Inquisitor

And have we ever seen KH doing a radical rework of the CAD designs for the sake of accuracy? I don't remember a single instance, just half-assed small fixes. Upper right image with yellow lines.

Maybe I shouldn't have quoted you for you to take it personally. Because my answer was only 1% related to yours, to clarify that Aerobonus was part of Aires, since Eli was also confused about Eduard and Eduard Brassin. As for the 99% in the rest of my post it wasn't directed at you. Was simply stating my opinion on why Eduard's piece was too small, nothing related to your own opinion about Aerobonus being the best. Or did I say anything against it or otherwise?

Like Brassin is a line in Eduard's products, also their Zoom and Big Sin ones too. Aerobonus, Quickboost and Wheeliant are lines of products from Aires. As for the reason Eduard MERs are too short and many other of their long thin things like missiles, its an inherent problem from their design and manufacturing process, which they're aware of but don't seem to try to mitigate or compensate for longer or larger parts. Let me explain. Both the photoetch and resin parts are designed at the same time, in the computer they have the same measurements. The manufacturing of the Photoetch, won't add any or very negligible difference in the measurements, the films used to transfer the designs don't shrink and the brass sheets won't shrink during or after manufacturing. So basically what you see on the computer designs is what you get with their photoetch parts. Now here's comes where the discrepancy starts. The problem is in the resin masters, molds and the cast pieces. From their tour videos here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryAlTDl5Q1Q from their first master made with 3d printing they make many copies for backup and to use as masters for mass mold making and production, but as they explain in the video they're already 3 generations down, so the ones you get are already 4 generations of mold and resin castings down from their original masters. Now what's the problem? Even if their first master would have the perfect to scale measurements, but as ironically explained in the video silicon molds and resin do shrink and it's further exacerbated that they're 4gens down the line. Let's take example numbers from stuff I've used, smooth-on silicons have a 0.1%-0.2% shrinkage at best. Their resins have from 0.5 to 1% shrinkage. Taking a worse case, 4 gens down the line the ones you get are shrunk by 5% from the original design. Also the video explains that the shrinkage varies from piece to piece, but usually the longer/larger pieces the shrinkage will be more noticeable when for example the fin pieces are quite a bit larger and doesn't fit the recess or hole in a missile body that's shrunk quite a bit more than the smaller pieces. Another place where this is noticeable is when the photoetch parts don't match the size of the resin piece.

I think you're mistaking Cold War Studio's conversion from RBT to BM for the ICM kit.

I'm sure my comment will offend a few people that await the next new novelty AM or extra bling out of the box, but those bronze exhaust nozzles don't make much sense. Yes, they have better detail than their older resin ones included in the kit. Yes, their lips are really thin, yet the amur reaver and amigo models ones are just as detailed if not more and the lips are also pretty thin. And if you say it's because thin resin ones could be damaged in transit, should I remind you KH already shipped theirs in thermoformed plastic boxes to protect them and now their bronze ones too? And the AMUR/Amigo ones weren't easily damaged either. The bronze ones from photos also seem to have a lot of imperfections in the lip area between outer and inner petals. Also being bronze and pretty heavy 8gr/cm^3 vs resin 1.1gr/cm^3, despite flankers not being inherently tail sitters, you're adding unnecessary weight to the back end. And of course it takes a lot of time to make them, let's just say if their bronze is being cast via lost wax process, they're doing something in 3 or 5 times more steps and cost than a resin piece. Dunno, I feel like it's an extension to their overengineering and not throughly thought out stuff... And no, I'm only criticizing their bronze nozzles, not the landing gear legs.

Speaking of programs about models. There's a new one with James May, you may know him from Top Gear and Grand Tour, called James May's Big Trouble in Model Britain. It's two episodes about Hornby and Airfix, aired in the UK's BBC.

Hope I'm not poking on a touchy subject and Raymond can give some answers? But lately I've been noticing that luckymodel has been late to stock or add new products for certain popular brands. Some of Kitty Hawk's latest releases like their RF-5E and MiG-25RB/RBS don't show up on Luckymodel, their Su-34 has also disappeared from their listings. Also I've been waiting for Model collect's B-2 with GBU-57 which hasn't been stocked yet as well as some of their other releases, while I've seen arrive to other stores as soon as dec'18. I ask this because I've been waiting on that B-2 I have on order with Luckymodel since november. I remember them dropping AMK because of the MiG-31 distribution problems when it was released. Some time ago noticed they dropped Takom too. Is it a reestructuring or problem/disagreement with their distributors?

Adding to what others have said, another borked detail on the KH kit: - Retraction mechanism in the main landing gear is incorrect. KH put a single solid arm that's supposed to rotate? It would never retract the MLG due to its geometry. (Photo taken from Modeling News review). Also its joint with the mainlanding gear strut should outboard, not inboard. Zvezda is correctly represented with a Y shaped arm that folds while rectracting the gear. Another detail that Zvezda kit wins over the KH's. -Both sets of auxiliary intakes can be depicted open or closed. Front ones, the ones that also function as FOD covers, can be moved open or closed after assembly. Although the rear ones are glued open or shut.

V3 also has a different photoetch fret with part to detail the exhaust nozzle.

You forgot the biggest mistake in their F-15 kits! They don't include pilot figures, thus they're unbuildable!!!

Then someone will complain the weathering is overdone, nothing in real life looks like that blah blah blah :v

And the white box ones too. It's not like they churn everything in their catalogue 24/7. Some products go out of stock don't resume production for a period but eventually they come back. I build 1/72 and their Su-33 and Su-35 appeared as discontinued on japanese stores not too long ago, for around a year but then they came back.

On the next page on the thread flankerman posted a series of pictures of a MiG-25 airframe and you can see clear the curvature of those couple of panels.

It's not the belly. It's how the sides gradual transition from flat aft of the wheel wells to round at the rear end in the real plane. While KH kit remains flat all the way down to the strakes and sharply transition to round. I already posted an image and explanation in the original KH MiG-25 Thread. On the posted image, there's a panel line on the red line, below it shaded in red that area those panels are curved in the real plane while KH that area is flat.

167, 168 and 169. set 47301/46301 are for the Su-27, and although it also mentions Su-35 I think it's referring to the Su-35 (T-10M) prototypes, not the in service Su-35S.