I am a casual, fairly inexperienced modeller living in the UK, returning to my childhood hobby from many years ago.

I have more disposable income now, but even so I am shocked at the price of kits these days and consequently always on the lookout for bargains.

For the most part I am fairly picky about the brands and have picked up some really good bargains for my stash.

My skill level and my shock at the cost of after market priducts means I tend to build 'out of the box'. Being a casual modeller I'm not obsessed with exact accuracy.

Living in the UK, importing is a risky business because if you get hit by customs it can end up costing way more than buying locally.

Recently I had the opportunity to buy an Eastern Express BT-42 for £10 (about $12). Not a brand I would normally entertain but I thought for £10 it will be a fun little build, it doesn't matter if it is not super detailed.

To put prices into perspective, I got mine second hand but if I were to buy new, the Eastern Express BT-42 is about £20 and the Tamiya version is about £40, so an extra £20 or twice the price.

My experience.

Detail vague - I was expecting that
Flash - didn't surprise me but a lot of time and effort to correct
Vague fit and instructions - unclear where parts went and poor (no) locating pins/holes to ensure correct loaction and orientation
Inaccurate fit - the flat pack body needed lots of filling
Incorrect details - I can live with most of this
Totally wrong details - the front fenders and the engine exhausts are totally wrong to the point that even I had to research and scratch build.

I'm a slow builder but I reckon I could have built the Tamiya version to painting stage in a weekend. Reckon this one has taken me three weekends so far and still not finished. It will turn out okay in the end but a lot of extra work for a vague inaccurate model.

Okay, I only paid £10 for it, but had I paid the ful price I would be wishing that I had paid the extra for the Tamiya.

Lesson learned, I won't be buying any more cheap brands.

Cheers,

Nigel

Hi, Nigel. I have some good success with cheap kits and some less than good success. Sometimes the challenge of overcoming the kit's shortcomings is half the fun, but at a certain point it can get wearisome. I'm with you; I try to be frugal with my hobby (more important things on which I need to spend my disposable income), so I'm always on the lookout for a bargain.

Is Eastern Express the molds formerly known as Frog? Or are they 'new'tools?

I agree with you,for some it's a real joy making a gem out of a real dog of a kit,it's what they do.For my time and skill level,I rather build a quality kit with less problems,I get more out of it.

I don't mind extra work to add or improve detail because I feel that I am getting something for my effort.

My problem is with time and effort spent because parts don't fit properly or are just totally wrong.

A good example with the BT-42. This Finnish SPG used a BT-7 chassis and mounted a boy turret for the gun. What Eastern Express have done is to provide the BT-7 chassis sprues from another model they do and add a specific sprue for the turret.

Trouble is, it wasn't as simple as that. The BT-42 had totally different front fenders to the BT-7. The kit has the BT-7 fenders and this is reflected in the instructions. But to rub salt into the wound, the box art and the painting guide show the correct fenders (that's how I spotted something strange and had to investigate which was correct).

So a lot of effort to research and construct the correct fenders just to correct a problem that EE were aware off but couldn't be bothered to do anything with. Same with the engine exhausts - totally wrong but an easier fix.

Cheers,

Nigel

To put prices into Another perspective consider this:
for 10 quid you got upwards of three weekends of modelling time,
for 4 times that money, i.e. £40 you guesstimate that you would have had modelling fun for roughly one weekend

I'd say that the cheep EE kit was excellent value for money if we are only comparing the quota modeling time / cost.
With this kit you can also feel the satisfaction of having won over that horrible dog of a kit and turned it into something presentable instead of just slapping paint on a "shake-n-bake" kit from Tamiya. Anyone can build a Tamiya kit, Real modellers can turn EE kits into fine models
I sympathise with your frustration though, bad kits are not fun at all.

I've got a few EE kits in my stash and I consider myself lucky for "failing" to buy one of their PT-76 kits, now I can build the one from Trumpeter instead

/ Robin

/ Robin

For aircraft about 60% of their stuff is ex-Frog . Their armour is a mix of self-tooled and sharing other companies' moulds which is common there. The ASU 57 is also available unde the Maquette brand for instance. Some of the GAZ and BA trucks/cars have appeared under other brands as well, such as Zvezda and Italeri. The BA 1/20/64 armoured cars have appeared under various labels such as AER Moldova and Maquette.

I have to agree with Anthony here. I've spent a good amount of time making gems out of real dogs. But therin lies the problem-- time is everything. I only spend time on a dog if there is absolutely no alternative kit available. In fact, over the last ten years or so, I've made it a practice of getting rid of the "dogs" and replacing them with higher quality (usually that means more expensive-- but not always) kits. For me, this includes kits that a few years ago might have been the latest releases-- like the 1/32 Hasegawa/Revell Spitfire for example. However, in some cases, I've chosen to retain some older kits that might not be "state of the art" kits but they still have some redeeming value, for example, Hasegawa's 1/32 F104C-- it's been superseded by the Italeri F104C supposedly, however, why would you but a kit for over $100 (Italeri) only to need to correct it when you could buy a good kit for $35-$40 since you're going to correct it anyway? This is the only time I stick with an older kit-- when it's better than the newer one, which needs help anyway. I realize cost is a factor for many (it is for me too), but if I'm selective and put money away, I can usually afford a quality kit-- and therin lies another lesson-- it's better to spend time and money on one good quality kit than it is to take three cheap dogs and try and "bend them to your will". I find the dogs usually languish for months on the shelf or workbench, when I could have finished a better quality kit. Not to mention the cost of the aftermarket stockpile required to finish those dogs.
VR, Russ

I agree here too. It's all about research.

Look up every little thing you can find about a kit. Usually by Googleing images you can find sprue diagrams, scans of instructions or at least a build article. That includes a lot of older iffy kits like the EE/Maquette/Alan/Ark Russian kits. Scalemates is your friend here to track down the confused lineage of these molds because at one point in their long history someone, somewhere, did a review or took pictures of the box's contents.

Some Eastern European retailers do this for all the kits they sell and that includes at least one incarnation of older Soviet Bloc kits. (As well as Asian kits to include older Dragon kits if the 1990s)