Where are we?

[Softscience]

Forgive my attempt at a think piece, and feel free to ignore but as something of an outsider looking in, maybe my perspective is skewed, so I'd like to hear from you folks who build Great War aircraft more often than I do.

I had a roughly four year gap in my biplane building, starting around 2020. During my time away doing things like building pointy jets (gasp!) and tanks (double gasp!) things seem to have changed somewhat. Of course WNW is gone..is anybody picking up their toolings? I know there was the Meng Fokker, but is more on the way?

Seems like Copper State has taken on the mantle.of high detail 1/32 models, but their bread and butter seems to be WW1 armored cars. And they're super at it, too!

What of Roden? Are they still manufacturing kits, given the invasion of Ukraine? Were they really even in the WW1 business anymore even before the invasion? I know they lost some of their staff during the indiscriminate shelling of civilians. I hope they can recover.

I see Eduard is still pumping out new boxings of the same handful of toolings.

Airfix's line of 1/72 biplanes didn't go anywhere.

Is there anything new and exciting on the horizon?

[PrzemoL]

Good questions...

Imho WNW is gone forever. Release of Dr.I and Lancaster was by pure chance. I doubt very much we will see any other WNW kit re-released.

CSM are very likely to add to their line of 32 scale aircraft. They deserve any kind of support. Even though their pace of new releases is far from what WNW used to accustom us...

As far as I know Roden did not stop the operations, vide the Strutter release.

32nd scale kits also come in abundancy from Lukgraph. Luckily,  they also continuously improve the quality. I have seen some bits for their imminent PWS-26 and really no traces of 3D print were discernable.
 
And do not forget Aviattic with the top notch Pfalz D.VIII!

In 72nd scale there are still very decent Roden kits available, many of them.
Eduard is also adding to their line, we are looking forward to new tool Alb D.III.

All in all, there are lots of kits available around. Me I have a stash of 25 kits in 32 and 72. Enough to occupy me for 6 years... And I am sure I will see some new releases in the meantime.

[macsporran]

I think you just missed the resurgence of Roden in the 1/32 WWI arena. There was nothing new for a long time. Then they invited Dave to gather our contributions for most wanted subjects and, true to their word, they went into R&D and came out with a new early SPAD XIII followed shortly by a late one, then out came one of our top wants, the two seat Strutter, again followed quickly by a single seater and no doubt soon to be joined by a French one. We understand a Avro 504k is well into planning and, hopefully, more thereafter. In the same time we've had a Bristol Bullet from CSM and variants thereof and of the Caudron, with a Nie Bebe to look forward to.
Meanwhile the huge stashes of collected Wingnuts seem to be making there way back onto the market at much more realistic prices. I feel the carpetbaggers have recognized this and are now selling rather than hoping for more stock value inflation. Of course the rare Gotha will never come down, there were too few made, but you can pick up an Albatros for a reasonable price now as so many were produced.
Adding in the resins, etc, I think it's still a pretty great time for the 1/32 WWI enthusiast.
My tuppence!
Sandy

[lcarroll]

    Sandy and Przemo make some very good points. Although the good old days of Wingnut Wings are no doubt gone like them I believe our genre of the Scale Aircraft Model Hobby is in good health! The soliciting of inputs from our Membership by vendors (Roden, Special Hobby, and Copper State in particular) are of particular note; we've had some great releases as a result and Dave's considerable and tireless efforts these past several years to strengthen our already robust relationship with the industry will be continued by your executive. Brad has already engaged in that challenge and we will continue to work on our relationships with the companies. As already mentioned the more recent products from Lukgraph and Aviattic are yet another bit of great news and Eduard are still engaged in the WWI subject market as well.
   As Sandy points out the speculators appear to be loosening their grips on their stashes of Wingnut's Kits and prices are definitely coming down. I believe that trend will continue and overall we can look forward to yet more positive developments as our collective influence reaches the business end of the activity chain.
   I personally welcome queries such as yours and strongly encourage all to table suggestions and ideas on how we can improve our lot; we have achieved a large membership over the years and the manufacturers, large and small are listening to our inputs. Thanks for this.
Cheers,
Lance

[Softscience]

I'm encouraged by the responses. I did not notice that Roden was back on the ball with new releases. I really like the strutter, and I like the idea of supporting Roden, so I'll probably be picking one up (even though 1/32 is not really my favorite scale).

I just looked at the WNW offerings on ebay, and it looks like the parasites are still asking for roughly $200 USD for most of them. Still a bit too much for me, but I guess it is better than around 2020.

[WD]

Don't forget that Eduard is going to bless us 1/72nd modelers with an Albatros D.III here soon. I do wish Eduard would consider bringing back their little DH2 and Junkers J.1 back into regular rotation. In a previous issue of their monthly magazine Vladimir Sulc stated that going forward that what they do in 1/48th they will do in 1/72nd,  . . . so,  . . . is there hope for a new tool Sopwith Camel?

Warren