david evans1707819943 Posted January 8, 2021 Share Posted January 8, 2021 2021 " well worth waiting for" not for ship modellers. Funny how other manufacturers can produce British ship kits yet the only major British kit manufacturer can not. Let down badly again.Dave Evans Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MattBromage Posted January 9, 2021 Share Posted January 9, 2021 Have to agree. Wasn't expecting anything groundbreaking but a few re-releases would have been nice. When Leanders and Amazon's are going for £40-£50 on eBay, somethimg is wrong! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian-396549 Posted April 4, 2021 Share Posted April 4, 2021 Was watching a recent Airfix special on Flory Models podcast recently, the designer was mentioning that ships just weren’t big sellers plus the cost of producing something like the new carriers (assuming they could even get access and plans etc) would be prohibitive and the end cost would be more towards £200 plus so they’d have to know they’d sell a lot at that price to even think about starting. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ratch Posted April 4, 2021 Share Posted April 4, 2021 the cost of producing something like the new carriers (assuming they could even get access and plans etc) would be prohibitiveThe have(had) access because they commissioned Dave Coventry to scratchbuild one in 1/350 scale. He actually built two, one was presented to the ship (he had access during its construction)) and the other was on show, on the Airfix stand, at SMW 2019. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peebeep Posted April 4, 2021 Share Posted April 4, 2021 ...the designer was mentioning that ships just weren’t big sellers plus the cost of producing something like the new carriers (assuming they could even get access and plans etc) would be prohibitive ^^^This. Ship kits clearly don't suit the Airfix business model, if so it is what it is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peebeep Posted April 4, 2021 Share Posted April 4, 2021 The have(had) access because they commissioned Dave Coventry to scratchbuild one in 1/350 scale. There's a big difference between commissioning somebody to scratch build a one-off against having enough data to cut tooling. Plus I know Dave used some short cuts (I'm not going to give away any spoilers!), because he told me so! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
steven_kerfoot Posted April 30, 2021 Share Posted April 30, 2021 I have to say to anyone who doesn't think that ships aren't worth making as models that they are a big investment, but rather like the ships themselves, they have lasting appeal. We all know that you can now get almost any marque of Spitfire in lots of scales. So much so that the market is saturated with them. But if you want, say, the Invincible class carrier, there's only one model out there, and that's from Airfix. There were failings with that kit, I've built it and can compare it to dozens of other 1/350 scale kits I've built by other manufacturers. Firstly, it didn't have enough detail. It was absolutely an Airfix kit, but you compare it to the best Airfix kits of the last two decades and it just didn't come up to scratch. Secondly, whoever designed the kit didn't keep in mind it should be issued in several guises at different stages of the carriers lives. So, you have one kit that could be three ships. You have the different ski-ramps with different angles, the varied weapons fit, radar and tech fit, and of course varying aircraft over the years. You change and add parts to the base kit and you have yourself a kit that keeps giving. Many ship builders would love three Invincible carriers, and I speak from experience as someone who has, say, Saratoga and Lexington, basically the same kit but with different parts, two Kirov class battlecruisers, two County class cruisers and so on. You make a kit that can be adapted, just look at Trumpeter's range or HobbyBoss. They even have ships that never made it off the drawing board or went to sea, (see the German WW2 carriers or Alaska class battlecruiser Hawaii). Finally, and Airfix need to realise this soon, people like photo-etch parts. True, also include plastic versions for those who don't, but with ship kits they are all but expected now. So, ship kits do sell, but because they are almost always on the expensive side, they need to be worth the cash, and kits that can be reissued as different ships of the class or at different times of the ships careers. There are two exceptions. One, the new RN carriers. They would sell like mad, and you can get two ships from one kit, which could be reissued when the ships change in their service lives. The other is a ship which kit builders are crying out for, HMS Vanguard, the last RN battleship. The only injection kit is an old Hasegawa kit in 1/450 which is incredibly poor. If Airfix made one of those, and made it the same standard as their aircraft kits, they could name their price. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ian_rutland Posted July 22, 2021 Share Posted July 22, 2021 Should Airfix decide on a ship, what would they choose as a subject and scale?It would have to be pretty special. A 1/350th QE or PoW would be very expensive. They wouldn't go back to 1/600, so 1/700 would be a possible, as there are already models of Type 23 and Type 45s out there. It would be a new scale for them.So, what else in 1/350th? The Ark Royal from post war years would be popular, and it would be nice to have a display with Airfix's Ark Royal Air Group, with Phantoms, Buccaneers and Sea Kings. I still can't see it being as popular as their current aircraft releases.Vanguard would be nice, but it was never in service during the war and had a fairly uneventful life.This really doesn't leave that many ships that haven't already been done. Possibly a Warrior starter kit in 1/400 to match Mary Rose in the historic dockyard, or Victory in 1/350th? It would be nice to display it alongside a more modern ship. Or, maybe in 1/400 historic ships range, which could later include SS Great Britain, Discovery and Cutty Sark. How about RMS Queen Mary in 1/600, to go with Airfix's other 50's liners? You see the problem. Very hard to find a scale, range and suitable subject that would be a good seller. Even a modest seller would be hard to find. Remember that any effort to manufacture a complex ship would mean dropping one, or more of the planned subjects from another range that would be a massive seller, keeping Airfix in business. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ironsides Posted July 31, 2021 Share Posted July 31, 2021 HMS Warrior(1860) possibly in 1/350 scale or 1/400 to match the Mary Rose, Full Rig, Full Hull model... would I think be worthwhile...Followed by Turret ship HMS Captain (1869) lost in a storm due to instability issues, but then the Wasa/Vasa is quite popular and that never got out the harbour for the same reason...and HMS Victoria (1887) perhaps one of the greatest disasters of the Victorian navy...Indeed almost any of the ships of the Iron clad fleets of the world would make great subjects...I think generally though ships have to be relatively famous (battles, disasters) or infamous (Graf Spee) to be worthy of an expensive tooling...Some inspiration from the excellent japanese series "Saka no ue no Kumo" the naval battle of Thushima 1905: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Johnson1707820221 Posted October 5, 2021 Share Posted October 5, 2021 Would love to see the 1/72 boats re-released, the MTB, ASR and E-Boat. Also maybe the older Leander and Amazon vessels. Would love to make these again Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AirportsEd Posted October 5, 2021 Share Posted October 5, 2021 Would love to see the 1/72 boats re-released, the MTB, ASR and E-Boat. Also maybe the older Leander and Amazon vessels. Would love to make these again Yes, MTB, ASR and E-Boat in the 'Classics' range would be great. Would like to see HMS Iron Duke re-released again too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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