Does toolling age matter? Unboxing the first release of the Hawker Sea Fury from Pioneer II/PM Model

[@john-alanpascoe5848]

It’s really important for the health of the plastic forests that kits are suitably foraged, so I’m glad the manufacturers paid attention to that.

[@mh53j]

Don Greer is an artist that has done countless illustrations for Squadron/Signal books going back to the early 1970s. Mostly vehicles/aircraft, some figures. Ron Volstad usually did those. Don must be getting up there in age if he's still around --hope he is! The address for "complaints" is the old address for Squadron mail order in Texas--publishers of Squadron/Signal. (Squadron now in Elijay, GA). I imagine Squadron was an "exclusive" importer of PM (Pioneer) model kits at the time. My Hobby Boss Land Rovers have a similar tag of being the "exclusive " importer of Hobby Boss ; this was in 2011 when the kits were first released.

[@jaws848]

Fantastic.. and tnx for a fantastic christmas pressie.👍👍👍

[@Adam_Boots]

You could have a go at scribing some lines on the engine cowling. The art clearly shows panel lines however the kit part is completely smooth. Get a strip of tape the right width to fit where the panel lines should be and wrap it around the cowling a few times. This will give a perfect guide for a scriber as the lines will end up parallel to each other. Just run the scriber along the edge of the tape.

[@VFCproductions]

Or... Buy the Trumpeter one?

[@Adam_Boots]

@@VFCproductions I like to use cheap kits to practice and experiment with.

[@anfieldroadlayoutintheloft5204]

cool build thanks for you cool vids thanks lee merry chrismas

[@sorvad99]

UV lamp or put the decals in a sunny window for a while will de-yellow those decals

[@Adam_Boots]

I've done this a couple of times in the window and it's worked both times. The only extra step I do is use a zip lock packet to protect them from condensation.

[@VFCproductions]

They have been sitting by the window for a little while but are only marginally better

[@sorvad99]

@@VFCproductions yeah winter isn't the best time of year but if we get a sunny spell it can work really well, I've done this several times now. In summer its faster but it just takes longer this time of year, direct sun is best

[@BWProbst]

Pioneer 2 was a Turkish company; the UK address was the distributor, not the manufacturer. This was never a "true" Matchbox kit, it was a Revell kit released using the Matchbox label that Revell owned at that time. You will find kits from a variety of manufacturers under that Revell-Matchbox label; some of them were even MB kits originally. (Nowadays they no longer own the MB label, so they just release kits as "Revell", but only a relatively small percentage of Revell kits these days were actually designed at Revell.) The infamous "Matchbox trench-digger" was a feature on some (not all) of the true MB kits from their early days. As for the 1990 date on the instructions, that seems to me to be a "coming in 1990!" advertisement as it's referring to the trainer version of the kit, not the one you have in your hands. I would hazard a guess that the 1988 date in Scalemates is simply wrong, probably the kit was first released in early 1989 (but possibly very late 1988), prior to the crash of the aircraft.

[@MisterHampshire]

I'm pretty sure I saw the Pioneer kit long before 1998 and even around the mid-80s, but then that might have been a PM release, which Pioneer may have taken over? Must admit, at the time I thought it was the old Frog moulding. Manufacturers in that period were forever doing it, Frog moulds included. I'm not convinced it's Matchbox, first due to the panel lines (as noted in the video which is rather good I have to say), but I don't think Matchbox ever did a Sea Fury??

[@VFCproductions]

I have looked at the Frog tooling and it is not the same as this one. As far as I can tell this is a genuine new tool from Pioneer II but accept Scalemates does sometimes get the dates a bit off. It has been correctly pointed out that strictly speaking it was Revell that released it, using the Matchbox branding in 1995.

[@MisterHampshire]

Boy. but we've moved on haven't we. Being a keen modeller of FAA subjects, more so 1950s-1980s, who could have believed we have so many beautiful kits catering for that now. Amongst others, we had the 1/48 Sea Fury and of course the 1/48 Sea Vixen, something I'd wanted for years. And now, 1/48 Gannet, 1/48 Westland Sea King, 1/48 Buccaneer and so on. Airfix have come a long way and are producing kits modellers want at a quality the deserve.