News from Heller and Airfix

Here's a rough french-to-english translation of a article on Heller.

"HELLER NEWS January-December 2007

Following the formal receivership imposed in the summer of 2006, the Commercial Court of Argentan ordered the full sale of Heller to Parisian society MANOP. This assignment will be effective January 21, 2007.
MANOP "Manufacture of precious object" is a company that specializes in retailing of watches and jewellery, chaired by Mr. Benjamin Leneman who also owns two other companies Workshop Bouder a jewellery and goldsmith-Jean Monnier SA, a manufacturer of watches.
MANOP provide two million euros, of which half working capital (financing of current operations) and half to investment.
Attention even when this investment, important as that is, concerns two lines: models Heller and educational toys Joustra."

EdGrune wrote:

fuhrman wrote: I would bet that the 1/400 4-Stackers are the Mirage kits as two of their four original releases were the St Albans and Montgomery.  The reviews  have seen for these were positive and US prices were about $20.  You are correct.   The Airfix/Heller 4-stack destroyers are the Mirage kits.   They are very nice kits in and of themselves.   Gold Medal Models has just released a PE set to enhance them and replace plastic details which are beyond the limits of injection technology.

Fopr those interested, there's a nice review of the PE set on steelnavy: http://steelnavy.com/GMM400Ward.htm

The state of affairs at the Heller factory was always a bit chaotic, so my guess is that a few pallets of these kits have been found in the warehouse, and the administrators have been selling them off. A similar thing happened with Airfix a few years ago (pre-administration). That's why, for example, a number of their 1/32 cars and 1/144 airliners made a sudden reappearance a coouple of years ago.

As has been said, ever since the events of Summer 2006, Airfix and Heller have been separate legal entities. That said, there are still some ex-Heller moulds in the Airfix range, of which the 1/400 capital ships are the most obvious. I'm not sure if Heller are supplying replacement stock (they no longer import into the UK through Hornby/ Humbrol), but all four kits are listed as available at Hannants, and both my LHSs have stock. Plus, the Heller KGV is still available in France, though it costs more than twice the price in the UK of the Airfix boxing (though, again, Hannants have all four, for the same price as the Airfix boxings).

And I've inspected the sprues of the 4-stackers in my LHS. Mirage kits, for sure, and good value at only £6.99 each (though Hannants have the original Mirage boxings reduced to clear at £4.99):

http://www.hannants.co.uk/search/?FULL=MIR40609

Cheers,

Chris.

Two more reissued Heller sailing ships on the Squadron website (http://www.squadron.com/NewItems.asp) today:  the 1/150 Passat and Preussen. 

I do wonder what's going on here.  The possibility that Squadron found an abandoned warehouse full of old Heller boxes can't be ruled out, I guess, but apparently some other mail order houses are avertising "new" (in fact reissued) Heller kits as well.  That suggests that somebody, somewhere, is actually producing them. 

There's also a bit of positive news from Revell:  http://www.revell.com/news/index.html . 

The 1/96 Constitution is coming back.  (I've seen quite a few in stores lately, but it's been off the websites of both Revell U.S. and Revell Europe for a while.)  I have no intention of buying one, but in my opinion it's one of the real classic kits that always ought to be available - another one of my personal top ten.

Also the old PT-212, originally released (according to Dr. Graham's book) in 1954.  The website's description of that one is especially interesting:  "Armed with torpedoes, calibre guns."  I wonder if any of the people running the company realize - or care - that their PR staff is using pure gibberish to describe its products on the web.

At any rate, that brings the total of U.S. Revell ship kits to the inspiring total of twelve, all but one (the 1/72 Gato) being at least 32 years old.

The "News" section of the Revell U.S. website also includes several nice old Monogram aircraft kits - though the Monogram name seems to be gone for good.  It's been rumored that the new owners of Revell are "model people," though not "ship people."  That's certainly consistent with what we see here.

I know the Revell Golden Hind has appeared in Heller boxes at least twice - once under its own name (with a photo of the completed model on the box) and once, with some slight and silly modifications, as a "pirate ship" or "corsair" or something of that nature.  But the box art in the Squadron ad is new to me.  It certainly looks like the Revell version, but neither the stated scale (1/200, whereas the Revell kit is on 1/96 - and contains some beautifully sculpted figures to prove it) nor the stated length checks out.  My guess is that - not for the first time - those numbers are simply mistakes.

If it is indeed the old Revell kit, it has my strong recommendation.  We've discussed it at some length in other Forum threads; I've got one under construction on my workbench at the moment.  The biggest flaw in the kit, in my opinion, is that the bulwarks are too thin - an understandable goof that's almost endemic to the plastic molding process, and one that can be fixed.  This kit is on my list of ten or twelve favorites.

jtilley,

I have the Heller version of the Golden Hind and the Revell version. I just compared and contrasted them for you . . . they are precisely the same kit down to the numbers embossed for each part.

Bill Morrison

Airfix and Heller are completely separate entities.
Heller went bust a couple of years ago - last time I looked, they were going through the French equivalent of Chapter 11. The time period permitted for them to find new buyers/backers expired some time ago and I haven't heard anything since.There is a law similar to the US law under which a company can call on legal administration and get its debt frozen for 6 months (ending January 20th 2007 for Heller). During this time the company had to prove to the judges that it was a viable business and that it could pay its debtors (albeit in the future). The court had to validate business management and continuity each two months.
If no one came forward to inject new funds into Heller then at the end of January it will have gone from "legal administration" to "legal dissolution" where the judge will have sold bits and parts of anything he/she could find (tooling , goods, machinery, real estate, patents etc...) to cover the debts incurred by the company.
Let's hope for Heller they won't come to such extremities as it would mean death of the company (but someone could buy the name)
After Hornby took over Airfix, they had all of the old Airfix moulds shipped back to the UK from Heller's plant in Trun.

The Airfix 4 stackers are indeed repops of the Mirage kits.
The 1/400 KGV/POW & Hood, along with the Scharnhorst/Gneisenhau kits are ex-Heller and reboxed by Airfix.

At the beginning of 2007, Heller announced a 'New Release' list which never materialized.
The list included the likes of their long OOP 1/400 Jean Bart, Richelieu, and Strasburg 1/400 kits.

(Scroll down to the bottom for ships)

http://modelstories.free.fr/news/News07_HELR_P/index.html

I have heard nothing more about the fate of Heller since then.

I think that Soleil Royal listing must be left over from the last time Squadron got a Heller shipment.  It's not on the "New" page (or at least wasn't as of two minutes ago). 

To be honest, that kit is among the Heller ones that I was hoping would not come back (along with the Sirene, Gladiateur, and various other mythical Heller creations).  But it would be nice to see La Reale, the chebec, the Pamir, Passat, Preussen, Gorch Fock, and several others again. 

The Heller ship catalog always contained a disturbing percentage of junk; I freely admit that my dislike of that Soleil Royal kit borders on irrationally obsessive hatred.  But there were enough genuine scale models in the line to keep a serious modeler busy for quite a while.  Heller also reboxed a number of good kits from other companies.  If that Golden Hind is indeed the Revell 1/96 one in a new, mislabeled box, its reappearance is cause for rejoicing.  I'm fairly certain I once saw the grand old Revell Flying Cloud in a Heller box; I wouldn't mind seeing it again either.

Just to add to the confusion . . . I followed the Squadron link provided by jtilley and saw some of the box art on some of the Heller reissues.  Most of these kits seem to have new box art.  For example, the Soleil Royale is apparently leaving harbor under full sail. Previous releases have had her seen from the port stern quarter at anchor. Squadron lists this kit as "Not In Stock" with the proviso to keep checking for this kit.  Based on this, it would seem that these are indeed re-released kits by Heller not Airfix.  But, I agree with jtilley and searat12 . . . buy now just in case.

Bill Morrison

Yup, that sounds like a good idea....

It's perfectly obvious that all the Heller ship kits on that Squadron list are reissues.  The two four-stackers are not on the Squadron list under the Heller name (though Squadron does sell several of the Mirage four-stackers); they're on the Airfix website.  I see no reason to think there's any connection between those kits and Heller.

I'm not clear on just what, if any, relationship exists at this point between Airfix and Heller.  My understanding is that the two came to a rather unpleasant parting of the ways just before they both went bankrupt.  The brief history of Airfix on the company website (http://www.airfix.com/about-airfix/) says that, in 2006, Hornby purchased the Airfix and Humbrol names; it doesn't mention Heller.  The list of kits on the Airfix website does contain a few ex-Heller ones (e.g., 1/400 Bismarck/Tirpitz and Scharnhorst/Gneisenau), but not many.  (Several Heller kits were being sold in Airfix boxes, and vice-versa, years before the two split up - if that in fact is what they did.  I suppose it's possible that Airfix retained some of the Heller molds.)  It was said for a while that the Heller 1/100 Victory was going to be released in an Airfix box.  I'm not clear on whether that ever actually happened or not; there's no 1/100 Victory on the Airfix website at the moment.

Just to confuse things further, today's list of "new" items from Squadron lists two more obviously-ex-Heller warships under the Airfix name:  the Hood and King George V.  Those two are not on the Airfix website - or weren't as of a few minutes ago.

The "new" Heller kits that Squadron posted on its site yesterday include two versions of an Airbus 380 in 1/125 scale.  I haven't kept track of Heller's aircraft line, but that's a relatively new airplane.  (My wife flew to Japan in one a couple of weeks ago.)  Maybe the kit was released before Heller's most recent bankruptcy, but if so it must have been just about the last new kit the company produced before it went under.

Squadron is selling the Heller kits under the Heller label - not Airfix (or "Airfix/Heller").  I don't know where Squadron is getting these kits.  I've done several google searches looking for a Heller website; so far no luck.  It certainly appears that Airfix, though it's selling a few old Heller kits under its own label, is not using the Heller name. 

The bottom line, as usual, is that if you want any of those kits it wouldn't be a bad idea to grab them while the grabbing's good.

I have both kits as well, but I also have the HMS VICTORY (albeit with French instructions). But, I will ask around for you.

Bill Morrison 

I have seen both on ebay too from time to time but my timing always seems to find them available for a set price (somewhat higher) from one of the shops that posts them as a 'buy now' item...

The whole ebay thing gets to be a run around sometimes for me.  I've found it easier to just cast around for trades or to journey to a model show when the opportunity presents itself. 

Have you built yours yet?  The discussion of these two kits on the forum seems to be generally positive.

That's probably why jtilley put "new" in quotes in the body of his post.  As for the age of the two kits with true Heller roots-Le Superbe and Le Glorieux, I tend to think this is new production as they show up on some other sites.  Internet Hobbies has them both for $58.36 right now...

fuhrman wrote:

What great news.  Now, if I could get someone to swap me the Le Superbe and Le Glorieux for my extra Heller 1/100 Victory... I would bet that the 1/400 4-Stackers are the Mirage kits as two of their four original releases were the St Albans and Montgomery.  The reviews  have seen for these were positive and US prices were about $20.

I have both of these that I picked up on Ebay.  They come up fairly regularly, so you should have no trouble obtaining them for a reasonable price (I think I paid $35 for 'Superbe' and $40 for 'Glorieux')

Well, I'm not sure that I see anything 'new' here, they look like the same old Heller kits that have been around for about 30 years (with the possible exception of the four-stackers).  As Heller and Airfix are the same company, and a number of these kits have been released under the Airfix label of late, it would seem to me that a more likely scenario is that Squadron simply located a stockpile of old unsold Heller kits somewhere and bought them at a discount price (perhaps discovered in an ex-Heller warehouse?)......

fuhrman wrote:

I would bet that the 1/400 4-Stackers are the Mirage kits as two of their four original releases were the St Albans and Montgomery.  The reviews  have seen for these were positive and US prices were about $20.

You are correct.   The Airfix/Heller 4-stack destroyers are the Mirage kits.   They are very nice kits in and of themselves.   Gold Medal Models has just released a PE set to enhance them and replace plastic details which are beyond the limits of injection technology.

What great news.  Now, if I could get someone to swap me the Le Superbe and Le Glorieux for my extra Heller 1/100 Victory...

I would bet that the 1/400 4-Stackers are the Mirage kits as two of their four original releases were the St Albans and Montgomery.  The reviews  have seen for these were positive and US prices were about $20. 

Sorry about that; I was typing late at night and got two little projects on the computer mixed up with each other.  I've edited the earlier post; the link should be right now.

Professor - your first link goes to a US Coast Guard site.  Semper Paratus.