Which Brand of Wooden ship model kit is better or worse.....? Take a poll and answer a few multiple choice questions.

[Chuck]

This is a poll of just registered members.  Only members can vote.  The most logical place for it is in the kit build log area and that is why it is there.   This is the largest collection of build logs on any ship model site.  The knowledge and expertise shared is quite valuable and it is something we want to encourage people to sign up for in order to see and take advantage of.  

 

  

[michael101]

Where i can see the votes of the group ? 

[Chuck]

Just scroll up....if you voted you can see the results...on the top of this topic.

[michael101]

Thank you  

[CRI-CRI]

Hi,

 

Vote results in agreement with my own experience, and also with most of general web opinions

 

In attachment some pics of my Panart and Constructo works, for instance... More modifications than direct using of kits... A best quality could be always the right choice for pleasant modelism !

 

Regards

 

Christian

 

 

[cog]

I can't cast a vote on any of the poll's questions, because I would need information on all manufacturers and their kits, which is impossible. This poll's results are in no way giving a true account of what it pretends to offer. I can hardly believe there is one person whom has bought a kit from at least 95%  of the manufacturers within a time frame that has had no major influence on the price.

It might be an idea to poll one's experience with the kit(s) build by that person.

[Thunder]

I agree with Carl, a better poll would be by individual kit by manufacturer. If you do by manufacturer alone you are not recognising the fact that they have a range of kits to suit experience and budget. A poor feedback result for Sergal's Racehorse (it is really poor) might not compare to their Cutty Sark.

 

perhaps if you had to give an answer for each manufacturer listed and this be poor, good or no knowledge, then you will get clear results on which are most popular and can get an accurate quality opinion based on actual experience.

[FoxtrotHotel]

On 3/3/2018 at 7:44 AM, Cathead said:

One Corel kit was enough. Terrible instructions, shoddy materials, inaccurate design.

I can attest to this. The Corel Chesapeake Flattie was my first kit. The materials are ok-ish. No dowels. The instructions said to sand all the spars and mast from square planks, which seems insanely tedious and unnecessary to me considering dowels are dirt cheap and can be bought anywhere, but I'm not sure if that's a prevalent practice among kits. The false deck planks didn't fit the keel, and I had to use a considerable amount of filler. Some planks were distorted or cracked, but most were good. It came with four highly detailed posters of the model in scale, but the instructions were god awful, and were more generally vague advice in broken English. Aside from the box photo and a muddled part on one of the posters, there's no guidance at all on the rigging. Fortunately, a few other users have built this model, and I've been able to use their photos as reference for how to rig it.

 

That said, the kit was still overall enjoyable to assemble, but it was more a puzzle than a kit.

[Chuck]

Added more companies.......remember you can still vote.   You can also change your vote.   You can pick 3 choices for each question in this poll. 

 

Please dont bash the poll.   We realize it isnt perfect but the info is still very very valuable.  If a brand has high negatives and no positives.  I think it is something you might want to know before spending a few hundred dollars.  This isnt a complicated poll....its just a snapshot of what you think based on actual experiences.   

[Erik A]

I only have two kits and one is the AL endevour longboat and the other is the De Ag Victory. both seem to have good directions etc so have voted accordingly

[Moab]

I recently built a Woody Joe kit. The laser cutting was the best I’ve seen. Although it was an easy build it may be a problem for someone new to modeling since there are no plans and the instructions are in “Japanese.”  The illustrations in the instructions are excellent and easy to follow. The wood was excellent!...Moab

[JPAM]

this poll is nonsense. 

Edited November 12, 2019 by JPAM

[lmagna]

3 minutes ago, JPAM said:

this poll is nonsense. 

Then I suppose you won't be taking it.

[Chuck]

That is not a very educated and well thought out comment.  👎🏻  Thanks for explaining why.  A “nonsense” comment.

[MEDDO]

The site has almost 34,000 users.  Of course you cannot expect any one member to have experience with every manufacturer or every kit but the aggregate of the members who do choose to vote can at least give you a small look at what people have had experience with in the past and their opinions.

[mikegr]

Im just a newbie here but i think the poll result is a bit biased as the majority of users are from US, therefore they preffered local brands.🙂

[ccoyle]

4 hours ago, mikegr said:

Im just a newbie here but i think the poll result is a bit biased as the majority of users are from US, therefore they preffered local brands.

It is not, nor ever was, intended to be a scientific poll, but it does show some trend data.

[Cathead]

4 hours ago, mikegr said:

Im just a newbie here but i think the poll result is a bit biased as the majority of users are from US, therefore they preffered local brands

The top four in the quality poll are evenly split between European and American. Of course there's a certain bias in any country toward kits that can be easily acquired or whose instructions are written in the native language, but it's also true that many of us have experience with various "foreign" brands with terrible instructions or other issues (Ahem, Corel). There are also "foreign" brands that have gotten rave reviews on this site, like Master Korabel and Dusek, that nonetheless are smaller brands and naturally won't match the volume of major players in the American market like Model Shipways.

 

By definition a poll is a collection of responses from the sample set.  If you want to know more about a specific brand, look for specific build logs or reviews written on this site. Or write your own review if you think a brand is over/under-rated. But it seems to me that none of the high-ranking results (for either quality or lack thereof) are mistaken based on my own experience and that of reading lots of collected opinions on this site. At most, some brands are under-represented, but that's inevitable. It amazes me how many people get worked up about this.

[mikegr]

7 hours ago, ccoyle said:

It is not, nor ever was, intended to be a scientific poll, but it does show some trend data.

Its kinda confusing to me as the most popular brand in my area here is voted as the worst one.

Maybe I need to order my kit from other European country.

[ccoyle]

But Mike, remember what was said about kit availability -- in Greece, the manufacturer that you have in mind may have the most readily available products, which will affect the local perception of that manufacturer. And if they are voted "worst" in the poll based on a small sample, than that assessment may not be completely valid. Remember, it's trend data, not a final judgment on worst/best.

[rshousha]

Some people are commenting that the poll doesn't make sense, but they do not explain why clearly. In my opinion, this is a popularity poll. It does not rank the quality of the kit manufacturers. If 1000 people have bought Corel kits, and liked them, then Corel will have 1000 positive votes. If one person bought a Corel kit and another kit from an obscure manufacturer, and that kit was a hundred times better than the Corel kit, it gets just one vote while Corel still gets 1001 votes. 

 

Conversely, if no one who voted bought a crappy kit from an obscure manufacturer, that kit gets a much better grade than, say, AL, who sold 10,000 kits during that same time. The crappy kit would get 0% on the bad grade while AL might get 10%. 

 

I put forward this is why some people are calling the poll nonsense. 

 

It's a good effort but really only reflects the quality differences among the top manufacturers. Smaller manufacturers, good or bad, will poll poorly no matter what. 

 

The poll would have to say something like: 

 

1- What kit companies have you bought from? 

3- How would you rate those companies?

 

Then, somehow the results would be something like, "of the people who bought Corel and AL kits, the comparison is, blah, blah.." etc.  It would be much harder to create such a poll but would really show how people feel about the brands. 

 

I, for one, have built Amati (tops for me; built two), Caldercraft (good value, but I've built just one), Corel (good material and plans but instructions are murky: built two), and Midwest (I loved the subject so, no matter what, I felt was a great kit). I have zero experience building other brands so I can only give a 0% grade everywhere else. That's why the poll doesn't make sense. 

 

 

 

Regards, 

 

Rick 

 

[ccoyle]

46 minutes ago, rshousha said:

this is a popularity poll

😉 Bingo! It's an opinion poll. It was never intended to establish which companies actually are better than others, only to sample opinions on which companies people think are better than others. Its results should be evaluated accordingly. 

 

P.S. I should probably add that the fellow who wrote this poll, whom we all know and love, wears many hats, but none of them say "professional market analyst," "pollster," or "expert in statistical sampling."

[Chuck]

Then vote as you like based on your experience.   That is what the poll is about.   Based on your experiences select the MFG you are familiar with.   Everyone who voted the way they did were not lying.   This is what they believed and it was their opinion and just because it doesnt match yours you can not disregard them.

 

Just vote for what you believe!!!!  I just dont understand these people who dont believe the results........they are honest and true.   You dont have to agree with it.  To say it is untrue is just plain idiotic!!!!

 

Model shipways uses both plywood and basswood for the bulkheads depending on the model....also they DO NOT use boxwood,  They use basswood for planking which is the same as limewood.   You are just wrong about that....sorry.

 

Chuck

[James H]

Edited topic to include CAFModel

[Dilbert55]

Have not built enough kits to generate any opinion to enter into the poll. Is there a way to see the results without voting?

[Chuck]

Yes there should be a link to view the results....somewhere, but it goes away after voting so I cant tell you for sure.

[VTHokiEE]

8 minutes ago, Dilbert55 said:

Have not built enough kits to generate any opinion to enter into the poll. Is there a way to see the results without voting?

Should be at the very bottom of the poll, “Show Results.”

[CRI-CRI]

On 11/13/2019 at 12:42 AM, JPAM said:

This poll is non sense. 

You think this poll doesn’t make sense, but I believe that the most important for any company is its public image: who is known for quality will live longer than another with poor reputation - Well known Artesania Latina, which went to close, is a good illustration of this hard reality...

 

Regards,

 

Christian

[Sailor1234567890]

I think I can explain his nonsense comment. Or, at least, there's a part of me that wonders why "which is the best" questions were broken down into plans, quality etc, while the "which is the worst" question lumped all subcategories into one question. Chuck, maybe you could separate them into individual questions for the worst kit questions as well? Just a thought. I still find the information informative and will certainly keep it in mind when buying a kit in the future. 

[Duanelaker]

I have recently purchased the following kit manufacturers kits...

midwest

model shipways

bluejacket

occre

mamoli

constructo

artesana latinia 

mantua

scientific

 

hopefully I will have better input For this pole once I start them!