Hi,

I have heard a rumor today and whas wondering if some of you heard the same:

It seems that Tamiya has stopt manufacturing the Willy's jeep kit (1/35), is this so??

I think I heard a while back that Jeep didn't like it's name on the kit, or something. Not sure if that's why, but I know it had to do with the Jeep license...

YodaMan

I still think it's a nasty rumor since Tamiya has the Jeep license stuff on the side, plus Tamiya does two other civilian Jeeps. Also count all the other Jeep kits, civilian and military, on the market. It's a great kit and a good seller, I can't imagine them stopping production.

Just a guess, but it could be their older model (from the 70´s) it isn´t very accurate, and now that developed the new tooling Jeep, this old mold isn´t necessary anymore!
Just a guess

Would you need a license from Jeep? In WWII, "jeep" was just the common name for them, not a brand name.

Nic

Nic I believe that Tamiya does need the copyright and blessing from the Daimler-Chrysler corporation They do own the Jeep name sadly Back in late 1991 or so I remeber reading that some car makers and even airplane makers wanted mdel makers their blessings to make a certain type of models It seems some auto makers thought that models were free advertising
But some like Chrysler wanted their name on the box as far as the copyright and name of a certain vehicle I hope what I said makes sense to y'all In the end result it's all about making more money I'm sure Chrysler probably charges Tamiya a good amount of money to put JEEP name on thier models
As far as I know the model companies can make a model of a certain vehicle,but they need the auto makers permission to put the vehicles name on the model For example Oshkosh name isn't on the Italeri 8x8 cargo truck that the U.S. military uses even though the name is on the real vehicles (Hemitt)
CHAD #:-)

Some manufactures just want to bless off on the kit while others want a royalty. Thanks to the lawyers greed is everywhere.

Daimler Chrysler is quite zealous about its trademarks. They have gone after Magazines, clubs, and owner's goups lately. Even before they sold out to Germany, they got quite aggressive. They stopped AMT from releasing the old MPC 1/25 scale WWII Jeep a while back. They have been targeting vendors at full scale car shows, like the Street machine Nats, and The St. Ignace and Gratiot cruises. They are looking for T-shirts, stickers, signs, posters, artwork, manual reprints, and car parts and accessories that violate their trademark, and copyright. I decided not to make any more resin conversions for Chrysler models recently, as I can't afford to be the one they make an example of! Too bad, because I had two dynamite masters finished up for conversions too!