Ferrari F355 comparo

looney said:

UT still holds up great IMO. I wish there were still brands that offered such a balance of price v quality.

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I dare say most UT models hold up pretty well til this day. At present it would appears that Solido is filling in that void left by UT. Their stuff are great and definitely has the UT feel to them namely the Porsche 964 and BMW E36 series. It looks like they are quite popular among aussie sellers too but most retailed between $90 to $120 AUD. 😟

ferrariforever said:

Nice comparison!
The Kyosho has better details compared to the HWE, but the HWE wins in the exterior shape.
Kyosho nailed the shape of the 308, 575GTC, Testarossa. To this day I don't understand how could they fail so miserably for the 355 which was released much later?

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Agreed. Their F355 doesn't appear to be their best effort. I wonder why Kyosho never get around to make a road going version of the 575. The 575GTC is brilliant but a high end version of the 550/575 would be fantastic. The HWE one although it is pretty brilliant on its own but I feel Kyosho could make one that can easily rivals HWE.

HighVoltage said:

Funny story. I just received a UT F355 in the mail today (bought on eBay for $25)...it's a fantastic model, but the lack of calipers is somewhat annoying.

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Congrats on getting one. The model is simple but brilliantly made. Mattel made them too in the early days (before remaking them for HWE) and I always suspect it is a borrowed mold from UT. The Mattel one doesnt look as good as UT to be honest. The most sought after version as far as I know is the GTS one.

@Rapid66: I am not sure to be honest I guess maybe it is the cool factor of having removable roof? It be awesome of HWE tackled that subject as well just made another batch of 5,000 back in the day with the roof cut off haha. I actually almost forgot about the scene in James Bond where the F355 GTS was driven by the female villain. I guess it is time for me to watch Goldeneye again tonight haha.

Ah yes you are right Winston, I now remember about the subtle difference with the F1 paddle shift. UT models was active during the time where disc calipers started to become an essential feature on diecast models and they improved some of their newer releases by incorporating these into their models. Slightly off topic, Minichamps on the other hand don't seem to bother improving their re-released models and if anything they strip some of the more subtle features in their new models. They should have followed UT models footstep.

Initially I only bought the red HWE spyder version to replace the HW spyder. Then I came across a cheap yellow HWE F355 on offer and i remember it was Frank (ferrariforver) who told me to buy it asap which I did. Best suggestion from him

@X-Filer: Yea that is one thing I don't quite understand. Whoever made the first 1/18 mold of the F355 why did they decided to go with sealed bonnet?? Even the 1/24 Maisto I had from 25 years ago had working bonnet.

Thanks Sam! I too baulk at the idea of paying $100 for the humble Solido models. But all things considered it probably isnt too far fetch as the typical Maisto/Bburago/Motormax are also priced at around $80 nowadays. You might get them cheaper from local online stores as opposed to physical hobby shops but for the new Solidos, i still see them hovering around $80 the cheapest on eBay AU. I wonder if it is due to higher import cost from the Aussie distributors.. or the sellers think they can get away charging bit more due to "rarity" as Solido isn't as common as say Bburago and Maisto.

We probably can't use the Costco's $24 Maisto pricing as yardstick for pricing since Costco has special arrangement with Maisto to sell cheap Maisto and entice us to sign up for membership. I think the more realistic prices for typical Maisto here is either around 60 online or $80 at the shops. I do wonder if Costco Perth has already received 2021 Maisto pallet yet. Went there couple weeks ago and was told they are still on order.