Small Scale Military Headquarters

Okay...so the wife has been bugging me lately to get something for myself for my birthday which was last month. So I've always wanted to get my hands on an FW190 A series aircraft instead of just the "Dora" offered by 21st back in the day. I have three of those BTW...just saying. Since Merit hasn't found (or is not looking for) a US outlet, I have to order on-line. Easy! I make my purchase and two days later I get an email that says "Sorry, but you'll have to wait till after TET (Chinese New Year) before shipping from China can be accomplished. Back The Truck Up! Well I've waited till now...what's a couple more weeks? Then....then....then I get a shipped notification. What?....on the way? Be still my beating heart. Finally, after eons and decades and centuries (okay...maybe three weeks) the wife casually tells me "You got a package today" over the telephone. Now being a cop on the beat, I pride myself in maintaining my cool in some pretty testy situations...this being one of them. I calmly drove to my house and went inside...even ignored the obvious box sitting on the table. If you believe that, I have some prime property just off the coast of Texas for sale at a really good price for you! Code 3 (lights and siren) to the driveway, a serious swat door busting entrance that had the pet dogs running for the back yard, slide to a stop next to the table (oh....I forgot to turn the siren off). Quick trip to the driveway...."Sorry folks...Nothing to see here!" and back to the table where one of my many defense knives becomes my devining tool. I open the box, no damage I can see...slide the tray out and VIOLA! There it is!
Here's where reality starts to set in. After removing the excellently wrapped pieces from the travel tray, I find this. The glue around the cowling-fuselage didn't work real well. The entire cowling came off sometime during transit. No biggie...I can fix that. Then....the tailwheel is missing....? After looking closer, I can see the mounting post still in it's receiver inside the tail. The tailwheel post has snapped in two...also during transit...so it has to be here somewhere in the packing "stuff". Sure enough, I find it just as I expected. Okay...I can fix that too.
In summary, since I paid nearly 5 times what I paid for a 21st Dora and waiting forever to finally receive on, you'd have thought that Merit would make better attempts at shipping securely so that damage like this doesn't occur. I got to tell you that the quality of the model is far better than that of the 21st stuff, which makes it more delicate. I can fix these small (to me) problems, but I clearly understand someone who may not have the patience or skill to make these (or worse) repairs just to have something they've waited in anticipation for a long time to get...and have it fall apart out of the box.
You tell me....and I being too critical, or is this what could drive Merit away from the hobby forever?

Fockewulf, very sorry to hear about your less-than-stellar experience... Who did you order the Merit FW190 from? I got mine from China from EC Hobbies. It took about two weeks for the model to arrive, but the item was in perfect shape and extremely well packaged. Another member ordered his from EC Hobbies around the exact same time as I did and had a similar experience. My FW190 is near perfect and there were no issues with it.

But I know Merit has had issues... They designed the model, though it is apparently being made by the same company that makes the Trumpeter brand models. I have also heard rumors from credible sources (dealers that know the Merit people) that the company is possibly having financial troubles. They may not have been able to even pay for the FW190 model they designed, hence it went to other distributors in Europe and Asia and not the USA. It is very likely we will not see a US release of the model... So Merit is likely on the rocks and is likely to meet its own demise sooner rather than later, unfortunately.

The low prices on the 21c products were an anomaly, so it's harder to compare what one paid for a 21c FW190D9 at Walmart 12 years ago versus an exclusive limited production model today. The 21c products had a low cost because Walmart ordered thousands of them; however, at the same time, 21c could not maintain acceptable quality control and meeet production demands, resulting in a frequently shoddy product. That was part of the reason they eventually went under... With 21c we got what we paid for. With Merit it has mostly been a different story, but we pay significantly higher for better quality models (generally) that see much smaller production numbers. Again, it sounds like Merit's manufacturer did not meet expectations this time around.

That said, I don't think you are being critical and it sounds like you got a genuinely bad example. Returning it may be difficult, but may not be out of the question, if you can explain what happened to the company you ordered from. What you may also consider is ordering another one and selling your example on eBay. There are none listed there currently and it could fetch a pretty penny given the rarity of the model, even with defects. That would at least help recover part of the cost if you ordered a second.

Like you I ordered through EC Hobbies, though I didn't want to name them because I'm sure they have no control what comes down the pike. As for returning it...not a chance. And selling on Ebay is no option either. As people who have been on the forum long enough know, I don't like leaving the models "as is" from the box. I have to make this one unique and mine. Not for retail....just my way. As I said before, for me these bumps and bruises are nothing I can't handle and either way, encourage me to go even farther modifying what Merit has already done.....but thanks for the ideas.

No problem, Fockewulf. Just I think it stinks about what happened to your plane and all. In one way, it's part of the risk taken when ordering overseas and could have just as easily happened with mine as it did with yours. With a few exceptions, the stuff I've gotten from Merit has been first rate and the 190 was no exception. But hopefully you can repair the flaws and still enjoy your model!