Good morning all
As promised I thought I'd do a short-ish comparison of the kit
decals and the AM one by H Models....
First though, the good news is that I'm just over half way having added 64
decals so far to the two kits!! The bad news is that the ones left are all the tiny tricky little ones.....
Anyway back to the comparison.....
Quality - H Models win. Generally less carrier film except oddly on the numbers, thinner but the kit ones fuselage numbers went down better than I thought. But the AM ones are definitely better ptint quality especially on the small detail stencils and markings, where they also had better colour variation on the 'text' markings rather than the mostly black of the kit
decals.
The only problem I had is that H Model large
decals stick
very well as soon as they go down....so a couple of the crosses are very slightly askew.....i even lost one completely where I had to scrub it off because I slipped as I put in place.
Quantity - AM
decals win again. Although you can do four decal options with the kit ones, they only have one set of fuselage 'side' crosses. H Models give four full sets of the 'main'
decals, including two part swastikas for those that use them.
Understandably, you only get one set each of the little details markings and '
interestingly' not only do they have a very similar layout, they are numbered
exactly the same on both sets. I can only assume there must be a common 'parent' set they've both copied or one has copied the other.
Instructions - AM
decals win hands down and I am very glad I bought them because the kit instructions give placement instructions for less than a third of the markings provided - pretty poor in my book. The AM kit has very good instructions for all of them but they don't have the decal numbers on the instructions so I ended up using my phone as a massive magnifying glass in some cases to work out what was what and then wrote them on the destructions.
Also, in once case they call out for double the type of a particular marking provided, causing me to make a mistake.....plus the external fuel tank side aspect drawing has the markings on the bottom but on the overhead drawing they're on the top! So I put them on the bottom so you will at least see them!
So in short H Model
decals get the thumbs up with a couple of qualifications
Anyway enough waffle....
ACW as usual.
Andrew
PS apologies for the quality of some the shots - they were taken to prove a point, not quality.
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AM vs Kit
AM first pic.
AM definitely better...
AM destructions
Size
As you can see, they're pretty small......the white blob in the bottom of the second shot is the head of a cotton bud!
On the planes....what this is supposed to be about....
The light blue 'White 7' has the kit
decals, except for the crosses and swastikas. The darker 'Yellow 4' is all AM
decals.
Other details shots.....