Hi,

Does anyone have any input about airfix 1/32 figures?? WWII. I have seen pictures of them on the internet and they look like "bag of army men" Not sure if they are lacking in the detail and quality as the kind I normally buy from Dragon and Verlinden, Etc.. Any input?? Thanks!

Multipose kits from the mid 70s. They aren't that bad and had exchangeable parts so you could build them in various poses.

Airfix produced two types of figures - Multipose (hard plastic, construction kits) which are still available. The second type, were soft-plastic polythene type which sold in boxes of 15-20 figures. Yep, 'Army Men' would be an accurate description...

I like the multi-pose a lot.Mix and match to a considerable extent and all seem to come with decent to well made personal kit and weapons.
The "army men" style figs are good for what they are. Italeri also does a line in the same style.
Cheers!

I bought long time ago the "us marines" box. The figures are ok(far better than old tamiya and italieri, definitely not dragon gen2). The multipose stuff is very usefull, with a pair of kits you can draft an entire army...In the other side, they are bigger than the usual, so if you plan to mix with other kit equippment or even figures for dioramas, forget about it(multipose them!). Ah, and the equipment pieces wheren't too good, nice detail but no variety: the kit only contain ammo pouch for rifle, not for the bar or the M-3 included.

I think it's a good buy if you plant to transform/detail a bit,perfect for a diorama.

A key point is the fact that they are 1/32 scale (approx. 54mm), and not 1/35 (approx. 50mm). So the figures will be bigger, as will any equipment. If using these figures together with any others by another manufacturer you will notice the difference.

Rudi

Considering that they're over 30 years old, the Airfix multipose figures are pretty good - and a LOT better than Tamiya's figures of the same vintage.

I remember when they first came out that they were cast in white plastic, but the current recasts are (I think) grey.

But as others have said, the fact that they're 1/32 scale really limits their use.

The soft plastic "army men" are just toys. But for toys, they're still (with one or two exceptions in a couple of the sets) very nicely and realistically detailed, posed and proportioned. I'll happily admit to having the full range of those, still in their original boxes - with the exception of the 'Space Warriors' and 'Footballers', the latter of which I could never really see the point of.

In fact some of the later sets like the modern (i.e. modern in the early '80s) SAS and the WWII British Infantry and WWII Italian Infantry were only available for a very short period in the early '80s and are now quite collectible (despite the extremely crappy Airfix box artwork of that time). There's even a "Holy Grail" set of "World War One British Infantry" that even had a catalogue number, but no-one in the Airfix collector community (of which I used to be a fringe member back in the late '90s) seems quite sure whether any actually made the stores or not.

- Steve