Fujimi NSX-R
If you love the NSX and are willing to rebody the Tamiya Chassis and engine, this kit will be worth your while.
Fit and Finish 5/10
I know Fujimi quality is pretty suspect in everyone’s opinion, but upon the first inspection of this model and subsequently assembling it, I was very disappointed. The only tree that was well molded was the interior parts, the rest of the kit seemed like it was spat out of a 30 year old machine. The body was full of flash and mold lines, especially around the headlights. This is particularly frustrating as they are the only real reason to get this kit instead of the Tamiya offering. Not only is the molding on the headlights so poor it leaves flash around the buckets, but there are weird triangles of plastic that must be removed in front of the lights. The worst aspect in my opinion are the front and rear bumper parts. They are warped, flashed, and so poorly molded they don’t fit on the body without leaving gaps. They are not properly shaped or sized, and require work to blend smoothly into the lines on the car. The same applies to the separately molded hood. Only the interior is well molded, it is fairly convincing despite the single piece molded bucket; the seats and the dash both look good. The engine is a very poor effort. The top of the engine is molded into the interior tub, and Fujimi tries to hide their poor engine detail with mesh to cover the motor. The brakes and wheel hubs are a joke. They are the worst I've seen from Fujimi, and I've never respected their wheel attachment or carriers.
Accuracy 6/10
While none of the kit is molded well, none of the details seem to be wrong. The overall shape of the car seems right, and the wheels are good depictions of the real thing. The tires should be Bridgestones, but they Dunlop. The hood and the headlights are close to correct, and will make a reasonable representation of the real thing, and can be modified to look correct. The spoiler, which is unique to the R version of the NSX is a bit chunky and seems narrow. It’s close though. The seats are good, but not correct. Close, again. The mirrors are oversized, as are most of the suspension components. The suspension, as well as the engine, suffer from Fujimi’s poor engineering. Everything is oversized, crudely shapped, and poorly sized. Jay was trying to tell me the engine was more like an older version, not the 2002+, but in my opinion, there is so little detail in the engine compartment it isn’t any worse a representation of one engine than another. If you are willing to work for it, this kit can be correct, but straight from the box, it will be just an NSX model.
Value 4/10
Do you love the NSX? If your answer is not a resounding “Yes!” you may want to pass this one up. Unfortunately, it is the only kit still in production of the NSX, which might corner you if you aren’t willing to pay inflated prices for the Tamiya offering (which can be gotten for $20 or less on Ebay if you are diligent). The quality of the kit does not at all reflect the price of the model, and to make a good model it will have to be kitbashed with an old Tamiya kit, effectively doubling the cost (though not substantially changing the amount of work required) involved. With no engine detail to speak of, with only one set of seats (instead of Fujimi’s usual inclusion of a second sprue with extra Type R seats, they only have one), with rally no spare parts, this kit isn’t very useful outside of building it up stock and making a mediocre model. This kit scores very low on bang for the buck, and really only has intrinsic value as the only kit of the modern NSX. But you will have to modify it plenty to make it accurate.
Overall 5/10
If you want the new NSX, get it. If you want a challenge, get it. If you want a great NSX kit, or a well engineered and relatively simple kit to build, hunt the Tamiya version on Ebay.