List of N Plastic Building Kit Manufacturers... Which Ones Are Missing?

[peteski]

I saw Woodland Scenics mentioned in an earlier post so I assumed resin was ok. If he wants simple then most of the resin kits qualify.
Randy Brown has quite a selection of simple kits which may be cast resin but the walls are much, much thinner than woodland scenics kits.

If he makes and sells N scale resin kits it is news to me. All the kits I've seen (and which are listed on his website) are made of Hydrocal (with thick walls).  Well, one is listed with a resin facade and rest of the walls are plaster.

Actually, if he does make resin version that would be really nice. I stayed away form those wonderfully modeled buildings just because they were plaster.

[eric220]

There's also Custom Model Railroads kits.

http://www.custommodelrailroads.com

[jimmo]

As a side note, 1/200th scale kits also work for some applications - especially in the background. I did forget another one too - Lindberg made some that weren't specifically called 1/160th, but were acceptable for N - especially the tug boat.

Lindberg combined four of their small boat kits into one set, called "Waterfront Four." On the box cover they labeled the Tow Boat as 1/220 and the other three were mis-labeled as 1/60 scale. They are actually 1/160 scale. The three N-scale kits are a Tuna Seiner, Tug Boat and Fire Boat. I have purchased several of these sets and have reworked most of the fire boats and tugs into fishing boats. After all, how many fire boats and tugs do you need in a small harbor scene? Since these kits are older, discontinued and not usually found in stores, I was able to find all of my Lindberg kits on eBay.

[DeltaBravo]

There's also Custom Model Railroads kits.

http://www.custommodelrailroads.com

These folks do some great work. I have eight of their Hampden houses on my layout.

[nkalanaga]

Roger:  "I saw Woodland Scenics mentioned in an earlier post so I assumed resin was ok."

All of my Woodland Scenics kits are plastic, and years old.  When did they start making resin kits?  My local hobby shop doesn't carry many N scale building kits, and I haven't shopped for them in years, so don't know just what is out there now.

[TimF]

VOLLMER, now taken over by Viessmann (Germany)

[TimF]

VOLLMER, was bankrupt but now taken over by Viessmann (Germany)

[jimmo]

If he makes and sells N scale resin kits it is news to me. All the kits I've seen (and which are listed on his website) are made of Hydrocal (with thick walls).  Well, one is listed with a resin facade and rest of the walls are plaster.

Actually, if he does make resin version that would be really nice. I stayed away form those wonderfully modeled buildings just because they were plaster.

Pete, I think you might be mistaking Randy Brown (formerly Arrowhead) http://trainsbyrandybrown.com/ for Downtown Deco's products which are primarily plaster with cast resin parts.

Also, you should be aware that the pics of those "wonderfully modeled buildings" used on Downtown Deco N-scale structure kit boxes and advertising are actually of their larger scale products. I have yet to see anyone get (n-scale) results anywhere near their HO and O-scale models.

I have inquired about their practice of using pics of larger scale, more detailed structure pics and I was told that they just don't have the time to put any of them together. Once I saw actual n-scale kit parts, I would never buy any of their N-scale kits.

[peteski]

Pete, I think you might be mistaking Randy Brown (formerly Arrowhead) http://trainsbyrandybrown.com/ for Downtown Deco's products which are primarily plaster with cast resin parts.

Also, you should be aware that the pics of those "wonderfully modeled buildings" used on Downtown Deco N-scale structure kit boxes and advertising are actually of their larger scale products. I have yet to see anyone get (n-scale) results anywhere near their HO and O-scale models.

I have inquired about their practice of using pics of larger scale, more detailed structure pics and I was told that they just don't have the time to put any of them together. Once I saw actual n-scale kit parts, I would never buy any of their N-scale kits.

You're right. Me culpa confused! I originally replied to mrhedley's post about Downtown Deco's resin kits, then Randy Brown's name was thrown in.

Wile I also shy away from the DowntownDeco N scale plaster buildings, friend of mine built the Pool hall and from a 3' distance it doesn't look too bad. Even uder a bit closer examination is still ok.  But OTOH, I recall seeing photos of the large warehouse and the walls look over 10 scale feet thick!

[christoph]

In the past also Arnold produced some nice plastic kits (injection molded styrene).

Vollmer closed (without bankrupcy) and sold their molds to Viessmann last summer.  kibri closed some time ago and the molds and the brand were taken over by Viessmann.  They announced to continue both lines as separate brands, both are now manufactured by a company in Hungary for Viessmann.

Faller went through bankrupcy and following reorganisation, they now started offering laser-cut kits in addition to their plastic kits.
Pola went bankrupt years ago and was taken over by Faller.  The old kits are now offered as Faller kits, it seems that they now use the Pola brand for large scale models only.

Auhagen is a family-owned company that offers plastic kits of high quality.

Piko produces some kits of industrial models, a line of factory buildings and a gas tank.

Heljan produces kits under their own name and also for other companies, some of the Walthers kits were produced by Heljan.  The grain elevetor and the power station were also offered by Minitrix for a short time, made by Heljan.
I think that Heljan and Pola were the main producers for many U.S. brands like AHM, Model Power and even Walthers.  I have also bought some of the Piko models labeled as Model Power kits.

Nowadays the trend seems to be towards laser-cut models because this allows for smaller production batches.  I read favorable reviews of the bridge kits made of laser-cut cardboard offered by Noch.

DM-Toys produce laser-cut models as far as I know.

A good way to get an overview of the German models is to look at the site of a dealer, my favorite shop is  http://www.modellbahnshop-lippe.com/  who has almost everything and also has a big shop in Bremen that happens to be on my way home from work 

[CoalPorter]

 "never heard of Green Max. I looked them up and found out they make 1:150 kits, so I'm not going to pursue that."

Green Max is from Japan and along with others like KATO and Tomix make some interesting building models.
I  don't think 1/150 or 1/160 really makes much of a difference.for buildings exact scale is not important since the
models are more than likely "freelanced" and not really prototypical in the way our ngines or freight cars are expected
to be.










'

[mionerr]

All of my Woodland Scenics kits are plastic, and years old.  When did they start making resin kits?  My local hobby shop doesn't carry many N scale building kits, and I haven't shopped for them in years, so don't know just what is out there now.

I may be confused. I thought that WS kits were resin since the walls are so thick. And Randy Brown's are so thin in comparison, but the description says they are cast...

I picked up several WS (DPM) kits when Hobby Lobby discounted their train inventory a few years ago. I already had all of them built but I figured, change the paint a bit and put in a different town.

How about we not split hairs and call them "plastic"? Ok with you, Peteski?

And speaking of Downtown Deco, I thought I heard once upon a time that that Randy was going to make his kits out of resin instead of plaster. Did that ever happen?

[peteski]

I may be confused. I thought that WS kits were resin since the walls are so thick. And Randy Brown's are so thin in comparison, but the description says they are cast...

How about we not split hairs and call them "plastic"? Ok with you, Peteski?

And speaking of Downtown Deco, I thought I heard once upon a time that that Randy was going to make his kits out of resin instead of plaster. Did that ever happen?

I guess I should chime in again since I was called.

WS (ex. DPM) polystyrene (to be anal) kits I was told were made using low-pressure injection molding. They used copper (not steel) molds. Low-pressure injection molding produces thick walls and very thick gates.

I split hairs because the original question was for a list of plastic (implying injection-molded polystyrene) kits. Not resin case, not laser cut.  Then people started going off on tangent.

But to be fair, you are also correct that resin is a type of plastic.  However most modelers realize that in the modelling community "plastic" implies thermoplastic material (like polystyrene) while "resin" implies cast urethane resin. So there! 

Despite of what you heard, according to their website (and from what I have seen personally), Downtown Deco kits were and still are made of Hydrocal (except for the resin cast front wall of one of their building kits).

[nkalanaga]

Peteski:  I always wondered why the DPM kits had such thick walls.  I know some older brick buildings really were that thick, but the window and door frames shouldn't be.  Never would have thought of low-pressure molding and copper molds...

And I agree with your description of "plastics", but I have an even simpler definition.  If I can glue it with ordinary solvent cements it's "plastic".  If it takes some other adhesive, it's something else, such as "engineering plastic" (Delrin etc), "resin", whatever.

[Denver Road Doug]

I split hairs because the original question was for a list of plastic (implying injection-molded polystyrene) kits. Not resin case, not laser cut.  Then people started going off on tangent.

But to be fair, you are also correct that resin is a type of plastic.  However most modelers realize that in the modelling community "plastic" implies thermoplastic material (like polystyrene) while "resin" implies cast urethane resin. So there! 

You keep saying "implying injection-molded polystyrene" but I'm curious why is that implied? (serious question)   I do understand the differences between resin and polystyrene, but when *I* read the subject line, my thought was "not laser-cut wood" And my second thought would exclude cardboard/paper and plaster, but I wouldn't have excluded resin unless it was explicitly stated/clarified in the original post.

IMHO, resin might be subcategorized differently under the larger category plastic, but certainly not a tangent, and certainly not a tangent worth stopping down the thread for.

And, as we are seeing, some folks don't even realize what manufacturers use what materials.   Not all resin kits have Alamo walls.