Imai sailing ship kits list

Thanks for the link - very interesting! I never knew that Imai had produced kits of the Gorch Fock, Sagres and Mircea in 1/200 as well as 1/350. I wonder if they're the same moulds as the USCG Eagle in the same scale? (The 4 ships were sisters, but not totally identical). Knowing Imai, they probably aren't.

It's also interesting to see a photo of the "Catalan Ship". I've heard of this kit but never seen it; I assumed it was a modification of the Santa Maria, but obviously it isn't. It's also a carrack, but very different in appearance, with a single mast and a wider, shorter hull.

I vaguely remember the Imai "Catalan Ship."  I believe it was based on the famous "Mataro Ship," a fairly large-scale model that was found in a church in Mataro, Spain.  The kit, as I recall, was large, simple, and (like all other Imai products I've ever seen) beautifully molded.

Dr. Thomas Graham's recent book on the history of the American kit manufacturer Monogram mentions (briefly) the handful of Imai sailing ship kits that were distributed in the U.S. for a year or two under the Monogram label.  Monogram, it seems, actually borrowed the molds, and molded the kits in the U.S.  According to Dr. Graham, the steel in some of those molds was so soft that Monogram damaged them, and had to repair them before shipping them back to Japan.  I wonder if that's a hint as to why Imai went out of business in such a short time.

Let's hope that whatever was wrong with those molds has been fixed effectively by the companies that are currently marketing the ex-Imai kits.  The plastic sailing ship kit industry has produced few finer ones.

Imai is my favorite subject.I've built the Catalan,Galeass,Santa Maria(2),Spanish Galleon(2),Cutty Sark,and Chebec.They are all great kits.I have all the rest in kit form.I always try to get the kits from Imai because of the plastic used by them it was outstanding.Totally different Than when Ertl or Monogram had the molds.I've build some of there 1/350 scale also.Also Imai had some of the Heller molds for a while Soleil Royale,and Cournne are a couple.They didn't change these kits much but added some Imai special touchs like cloth flags rigging info.

The 1/200 scale Eagle and sister ships Imai did use the same hull.But changed deck detailing. I'm sure because of cost they had to do this.

Some of the Imai kits come with cloth sails.Santa Maria.Chebec,and Galeass.The are a little thick but give and option from the plastic sails.Also several kits give you the option to rig your own deadeyes and shrouds getting again away from the plastic preformed.

The USS Constitution Kit was based on the ship in the 1970's in Boston.Jtilley is correct the Catalan is based on the Mataro ship.

Imai kits to me are the class of plastic sailing ship kits from any era wish they were still around.

Rod

I am depressingly sure that any company that tried to produce such high-quality, not to mention highly accurate, plastic kits would inevitably go broke.  Such attention to detail, materials and moulding techniques needs big sales to amortise the costs.

One only has to look at the shifty tricks perpetrated by such as Revell and Heller to see how it 'should' be done.

I'm just glad there seem to be plenty of Imai kits still out there, even if some are almost unreachable.

Michael 

 

No, that Catalan Ship isn't a modified Santa Maria; it's a good accurate kit, heavily moulded a pleasure to build. The only minor point: the planking seams & grain are a bit crude, out of scale.

Max.

It is great to see a complete IMAI- lineup - I also did not know that they had more than the 2 half-sisters Gorch-Fock and Eagle in their 1/200 line.

What I´m missing is the 1/350 full-rigged ship Dar Pomorza, it was available when the whole series was issued as waterline-only but afaik it never reappeared with the full-hull option. A shame since this was a one-of-a-kind and did not share any parts wit other ships in the series.

Moreover, there was a set of waterline small craft such as yachts and motor boats to liven up the "Operation Sail"- waterline display.

The "Mataro" was also made by Heller, but in this case it was just a recycled "Nina/Pinta"-hull with higher sidewalls and added superstructure. Of course it had only half of the "thickness" of the IMAI kit. I know some photos of the "original" model and it seems it IS as fat as depicted by IMAI, but I wonder if the museum piece really accurately depicts the lines of the actual vessel, seems almost ridiculous.... The heller kit seems too slim in comparison, but as a generic early Carrack it might just pass.

Anyway, those IMAI kits are definitely among the best ever made and the Aoshima reissues are a good thing. BTW, Imai did have an equally big lineup of wooden kits back in the 70s-80s and those are being reissued as well! The manufacturer is called "Woody Joe" and the kits can be ordered through hlj.com. Many wooden kits are bigger versions of the plastic ones (they even have a "Mataro"-should be fun to build this hull in plank-on-frame!), but some are unique, such as the steam-powered "Kanrin Maru". 

I definitely remember seeing a plastic "Kanrin Maru" kit on eBay earlier this year. (I think the manufacturer was Nitto, not Imai or Aoshima, though it may have been an Imai mould). The seller definitely said that it was a plastic kit, not wood - unfortunately there weren't any photos of the kit parts in the auction. I think the scale was 1/100 or 1/96.

There's an ongoing debate about the "Mataro ship model." Some scholars believe pretty emphatically that it's a genuine scale model (albeit a simplified one) - i.e., that its hull lines are more-or-less accurate. I'm inclined to think it's more of a symbolic, deliberately distorted "general impression" of a ship, like the "votive models" that were hung in churches all around Europe in later centuries. But I don't think anybody knows for certain. I do remember the Heller "Mataro" that Honneamise mentioned. (My recollection was that it was based on the Heller Santa Maria hull, but I could well be mistaken about that.) The packaging suggested that, as was so often the case, the people responsible for marketing it had no idea what they were looking at. ("Mataro" isn't the name of the ship; it's the name of the town where the old model was found.)

Judging from the Paule Lengellé box art painting, the Heller ship has all the main features that should be found on the Mataro ship, just mounted on a slimmer hull. Still, if Heller somehow managed to make a somewhat proper scale model of an early carrack, they got there by mere accident... and I agree with Mr. Tilley: as for the naming of their ship models, the people at Heller showed a limitless yet clueless creativity. 

I remember the Atlantic Carrack ( I guess this was the one based on the Santa-Maria, the "Mataro", judging from the price and box size,  should indeed have been based on the smaller hull but I could be wrong here) was called the "Conquistador" -that might have been the profession of those on board, but I highly doubt the Spanish or Portugese would have named their ship like that.

BTW I always thought that the "Conquistador", even though based on the Santa Maria, was a historical reconstruction, simply based on the fact that some Italian manufacturer offered (and still offers) a big wooden model of exactly the same ship (this time more properly named as "Caracca Atlantica") -it even has the same paint scheme! After a little examination I am quite sure that it was the other way round - the wooden model was just a rip-off of the Heller model that was itself just a rehashed version of their S.Maria. 

All the former Pyro kits, even the smallest ones got fancy names like "LÓrgueilleuse" for the "Brig of War", "Half Moon" became "La Providence" and even the small "Golden Hind" was changed to "Marie Galante" - some were even named after real ships that looked completely different- they renamed the "Olympia" as the "Maine" (but Pyro came first with that bad idea) and had a "Le Sphinx" that was actually a "Harriet Lane". What fun.    

Sorry for straying away from the main topic. As for the "Kanrin Maru", I remember seeing that one on eBay as well. It was indeed 1/100 scale and had a NITTO logo on it. Boxart resembled the Revell Alabama in perspective and general layout if I remember correctly. A shame that in the auction there were no photos of the parts - I´d really like to know it this kit was a good one. It seems it has never seen a recent reissue. The wooden IMAI model is 1/50 and is 127cm long, so the Nitto kit is not that small either. 

Thanks to Hobby Link Japan and later, to Aoshima, I menaged to get most of the significant historical ships from Imai. The Xebec, Chinese Junk, Venetian Galeazze, USS Susquehanna and Le Napoleon, being types of ships that no other company ever produced are now on my shelf. After I learned that their spanish galleon is the only accurate kit of that particular type; I ordered an Aoshima reissue a few days ago. I swear I'm not exaggerating: whenever I open one of my Imai boxes, their precision, cleanliness and accuracy fills my eyes with tears. I doubt there are more than one or two producers who can challenge Imai kits in the field of sailing ships. Imai's bankruptcy was indeed a major blow to all age of sail modelers community.

I've got the Karin Maru kit.Nitto Kagaku is the company that produced it.The box has 1/100 scale printed on it.But inside the box it has english written instructions and it has 1/200 authentic scale typed in.The hull measures 19 1/2 inches without the bowsprit.The hulls done in black plastic the deck and parts in tan,brown,and gray.It has less than 200 parts.Dosen't have the detail of Imai but is a pretty good kit.

Rod

Judging on the hull length, the NITTO kit should indeed be closer to 1/100 than 1/200 - the Kanrin Maru was not a very big ship.

One more thing comes to my mind (just read about the Chinese copies of the JAG kits)- if you want to buy a genuine IMAI kit, go for the Aoshima reissues or buy the original ones. I have read about people complaining that their LEE Galleons had a lot of flash and they blamed it on the "aged" mold -  that is not true, in fact LEE did not use the IMAI molds at all, they are simply the pirate arm of Wasan, the parent company of Trumpeter, and most of the kits they sell (or sold, I think they are not around anymore) are illegit copies of inferior quality!   Before I knew about that, I had already bought two LEE kits: the Enterprise CVN-65 in 1/400 which proved to be a copy of the ARII/ex Otaki kit and an "Admiral Scheer" in the same scale, which in fact is a copy of the Heller "Spee", just with a one-piece hull. Look good at first glance, but if you look closely, all of the details are soft-edged or simplified - the planes that came with my Enterprise are hardly recognizable. Same goes for "Mini Hobby Models" - all pirated stuff -they even change the scale of some subjects like the Tauro "Pola" from 1/400 to 1/350 but you can still see it is just a crude copy) - I will stay away from this crap.

Interesting subject matter.  The Imai list isn't complete if they are trying to indicate all of the ships that they produced however.  In 1985 I purchased the 1/100 scale model of the HMS Victory that was produced by Imai from Heller molds.  Very nicely done - no flash and I believe very good quality cordage.  I bought it from Model Expo on sale for $50.00.  I still haven't finished it yet tho.

 

Cheers,

Paul 

honneamise wrote:

Judging on the hull length, the NITTO kit should indeed be closer to 1/100 than 1/200 - the Kanrin Maru was not a very big ship.

I think there's a replica of the Kanrin Maru in Japan which is twice the size of the original ship (to allow it to carry more passengers) - maybe they took the measurements from this!

I agree with you overall about pirated kits (particularly when the original manufacturer is a small one, like JAG and White Ensign) - although as most of the Imai kits are so hard to find outside Japan (very scarce here in the UK, other than the 1/350 range) the Lee copy of the Spanish Galleon is the only one I could find.