Online Suppliers

Welcome back to the hobby.  If you live in the US,  Sprue Brothers or Squadron would be good places to start.  Their ads are usually on the side of the screen.

Hey Slang.  I second what roony said.  There are a bunch out there, but a good start would be Squadron and Sprue Brotheres.  They have sales all the time and daily specials.  Just depends on what you're looking for.  eBay, Amazon, Craigslist, local yard sales are great for finding older possibly hard to find kits.  Then you have any local hobby shops (if you're lucky enough to have any), Wal-Mart, and craft stores like A.C. Moore that carry a small selection of kits,  oldmodelkits.com is another good place to look.  A bit pricey, but he has high quality stuff and has great descriptions of what he has.  A great guy to deal with too.  Hope all this helps.

Eagle90

Spruebrothers as stated,Freetimehobbies and Scalehobbyist are good,Redfroghobbies and don't overlook Ebay for kits and supplies.just shop carefully and watch shipping costs.See if there are going to be any shows in your area,those are really great to pick up stuff at the vendor tables also.

overseas,lucky hobby e reliable also

Thank you all very much for your help. I had to wait for my post to be cleared by the moderators, and so I did infact check out some of the sources that you guys listed (Squadron, Ebay, Spru Brothers, Oldmodelkits.com etc.) These places seem to have an exceptional inventory although, it is kinda sad that the economy has taken advantage of so many of us these days with the rising prices on everything, not to mention even our hobbies, for goodness sakes.

I am in the process of building a modeling table as we speak, and hope to have my stuff in place within the next few days. I am absolutely amazed at the detail and results that you guys get out of your efforts with your models. I want to get into weathering, and detailing and I am sure that I will have some more questions to ask as time goes on.

Thanks again, and I will definately be looking in the gallery, and surfing around the archives in here for some good tips and tricks to help me solve any problems that I run into. 

I've used Squadron (and many others), for decades (since 1988) with no problems. They sell a variety of kits and supplies, but I tend to think of them as mainly a military modeling supplier. Depending on if you want more esoteric items, shopping around (and then asking FIRST about the seller, not after you've placed an order) to find what you want could be more effective.

I can't count how many times someone has ordered from "badmodelservicecompanydotcom ", got poor service and then complained about it on modeling forums. In response, a dozen modelers post links to old forum posts with extensive complaints about that company. The online modeling community is so vast that any company that has bad service has already been used by somebody here who will tell you about it.

One of the nice things about ordering from Squadron is that you get email sales specials with great deals and they still mail out a full color monthly catalog. My August flyer came yesterday.

"I've used Squadron (and many others), for decades (since 1988) with no problems."

Thanks for the tip, these are good things to know after being out of the circle for a while. If you don't mind me asking, who are some of the other dependable sources that you order from besides Squadron? (and I do like armored vehicles alot.)  I agree with you 100% in that, slack customer service is an enormous hassel, and a big motivational let down. I would appreciate knowing who to deal with, and who to stay away from, as far as any of the forum members recent experiences, if it is allowable to be said on this site.

I am going to need some other accessories, like a quick disconnect micro adjustable air valve for my airbrush, and some other specialty items. I was looking at Coast Airbrush for the MAC valve, a moisture trap and a new hose, and was hoping you might have some insight on their customer service, either good or bad.

Thanks again, for all advice. I will get a Squadron catalog in the mail asap.

I have used Sprue Brothers, Dragon USA, Hobby Link Japan (great if you are into hard-to-find Japanese kits), CultTVman for sci-fi type kits, Starship Modeler (for sci-fi stuff), Tracks-n-Troops for 1/72 scale armor, Track48 for 1/48 scale armor items, all without any problems.

I also use the heck out of eBay. The various eBay sellers get the lion's share of my modeling dollars.

Many thanks Rob, I am much obliged for your help. I have been looking around on Ebay for the past few days myself, and there are a couple of Panzer kits that caught my eye. I noticed that Dragon is having a sale through the summer on some of there armor kits as well. There are some specific kits that I would like to try to find that have a distinct interest for me, and I'd like to add them to my collection in the future.

I'd like to find an M4 Sherman,  Panzer V  and a Tiger that would be relevant to the winter of 1944 in the Ardennes, and do a winter camo scheme with weathering for those three, as well as finding a 1950 Chevrolet C10 pickup truck kit (to be weathered of course) plus many others that hold a special place for me.

I'll keep these contacts, and definately check them out.

Thanks again.