collapsed, which suggests it could have been based on the one at Houffalize in the Ardennes. This was a Battle of the Bulge Panther that clearly caught fire. Intense heat softens steel and ruins the torsion bar effect of the suspension, so it collapsed. It was left blocking a bridge, so someone bulldozed it off the road into the river. Some time later it was hoicked back out of the river, cleaned up and placed on a plinth as a war memorial. Its stance resembles the Airfix kit, and another point of similarity is that both lack a loader’s hatch in the back of the turret. The Houffalize Panther is missing this hatch altogether and just has a round hole. Airfix perhaps saw this and rather than guess the hatch’s shape, just omitted it. The Airfix Panther hull has features of both an Ausf A and and Ausf G, which is impossible, so they perhaps referred to more than one source vehicle.

The Tiger I is actually pretty accurate but again was based on a late-model, partially-stripped example in a German tank museum. It lacks the storage bin on the turret rear and the mudflaps, and it has trailing arm suspension on both sides when in fact it should have leading arms on the right. It correctly leaves off the Feiffel air filters (not seen post Tunisia) and the outer row of road wheels.

Some of the early sailing ship kits are very impressive achievements. The Royal Sovereign is known only from one side and one rear view drawing, but Airfix seem to have deduced the proportions by referring to the hull-form rules applied by ship designers of the day such as Mathew Baker. The Revenge is a copy of the Elizabeth Jonas, a contemporary of which there’s a model in the Science Museum. Nobody really knows what these ships actually looked like, but Airfix came up with some very plausible reconstructed shapes.

The historical figures are also pretty thoughtful. The Black Prince is based on the man's actual tomb effigy. Cromwell looks to be copied from the Thornycroft statue, with armour and a lobster pot helmet added as details; there is a remarkable facial likeness. Charles I is a foot version of the Van Dyck portrait, Joan of Arc seems to be a foot version of the Frémiet statue of her in Paris. The Showjumper was famously said to have been based on Princess Anne. 

The actual units on the vintage kits are often a bit vague. Nobody's ever worked out what unit the original "White 11" ME262 came from, nor the "Yellow 3" of the 109G6, nor of course the BT-K Spitfire of yore. I tend to build the prettiest version offered. I have an RF-D 1.24 Spit V in the stash, but I'm going to do this as a Dieppe Raid version because they had white fuselage ID stripes behind the engine. They weren't visible enough, so for D-Day they were moved to the wings and a black stripe added.

[Nerazzurri]

Out the box. Maybe with an aerial wire added, or seatbelts, something like that.

 

My interest in the subject isn't strong enough for me to spend time on anything else. I just like building them, painting them, and seeing them on the shelf.

 

It also grinds my gears a little hearing people say oh Airfix could be doing with adding a PE set, or more options for the build or something. These things are all catered for in either other manufacturers kits or the aftermarket cottage industry. It's not their target market, and if it became so and was obviously reflected in an increased price tag then they just wouldn't feature on my shopping list anymore.

 

Thankfully I don't see this becoming the case - Airfix know their audience.

 

Gavin.

Edited June 19 by Gavin-1212362

[Sailorman]

A fair comment Nerazzurri!  Airfx offer a decent kit and then one is free to buy all the PE / aftermarket upgrades / decals he or she desires.  It's useless ending up setting the price of the kit at too high a level because you reduce the number of potential sales. 

 

Edited June 25 by Sailorman

[Dominic Thomas]

Back in 1992, Airfix produced the Hi-Tech series with white metal and PE parts. I bought the Tornado GR1 & F-15. 
Suffice to say the project did not become standard. 

 

[Nerazzurri]

11 hours ago, Sailorman said:

A fair comment Nerazzurri!  Airfx offer a decent kit and then one is free to buy all the PE / aftermarket upgrades / decals he or she desires.  It's useless ending up setting the price of the kit at too high a level because you reduce the number of potential sales. 

 

I think so SM.

I mean I guess it would be great if the kit included masks, PE, 3D or resin, half a dozen variants (where you build one, and everything else is for a box in a drawer) - everyone would be catered for. 

But none of that comes free. And, generalising, I don't think it's of interest to Airfix's market.

I think the current arrangement is best. As you say, the end user can tailor their build with aftermarket if they desire 👍

2 hours ago, Dominic Thomas said:

Back in 1992, Airfix produced the Hi-Tech series with white metal and PE parts. I bought the Tornado GR1 & F-15. 
Suffice to say the project did not become standard. 

 

Ha. I've seen those around on auction sites Dominic. I've never had one though.

I do have some kits in the stash from other manufacturers which include things similar. But I didn't buy the kits because of that, if you know what I mean. I just wanted that model and it happened to include things.

Gavin.

[A J Rimmer]

For me it's a bit of both. Sometimes I'm happy to use the decals in the box, much like the Curtis Hawk I'm building now, or sometimes I like to do something different. I recently built the newish Spitfire Vb kit with some Xtradecals for a PRU Blu over Grey aircraft from the South African Air Force. 

I also like to do certain themes, I recently started building a collection of Iranian F-5s that required AM decals. 

 

[john redman]

16 hours ago, A J Rimmer said:

I recently started building a collection of Iranian F-5s that required AM decals. 

That's interesting, I have in the stash a red stripe Airfix F-5 which I plan to pair with a Jet Provost to make an Iran-Iraq War dogfight double. The F-5 would have had IIAF rather than RIAF markings by then and the Provost would be in bare metal. The only photos I can find show them with a day glo orange fuselage and wingtips, which I guess the Iraqis may have painted over for obvious reasons. Are your F-5s RIAF or IIAF? For contrast I'd love an excuse to have the F-5 in 3-tone camouflage but I'm not sure this correct. It's also possible the F-5 should be an F-5E rather than an F-5A, but all the original post-WW1 DFD pairings were inaccurate anyway so I don't let this bother me.

Edited August 8 by john redman

[A J Rimmer]

13 minutes ago, john redman said:

That's interesting, I have in the stash a red stripe Airfix F-5 which I plan to pair with a Jet Provost to make an Iran-Iraq War dogfight double. The F-5 would have had IIAF rather than RIAF markings by then and the Provost would be in bare metal. The only photos I can find show them with a day glo orange fuselage and wingtips, which I guess the Iraqis may have painted over for obvious reasons. Are your F-5s RIAF or IIAF? For contrast I'd love an excuse to have the F-5 in 3-tone camouflage but I'm not sure this correct. It's also possible the F-5 should be an F-5E rather than an F-5A, but all the original post-WW1 DFD pairings were inaccurate anyway so I don't let this bother me.

Hi John,

That's a cool idea! 

Print Scale do a 'Iranian Tigers' decal sheet that covers both IIAF F-5A, F-5B and RF-5A and IRIAF RF-5A, F-5E and later versions. So you'll be good to go with the F-5A as all of them seem to be IIAF. It is a hard sheet to find though - it took me ages, although, lucky you, Hannants have 3 sets in stock (I had to order mine from Poland!)

https://www.hannants.co.uk/product/PSL72229?result-token=MuiMY

Here's the sheet. 

I warn you though, the decals are very hard work - I've had a lot of trouble with them rolling up and having to spend ages un-folding them (dipping the rolled decal back in the water and then trying to get it back on a bit of backing paper helps). I haven't lost one... yet (touch wood). 

Here's my current build - PM Models F-5A. I also have an Airfix F-5E, another PM models F-5B and a Italeri F-5A to do. I don't know what  to do about the RF-5A. Airfix did a RF-5E kit, but the A doesn't seem to have been kitted. I might just as well build the RF-5E anyway - I'm not that bothered by accuracy lol! I also have an F-14A with decals but that's another story. 

 

Why the IIAF/IRIAF as a subject. Not sure really. It's cool to see US jets in Arab markings and I love the tri-colour desert camouflage - goo enough reasons! 

Cheers!