Hello guys!!!

This post is about something sad (at least to me).....

In the last year I bought the Academy's 1:35 UH-60L and when the kit arrived I do what I usualu do, I opened the box to check if anything is missing or broken, letting the bags sealed.
Now I take the kit to the workbench, and surprise me in discover the fuselage halves come with some injection fails.

The panel lines in the belly of the chopper come very light, in some spots have only a "shadow" of the lines. Moving foward, just below the nose has many paralel scratches and in others places scratches randomly. The right side have a huge scratch just aft the cargo door, from the bottom to the top. The engine nacele in the part A1 (left side) come a little warped (the minor problem). But, the worst case is in the nose; the lines of the eletronics bay come almost invisible, and the others simple don't exist. The pics below will show what I'm talking.











The case is, I want to contact the manufacturer (Academy) but her site don't have any kind of consumer's contact (only a phone number to Korea), and my attempt in contact the seller (I purchased from Hobbyeasy) via the customer service e-mail([email protected]) was frustrating, since no answer was given. The same e-mail was send to MRC (mrcsupport@modelrect​ifier.com) but any kind of answer was given too.
So, this topic is a mix of ask for help (to anyone that can do it), a demonstration of neglect from manufacturer/seller with consumer and a protest about all of this.

Many of you can say this isn't necessary, the lines can be rescribed and the scratches filled and sanded. I know! In the belly this is quite simple, but in the nose is beyond my skills. And when you purchase something new you expect that thing come perfect, without damages right?
I'm only asking for my rights like a consumer, the replenishing of the parts that come with fabrication faults (the fuselage halves, or the srpue A, whatever).

I will send an e-mail again to the envolved parts, and hope they answer now.
If anyone that read this post can make something to help I will be very grateful, and if necessary, my personal e-mail is [email protected].

Regards, Audren.


PS: Sorry my poor english.

Hi Audren, don't worry about your English, it's much better than my Portuguese

According to Academy's website, their Brazillian distributor is HTC Comercio de Modelisimo LTDA. Perhaps you could give them a try?

If you want to try scribing on a curved surface, try using Dymo Labeller tape. You can get this at any well-stocked stationery store. It's usually about 6mm wide, but it can be cut. Use the tape to guide your scriber. If you cut it narrow enough, you can bend it to match the curves you need to restore.

I sent an e-mail to HTC, in really, I forgot of try to contact the local dealer, mainly because I was focused in contact the vendor or the manufacturer.

Will be very sad if I need to rescribing the panel lines if any of the vendor, manufacturer or local dealer don't answer me or refuse to send a replacement part.

Academy's kits are pretty famous for having poor panel lines like the ones in your kit so you're probably better to increase your skills and rescribe them. There's no guarentee that the replacement parts will be any better than the ones you have now At least they're nice and big. Imagine if you had the 1/72 kit instead!

Happy modelling.

The weak moldings on the nose and underside are standard on 1/35 Academy H-60s. No matter which one you get, they are all that way.

The scratch is a manufacturing defect.

As stated above, these are easy to fix though. The lines on the nose are not that hard to rescribe. The upper one by the canopy glass should actually be raised, not scribed. I use 0.020 styrene rod to replace it.

Hi Audren

As Gino said, Academy won't be able to help you much as all the builds I've seen of this kit have had similar complaints. If my memory serves me correctly Academy is using old moulds from another company for these kits and they weren't much to write home about then.

If you're committed to the build I think rescribing is really going to be your only option My friend built one of these a while ago and had to use so much filler and sanding on the joins that hel ended up rescribing a significant portion of them anyway...

Good luck!
Damian

I should be more clear in my ideas, but is a bit difficult to me sometimes express yourself in other language.

Well, the point is, I put a topic like this in others foruns, and the posts was quite similar. In the fact, I would appreciate too much if Acamdemy send me another parts (like Hobby Boss and Kinect do when I purchased kits with a damaged part and missing one, respectively), But I discovered this's probaly a flaw of the mold not a isolated case.
What saddened me is the fact of either Academy and Hobbyeasy, did not answer any of my e-mails, even to say that any of them can't do anything, or something else!

Like I say before, is the neglect with the consumers that let me boring.
The companies should show more respect with us, answering an e-mail with appologizes at least.
Only the local dealer of Academy (HTC), return the e-mail saying they can't help me because the kit wasn't bought with them. I expected this.
If us always shut up when a company sell products with low quality or flaws, the things will never change.

Everyone has his limitations, and I konw my, rescribing a curved panel line in a round suerface will be a challenge to me, but I'll make it (I'll pratice first, of course).
I take my hobbys seriously, mainly when I put some money on it, and opposed to what some guys make understand about me in other places I put this topic, can say I'm a lazy guy, I let these pics of a 1/48 MilMI-24 (Mini Hobby Craft) that I finished some time ago, who know this kit know how bad he is.

if you can pull that one off you should have no problem fixing the other kit this is how we learn