From the Mouth of St. Jon the Oracle

And the saint himself sayeth:

To give you the full story on this, actually KR wants to get this one
quite
badly, but the problem is that I haven't got anything good enough to
send
him as a master right now. The moulds for the 25-56 dropship are old
and
failing, and I need to do some bits of reworking of the original
before I
remould it - at the moment we are just casting the odd one or two out
to
fill UK orders as they come in (and a couple to take to each show we
do).
The remodelling/remoulding is in the "to be done" pile, like so much
other
stuff (FB2, FMA, BDS, sleep, food etc., etc..... you get the idea?).
When we get it revised for full production again, KR will get his
masters
and be able to make it for the US market.
=========================================
I got mine and I have to say I concur with your analysis. I've seen
far better molds for some of your other work.
As an aside, can anyone tell me why the current armourcast moulds seem
to be almost perfect (ie very very little work need done - most of the
terrain I've bought and my two older Eldar Tempests in 25mm) requiring
no filling or filing or prep and most of the resins I've got from Jon
and KR have required filing, surface pockmark filling, and in the case
of the dropship some noticeable attacks with a big-ass mill file to
get the segments together? And the resin seems a little different?

Now, I understand Armourcast may use a better resin and hence their
per vehicle price is higher (at least I assume this is it). Is there
something different or more high-tech about their process? This might
help explain the apparent quality difference and or the cost
difference. (If anyone has checked out their latest big ass Battletech
kit at $140.00 US you'll know what I mean - I think each of my
tempests were worth about $62.00 Can each or so).

So, someone who knows (KR or Jon), could you comment on the
differences - the whys and wherefors?

As to the GZG dropship, for those who have not seen it, it is a bulky
but kind of neat unit - holds 1 APC or the Coonhound FSV/Tank
Destroyer and seems to me it'd be very solid. The APC is the LIPPC, a
small NAC (I think) APC. The dropship is not an aliens style weapons
carrier that also drops pallets or APCs. It is a transport. It has a
weapon but that obviously isn't its main role. The LIPPC isn't the
aliens APC - far too small. By comparison, if the crew in the galoob
Alien's APC is any scale, the "real" aliens APC would be 10" long in
25mm. (It is about 1/72nd scale and is 8" long). The Aliens APC would
be taller by a fair piece than a standing man - esp if you count the
height of the gun turret. The LIPPC is about a six man APC with six
wheels.

If anyone has seen them, Grendel had some multi-wheeled armoured
vehicles that also have turrets. I'm trying to negotiate an
acquisition of some of them. They are pretty sweet - 6 wheels, and an
RFAC in the turret. Look big enough to hold an eight man squad.

Jon, another thought for you (an easy "extras" kit): Off Road Tires!
You make plenty of wheels for plenty of APCs but all are what I'd
describe as racing slicks - they don't have the character of the tires
I've seen on OR vehicles (like the MOWAG chassis for the Grizzly, LAV,
etc) and it strikes me a mould for these could be a good spruce up
item for those of us with APCs to build and not cost you much to make.

Anyway, that's my 0.02 FWIW. Maybe it'll help someone or provoke some
discussion.

Now, it's kind of a pity too that we couldn't get a 25mm moulding in
Resin of Brian's kitbashed VTOL. That would be a great assault
vehicle.... I wonder if that would be feasible? I don't actually know
how upscaling works or what it costs. But its a sharp looking piece of
kit.

Thomas Barclay
Software UberMensch
xwave solutions
(613) 831-2018 x 3008