sigtau

According to this article, they have ceased operations: https://www.cgchannel.com/2024/07/3d-printing-firm-shapeways-files-for-bankruptcy/ I wouldn't risk a dime on trying to put in an order now.

Thanks for the link! I just ordered a couple of their sets.

Who makes those parts?

The only gold kit that can build any USAF block in the single seater config is the ANG F-16C kit. It contains the block 30/40/50 sprue that includes the GE exhaust and MCID wide mouth intake. The F-16D kit also includes the GE/MCID sprue. In theory, the other gold single seater kits can build an early block 30 w/narrow mouth intake. But you will need to swap out the PW exhaust with an aftermarket GE set.

Regarding the 2022 F-16 tooled kit, mine was a total dumpster fire as far as fit. I won't completely rehash all my other commentary and photos posted on ARC, you can look that up yourself. But the key flaws with the kit are: It's tooled as a block 52 plane.....anything else requires tons of panel line rework and other airframe mods The Electrical Discharge Machining (EDM) die for the single seat upper fuselage "cut" too deep, resulting in a ~0.4MM step at the wing root. The two seater fuselage doesn't have this problem. The "A" early vertical tail has the same shape issu

That Aces II seat looks oversized and out of proportion like what they did with their F-15 series. But the rest of the kit looks very good.

I have the DEF set and the Phase Hanger set. I prefer the DEF set due to it's simplicity and lower price. This thread has a build with the Phase Hanger set. There seems to be an issue with the fit and/or contour of the inlet cowl. I'll still use my set on one of my builds, but it looks like it will need some rework to correct the contour issue: In that same thread, it's mentioned the fan blades are shaped wrong on the MCC set.

Why not track down the seller, get a refund? Those parts are most likely missing from the kit because someone stole them to build an M-21 drone carrier using an SR-71 kit.

I ended up buying a kit 2nd hand that was missing the entire clear sprue. Message me if you have a spare set of the clear parts. Ken

Darren, I'm interested in buying all of your masters. Do you have an inventory of everything?

I'm no expert on the U-2, but this photo shows both visible ribbing on the flap and visible fasteners on the wing and fuselage. Sure it's overdone on the AFV and Hobby Boss kits, but they are far better starting points than the Italeri kit.

From a quick google search, it's easy to find photos of the U-2 flaps and ailerons. It's not an attempt to mold fabric covered control surfaces. The real thing has a wavy look where the ribs are showing through the skin. The kit seems to be replicating the look, but is somewhat overdone as the previous reply pointed out.

It's truly a shame what has been lost due to the little guys shutting down. Add to that list True Details/Avionix/Blackbox. I attempted to purchase an extensive collection of the True Details masters that were originally auctioned off after Squadron went under. Greg Cooper (racerhaven on ebay) bought up much of the Squadron inventory, including all of the masters. Instead of auctioning the masters on ebay, he ran a raffle for charity and basically gave them away. That was over a year ago and the winner never did anything with them.

I just received the order I placed on Dec 2nd. He had several new releases that just came out, such as the F-14 tanks. His original post about shutting down was about a week ago on Facebook. His post a few days later stated he was swamped with new orders and had to turn off ordering. Hopefully he licenses or sells his intellectual property to another producer to keep his sets in circulation. I asked him what his plan was since I'm looking to buy into a product line like his to start a side hustle in preparation for retirement in a few years.

There's no problem if you are actually getting your packages. Were the packages being sent via USPS mail services? Any USPS shipping service that includes a tracking number requires a full address to be provided to USPS. That means one possibility is you are putting in your own address incorrectly (I see this quite often when I sell internationally). It's also possible that due to the geographical location of Sprue Bros, anything they send to Canada goes through a port of entry not close to you. If Sprue Bros is using UPS Surepost, then it might be getting routed through a ma