Official 1:18 Scale NY Toy Fair Thread

Website · Post by **Teamski** » Mon Feb 21, 2005 7:19 pm

Well, I just got back 5 minutes ago and I'm still speechless..... Digger YOU ARE THE MAN!!!! I owe you sooo much for hooking me up. I don't know how I can pay you back............

Well, guys, what can I say. I met up with digger and we were shocked at just how big the 21st display was. It commanded the whole area and made the next-door Dragon display look pretty sad.

Tko211 and his buddy were shocked to see us at the booth but our eyes were immediately drawn to the Avenger. I cannot even start to describe it. Big and beautiful. It was the star of the show, hands down. It is right on par with the bbi P-51 and it's lines are the best I have seen so far. Abosulute perfection guys. The wing folding hinge is really beefy, something that I was relieved to see. The paint master was only a couple days late for the show, so be assured that our Avenger will be in our mits soon enough. The folding wing didn't have a lock to keep it in place, but Roy told me that it is already done and works like a champ. Guys, I can't even start to tell you how big this thing is. I was told that will come with 3 figures. It is just perfect!!

The re-tooled P-51 looks really nice. It lacks some of the panel detail of the bbi version, but it looks better in my book. The shape of the plane is the best so far. You will notice that the nose is 100% spot-on (for the first time) and all of the flight controls are hinged, instead of tabbed. I asked Roy about the lack of forward rake of the landing gear struts on the existing planes, and was relieved to learn that the retooled P-51 will have a redesigned strut that shows the rake. Yes!!! I will definately be getting a couple of them!

I haven't seen the photos yet on the 21st site, so please bear with me if I mention something that wasn't shown. As mentioned before, the 1:32 guys are well set up! I really liked the playsets and they are 100% go! My personal favorite believe it or not was the IE18 Infantry gun with crew. I'm a sucker for mini-dioramas of crew served weapons. It looked cool as hell. The Morter pit shown last year is a possible go as well.

They had the 1:6 scale Pak 40 with the ability to shoot some soft yellow balls. I thought it was a cool idea, but for some reason, it was STILL displayed in the recoiled position (??).

The plane towers looked really good. If they show pictures of them, they hold 10 planes each. I was asked if I liked them, and I mentioned that if they are painted flat black and reasonablely priced (around $125 or so) that they are a great value. A lot of you out there just lost the excuse for not buying another plane!!!

Ok, well, once digger and I got our first look at 21st ,we checked out bbi and Dusty Trails. Wow, what a dissapointment. The sales rep at the bbi booth was knowledgeable enough to mention that the Kiowa (not at the show) would be coming out in a month or so. I almost laughed in his face. Digger politely mentioned the fact that they are already on shelves. I was really shocked at the fact that there was absolutely NOTHING new at the show. Digger was gutted that they showed NO WWII figures that many guys were looking forward to and the rep couldn't give us any sort of update on their production. Sad.

Dusty Trails was even worse. They showed none of the Western stuff that were shown in pictures past. I'll let digger expand on bbi and Dusty Trails since that is his domaine.

Dragon had their usual fare. I personally didn't see anything that isn't on-line already.

I have to mention that digger and I had the honor to meet Dirk of all people at the show. He was talking with Roy on some Zero matters (like the rest of us) and left before I knew that it was him. Luckily he came back in the afternoon and with his wife (I believe) assisting in translation, we had a great talk about XD in general. Sadly, he couldn't get any Corgi XD to sell since they are too expensive over on the continent. Thanks Dirk for the great talk! I look forward to more intel that you can furnish, hehehehe.

What a show. Digger treated me to lunch and had to suffer as I talked Roy's head off about planes. Roy is indeed a great guy and a plane buff through and through. I almost got him to consider a Mossie, his favorite plane, but you know how that goes, hehehe...... I think we talked for over 2 hours on planes alone (wyverns, Gannets, Mossies, 110s, etc) I attempted to convince Roy on a 110G nightfighter, but the class is out on it. He's got a good point on the fragility of the antenna. It would look cool as hell, nontheless. A couple interesting facts came out our conversation:

1. S1 Razerback P-47. I'm sure many of you know about the initial release of the Checkertail P-47 without the slot for the canopy. Supposedly, the factory made the 2 piece canopy to look like that of the P-40; the aft portion was to be glued to the fuselage while the forward part was to slide back over the aft part. Luckily, it was somewhat fixed before I picked up mine right before Christmas. Funny, though.....

2. The D-Day Spitfire and the Huckle-De-Buck P-47 were supposed to be special releases for a D-Day commemrative version of those planes. It never happened, but the planes were made anyways. Interesting.

3. The tail number on the CIA Huey is the birthdate of a 21st employee!!

4. Roy snapped off his first P-38's nose landing gear strut! We aren't alone!

5. You will find some minor differences between the S1 109G and later ones: S2 and later have a small antenna added behind the cockpit and the wings will fit a lot tighter due to an addition of ridges on the attachment tungue.

6. I didn't know it, but there is NO dash on the real bubbletop P-47. The gunsight was mounted to the fuselage and you can see the back of the instruments on the real thing. And all that complaining I did mmmmmm.......

7. Some of you will remember me snapping off my strut on the Candy Stripe 190 within 5 minutes of getting it. Well, it WASN'T MY FAULT! I found out that the very first run of 190s had extra small pivot pins that snap off very easily. It was fixed on later issues.

I gotta quit talking....... Many thanks to 21st for making the trip well worth it! Thanks Hilary for listening to digger and I for what seemed forever.....

Digger, I owe you big time there bud!

-Ski

tmanthegreat · Post by **tmanthegreat** » Mon Feb 21, 2005 7:47 pm

Darn you east coast guys are lucky!

DocTodd · Post by **DocTodd** » Mon Feb 21, 2005 7:52 pm

What an awesome deal. I would have been in hog heaven. Thanks for the updates and now I know I'm not the only one who had a s1 190 that the strut snapped off. Can't wait to see some of the great planes coming our way. Ski any mention of an A-10?
Todd

Website · Post by **Teamski** » Mon Feb 21, 2005 8:21 pm

DocTodd wrote:What an awesome deal. I would have been in hog heaven. Thanks for the updates and now I know I'm not the only one who had a s1 190 that the strut snapped off. Can't wait to see some of the great planes coming our way. Ski any mention of an A-10?
Todd

It was brought up by Rob himself. It's just too big. The original prototype isn't accurate enough to produce in it's current state. So with all of the production costs, don't expect it to happen, unfortunately.

-Ski

Post by **p51** » Mon Feb 21, 2005 9:04 pm

Thanks for the great updates digger and teamski!

fredricchio · Post by **fredricchio** » Mon Feb 21, 2005 9:10 pm

Wait, so those racks they had the planes displayed on will actually be for sale? Thats pretty cool, I would definitely be interested in picking up some of those.

Bummer about the A-10...I would say, wait and see what BBI has up their sleeve, but, well, you know. Ah well, there must be some new stuff coming from them, we'll just have to wait a bit longer to find out I guess

CW4USARMY · Post by **CW4USARMY** » Mon Feb 21, 2005 9:22 pm

Appreciate all the great info Teamski and Digger! With regards to the Avenger, I just read on BadCat's site that it has been delayed until at least May but probably DEC 05.

Is that what the folks at 21st's booth were saying too?

Thanks again,

Andy

hworth18 · Post by **hworth18** » Mon Feb 21, 2005 9:30 pm

Great intel guys!!!
Yes, I am definitley jealous.. Did Roy happen to mention when we could see the next 109s on the shelves?????

Website · Post by **Teamski** » Mon Feb 21, 2005 9:36 pm

Hey guys:

I posted some pictures I took of the 21st booth, especially the Avenger. Check them out in the Toy Fair Album!!

From what I got, the S2 and S3 109G's should be out anytime now. The Sahl and Hackl 109Gs looked awesome as you can see in the photos.

My impression is that the Avenger will be out before December. The F-104 will show first, followed by the Avenger.

The airplane towers are currently one-offs, but there seems to be enough interest for them to produce them, so you could see them for sale on their site in the future. Again, this is just me talking, hehehehe......

-Ski

ps: I had to bump a couple albums off to fit the additional images. My appologies to the guys that lost their stuff......

tmanthegreat · Post by **tmanthegreat** » Mon Feb 21, 2005 10:10 pm

I'm hoping we get the Avenger sooner than december! We practically can't wait that long - especially since it was supposed to be out around last december.

Nonetheless, thanks for the great info and pictures! On the new P-51, it looks like they got the wing tanks in the right position and that it will come with a new US pilot figure.

Website · Post by **Teamski** » Mon Feb 21, 2005 10:14 pm

tmanthegreat wrote:I'm hoping we get the Avenger sooner than december! We practically can't wait that long - especially since it was supposed to be out around last december.

Nonetheless, thanks for the great info and pictures! On the new P-51, it looks like they got the wing tanks in the right position and that it will come with a new US pilot figure.

Yep! I took a close look at them immediately upon arrival and they were in the correct spot. I liked the pilot a lot. He had the correct "C" Type RAF helmet and US goggles. Thankfully, no sunglasses!!

I did finally find the bbi Sherman at a Newark, NJ TRU and after seeing it on display at the show, I bought 2 of them. I had to, you know!

-Ski

Post by **aferguson** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 7:06 am

Great reporting Ski, Digger et al. Nice to have eyes on...

Overall i guess a(nother) disappointing Toy Fair. I will be less enthused next year as Toy Fair '06 approaches. These trade fairs just don't seem to be as important as they used to be.

Even though 21c had such a great display i still find what they had sort of a let down. I guess i just had higher expectations of seeing all the stuff that is coming out soon on display (262, 15, 86 etc) but that was clearly not practical for a variety of reasons. No new surprises either...drat.

Also not great news about the Mosquito and A-10. The Warthog i was pretty certain to be a dead duck but i thought a Mosquito was just a matter of time. Seems like a natural and woud be highly sought after in my opinion.

Also sorry to hear Roy put the nix on a nightfighter Me-110. That was the version i would have thought would be at the top of their list. It's really our only realistic chance of getting any german nightfighter in this scale. Still i guess a custom wouldn't be overly difficult i spose..

Nice to see the Avenger looking so good. But delays, delays!... Still as these will probably retail at the usual $40 at WM they will represent quite a bargain..

I hope we get some news from BBI in the next couple of months. I am ever so anxious to see what they are planning. The nice thing about them is once you hear something from them it is generally only a couple of months from the shelves....unlike good ole 21st when it's more like a couple of years from the shelves...

Still i'm not complaining. This hobby is getting better and better every day and the future is looking pretty sweet. But it's hard when you're the most impatient person in world....

Incidentally, the IG 18 infantry gun that Ski was talking about for the 32x line: there was one made by Hausser back in the 30's that is a very nice little model and pretty much dead on 1/18 scale. It's made of metal and is really quite well executed. Needs some work around the breach area but otherwise it looks good. They are hard to find and expensive though (as is most hausser stuff). Expect to pay $100 on ebay. I bought one a few years ago for $40 that was dinged up but i straightened it out, repainted, new wheels and it looks spiff. They really are a nice piece and with the limited supply of 1/18 artillery out there it's nice to have...

Thanks again for the great reporting guys!

Website · Post by **Teamski** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 7:22 am

I agree with you Andrew on the over-all impact of the show. Digger and I were let down by the lack of new stuff. Bbi didn't disclose a whole lot to us as they kept their cards close to the chest. It probably had to do with the fact that we had guest passes and not buyer's passes. We could tell that the rep wanted to say more but chose not to do so.

The F-86 and Mig 15 are 100% go. I don't know why they didn't bring them. Oh well. As far as the NF 110, I hope they change their mind. I mentioned to Rob the fact that it was by far the most successful of the 110 series and it looks cool as hell with the 2 tone gray, but who knows..... I'll just keep my fingers crossed.

The F-104 was pretty damn slick. The intake and exhaust are really accurate. No shallow turbine blades with the thing. I also failed to show the packed plane. It fits perfectly in the current box.

If I were a 1:32 guy, I would be going nuts right now. Those playsets are going to be released and look really cool. I'm ready for this next year. Bring it on............

-Ski

Website · Post by **Teamski** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 9:29 am

Figures.com has some good photos as well:

http://photos.figures.com/photo/TF05/sh ... rd=&page=1

They show the S2 and S3 109G's.........

-Ski

Morian Miner · Post by **Morian Miner** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 12:16 pm

3 Figures for the Avenger? Wow, is there enough space to fit them in? That should be very cool. Any word if we are ever going to see a Pak40 in XD? We finally are getting armor and trucks, I want something to blow them up!

Website · Post by **Teamski** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 1:56 pm

Morian Miner wrote:3 Figures for the Avenger? Wow, is there enough space to fit them in? That should be very cool. Any word if we are ever going to see a Pak40 in XD? We finally are getting armor and trucks, I want something to blow them up!

You will only be able to fit one figure in the plane. You already know how the figures bend, hehehehe.........

I asked about XD artillery and no word on it yet. I pleaded for the Pak 40, citing how easy it would be to make now that there are ones in 32x and 1:6, etc, etc, but nothing. Another one of those things, I guess.....

-Ski

MightyMustang · Post by **MightyMustang** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 2:29 pm

Just saw the pics from the Toy Fair and heres my thoughts on the pics I saw from 21st. I'm very impressed with the forth coming Avenger and will pick one up ASAP BUT I am not impressed with the new tool Mustang which to me looks like a carbon copy of BBI's Mustang. It has the same features with BBI's still being the best in my opinion. I know they say its not THE final product but with what I saw I will pass on it and no doubt pass on their final version as well. They say it will be the most accurate version of the Mustang in 1/18th scale. Well I HOPE they can back up those comments because I'm very picky when it comes to the P-51 and I will have to see their final product to say its better then BBIs version.

digger · Post by **digger** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 2:55 pm

MightyMustang wrote: I will pass on it and no doubt pass on their final version as well. They say it will be the most accurate version of the Mustang in 1/18th scale. Well I HOPE they can back up those comments because I'm very picky when it comes to the P-51 and I will have to see their final product to say its better then BBIs version.

It sounds like you don't need to see the final version - "no doubt pass on their final version as well."

We should pleased the new Mustang looks similar to BBI's - BBI's version is great! I'm afraid if you wait for BBI to give you a new plane you might have many a lonely night with just you and your Mustang

compfire · Post by **compfire** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 3:05 pm

Thanks guys (Teamski and Digger) for the intel, pics, and taking the time to share with the rest of us.

vulgarvulture · Post by **vulgarvulture** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 3:09 pm

Are the bomb bay doors on the Avenger accurate....Did some Avenger versions NOT have the double-folding doors (for lack of a better description)?

hworth18 · Post by **hworth18** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 4:22 pm

MightyMustang wrote:Just saw the pics from the Toy Fair and heres my thoughts on the pics I saw from 21st. I'm very impressed with the forth coming Avenger and will pick one up ASAP BUT I am not impressed with the new tool Mustang which to me looks like a carbon copy of BBI's Mustang. It has the same features with BBI's still being the best in my opinion. I know they say its not THE final product but with what I saw I will pass on it and no doubt pass on their final version as well. They say it will be the most accurate version of the Mustang in 1/18th scale. Well I HOPE they can back up those comments because I'm very picky when it comes to the P-51 and I will have to see their final product to say its better then BBIs version.

Well, If BBI's Mustang is the standard in which to judge by and 21st's Mustang looks like BBI's, wouldn't that make it a GREAT piece???
IMHO, BBI's Mustang isn't perfect and it most definitely can be improved upon..
So, I will be looking forward to 21st's Mustang to see if it is everything it is hyped up to be..

Website · Post by **Teamski** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 6:03 pm

As mentioned before, the 21st P-51 doesn't have the panel detail that the bbi one does, but it has a far better shape. The nose is spot-on correct and the canopy isn't as blown as the bbi one is. If the landing gear is done right, I'm in there!!

-Ski

immeww2 · Post by **immeww2** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 6:48 pm

Enjoyed reading all the reports regarding the Toy Fair. Looks like we'll be getting some really nice products this year. I'm particularly waiting for the panzer repaints. I also hope they do the building playsets in 1/18 scale too!

Post by **p51** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 7:45 pm

Well I HOPE they can back up those comments because I'm very picky when it comes to the P-51 and I will have to see their final product to say its better then BBIs version.

I'm just as big of a P-51 Mustang fan, but I really think 21st will pull it off. I have no worrys or fears, I know, especially after the Avenger, that we won't be dissappointed. 21st has time to see what has been offered so far in the Mustang category... and they can improve on it and fine tune it. And hey... even if it was a carbon copy of the bbi Mustang, I sure wouldn't mind! More Mustangs with new paint schemes! But I have a feeling we'll be seeing it blow away the bbi Mustang.

JimBob55 · Post by **JimBob55** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 8:34 pm

Wow: great scouting, guys! I appreciate the advance intel! I've been waiting for the Avenger...and it looks absolutely great! Rockets, too, which weren't in the early photos. The Mark 13 torpedo looks good, although it should have the Mark 24 "Fido" (much smaller than the Mark 13) for the Atlantic ASW paint scheme shown so far. As impatient as I am about the Avenger, I'll bite my tongue and say that it may be worth the wait!

The Starfighter looks fabulous, too. It is outside of my collection limits, but I may be tempted!!

Thanks,
JimBob