SW-48026 Model Kit F-16XL Experimental Fighter

Great product.

Great model

I think it's rather inefficient to immediately decry the price when you haven't bought the model itself, especially considering it is a new-tool kit of a rather rare subject, and ships to your local distributor here from Hong Kong. I don't know if anyone has noticed, but shipping things across the planet costs money. Obviously the previous reviewer has never seen a Hasegawa kit, some of which can run upwards of $90 msrp for a 1/48 scale kit, AND which often lack the weaponry, intending for the modeler to spend an additional $20+ buying armament kits to actually arm their models (not every Hasegawa is this way, but a rather surprising amount of them are). While I have not personally purchased the F-16XL yet, I've heard a number of good things about it on cybermodeler.com, and from the images supplied of the kit in their in-box review, the XL looks to be easily as detailed and well-engineered as their other line, Kinetic models, of which I own the F-16MLU kit, which is easily as good as a Tamiya F-16 kit (MSRP $65.... Also one of the best kits on the market if you're a Viper fan...) and comes with very nice touches like a turned brass pitot tube and also a staggering array of armament, which according to cybermodeler's review also holds true here, despite both the MLU and XL kits representing unarmed aircraft (the MLU kit I have features a Tiger Meet air show MLU and the XL depicted on the box was only armed in trials). This is in stark contrast to some other kit makers (the aforementioned Hasegawa [which, side note, are extremely nice kits despite the high prices, keep your eyes open for deals or go to model shows and swaps for deals, I have the F-2A and F-22 kits by Hasegawa and while the "limited" edition F-2 lacks any JASDF weaponry, I paid $50 for the kit and it is worth it, considering ONLY Hasegawa makes a good F-2A in 1/48 and it is a beautiful kit, and the F-22 is msrp $89.99 and also a beautiful kit, though I didn't pay msrp for mine] and another example of a kit doing that that I personally have would be the Kinetic Mirage 2000B/D/N, which gives one the capability to model the nuclear armed Mirage N without providing an ASMP missile, or Academy's older issue F-15E which gives a modeler four sidewinders and an anti-satellite missile for a ground strike craft) but I digress. Skunk models and their branch Kinetic make quality kits out of good plastic, and as a model builder and a kit maker myself I can attest that the cost of making molds/tooling far exceeds the cost of the plastic or resin that goes into them. That being said, according to cybermodeler (and luckymodel.com which is based in Hong Kong and is a Skunk/Kinetic distributor) the MSRP of this kit is $39.99. It still costs an additional $15-30 to ship here by various means, so that should tell you your seller is counting the cost of having to have the model shipped across the planet. That's why these kits cost a bit extra. Keep an eye out for deals and shop around, but the prices I am seeing on Amazon are not bad for these kits with the level of detail they contain. If you want to pay $15, buy a Revell kit, which you won't find an XL of (not in 1/48 anyway) and then you can attempt to detail your Revell kit to match the much more detailed Kinetic/Skunk/Tamiya/Hasegawa kits. I have F-16s in 1/48 from almost all major manufacturers (Academy F-16C, Tamiya F-16CJ, Hasegawa F-2A, Kinetic F-16AM/MLU, and Revell USA) and of those, the only time the Revell was worth the money to me was when I was 11 and painting with a sponge. Now that I want my models to represent the aircraft I love, I am more willing to spend more money to have a model that is worth putting on my shelf.

I haven't bought this item, but the price is outrageous.How do you expect anybody to pay that much for a 1:48 model.