I never planned on revisiting this article. But a visitor to this site, ericritter65, asked a question about scale and it just got me to thinking I had never really shown how big any of these subjects are in real world terms.
Several recognizable subjects with common scale objects.
So let’s take another look at scale, and compare it to reality.
My previous post Scale Matters was mainly about why I chose 1/48 for all my kits and how various subjects compare to each other. My wife is a graphic designer and fine artist, and once commented that previous post was her favorite. So let’s see if this slight tangent is interesting.
Big models in their natural habitat.
My main display shelves in the library.
Kubelwagon with a carnivorous quadruped.
SBD Dauntless with the glamorous Jodie. The Dauntless is about the size of most WWII fighters, so this is a very common size for model aircraft. Tanks and other vehicles are much shorter, see the first picture for comparison.
Plane Dave 
You’re in luck with glamorous Jodie…
She’s a keeper!
In the sixties when I was a kid making model kits they were all 1-72,mainly Airfix and the more expensive Frog. 1-48 only came in in England around 1970, and they were always very expensive for a sixteen year old.
I grew up around Chicago which made Monogram the hometown team. When I started, Around 1974, it cost $4 for most of their kits. I could afford them with paper routes and lawn mowing.
1/72 kits were usually cheaper, at least Monogram, Revell and Airfix were. When Hasegawa & Tamiya Came along they were more, even for the smaller scale!
Has there been a real surge in 1:48 in recent months (or years), or is it just my imagination. There seems to be many more in the market and costly too. I saw an Airfix kit for a sneeze off £100. Way out of my league!
Recently there has been a push of new products. ICM and Eduard have both had several new products, plus pricy new offerings from Tamiya and a couple of the Chinese companies. There are several more coming yet too.
I’m not sure why? Some things were delayed earlier this year, and maybe the producers are just getting back on schedule. ICM in particular likes putting out BIG subjects that can be expensive (they have become known for German bombers).
I hadn’t noticed anything so expensive from Airfix, but if it’s multi-engine that may just be par for the course.
Fortunately this hasn’t hit my pocketbook all that hard. A lot of what’s going on is just that EVERYONE wants their own Mustang/Spitfire/Messerschmitt. Those are the money producers, it doesn’t matter how many are on the market. I may buy a couple of those myself, but I don’t feel like I need a bunch of them (Airfix may have scored the last mass purchase from me with their early P-40s). Tamiya’s new P-38 is sort of an exception, it’s light years beyond what was out before, but there’s a lot of sub-variants, so with any given release I’ll only buy a couple. Even if I do get excited about some future subject, I can’t think of anything I would ever want a dozen of (errr, anything that hasn’t been released that is).
You may be right in that things have been put on hold and as companies get back to full production there is a swelling of the market. Certainly quality is better at bigger scales and this may also be influencing producers decisions to build bigger, I don’t know. We’ll have to see what comes along I guess and hope prices don’t go beyond the average modeller’s pocket, that would be a terrible shame.
I do think as the average modeler has gotten older, the average scale has gotten bigger! Not only can we afford more than when we were mowing lawns or delivering papers; but the eyesight is going!
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