EMvTW 23 - USS Honshu NCC-60205 (Nebula class)

NOTE:  You can click on most pictures to get a larger view of them.

Rewrites: March 2016 & June 2018

Welcome to the 23rd installment of my Eaglemoss vs. The World series.  For those of you who are new to my series, I use these articles to provide a comparison of Eaglemoss models to other small scale manufactured models.

This article is going to focus on the Nebula class of starship.  We are introduced to the USS Honshu (NCC-60205) in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode called "Waltz".

My current collection consists of an Eaglemoss, a Furuta and two MicroMachines models.


Per Memory Alpha and Beta, "The Nebula-class was a type of Federation starship that was in service in Starfleet during the second half of the 24th century.  The mission profile of the Nebula-class varied from performing various scientific and exploratory roles to conducting patrol and transport duties."  They go on to say this about the USS Honshu (NCC-60205), "In 2374, the Honshu was responsible for transporting former Cardassian leader Dukat to stand trial for war crimes at Starbase 621. Captain Benjamin Sisko was also aboard and was scheduled to testify at the trial.  At approximately 1030 hours on the second day of the three day voyage, the ship was intercepted and destroyed by a wing of Cardassian destroyers."

It wasn't until I re-wrote this article in June 2018, that I realized that the MicroMachine and Furuta models were actually of a different starship, the USS Farragut (NCC-60597), which Memory Alpha and Beta have this to say, "In 2371, the Farragut helped recover the crew of USS Enterprise-D from Veridian III following the warp core breach that destroyed the ship's engineering section, and forced the crash-landing of its saucer section."

If you would like to read more official stuff on this type of ship, feel free to check out the following links:

Nebula Class Information: Memory Alpha LINK and Memory Beta LINK
USS Honshu (NCC-60205) Information: Memory Alpha LINK and Memory Beta LINK
USS Farragut (NCC-60597) Information: Memory Alpha LINK and Memory Beta LINK

My original MicroMachine came with a missing warp nacelle.  I eventually purchased another one to complete my collection and ripped off the extra nacelle to use in my model building greebles bin..

 

Broken Model

 

Good Model

Since my article isn't about MicroMachines, that is all the attention we will give this model at this time.

Eaglemoss vs. Furuta vs. Hallmark

When I first started collecting small scale starships, I always wished for a resource that would show me how different manufacturers' ships compared to others of the same classification.  Now that I've amassed a bunch of models, I figured I would share my comparisons and my thoughts on those different models.

So now I present to you what I like to call "the gravy shot", a series of pictures I wished I had seen long ago, and the main reason I started this blog.

Eaglemoss vs. Furuta

Eaglemoss vs. Furuta

As you can see, the Eaglemoss ship is HUGE when compared to the Furuta model.  

One complaint that I have in regards to all of the Nebula Class models is that there is a serious lacking of impulse engines.  Although, when I look at pictures online of this type of ship, it appears that it was a design flaw from the show's creators so I won't hold this against anyone in the following reviews.

Eaglemoss

 

 

 

 

If you are fortunate enough to own the Eaglemoss Enterprise D, then you were undoubtedly awaiting the arrival of this ship with baited breath.  After receiving the last three very well executed models, how could Eaglemoss go wrong here.

Before I go into my nit-picking, here is a comparison view of the Eaglemoss Galaxy Class vs. the Nebula Class for size comparisons.

If you haven't read my huge write-up on the Enterprise D, feel free to check out that review at THIS LINK.

As you can see from these comparative pictures, it looks like they reused the mold for the saucer section of the Enterprise D for the Nebula.  Which wasn't a bad thing as the sculpted and molded details were, and I quote from my Galaxy Class Review, "Eaglemoss did a very nice job with thier sculpting and molded in details.".  This excellence of these molded details carry over well to the secondary section as well.  And I'll stop with the praises of the molded details there.  You will see why in a minute.

Honshu vs. Enterprise D

The paint job is pretty decent, but not as intense as the Galaxy Class.  Eaglemoss chose to paint this ship a duck egg blue color, but they did add a subtle aztecing to it.  My one legitimate complaint is in regards to the painted windows.  It seems that for some of the windows, the paint doesn't quite line up with the molded recesses.

Honshu vs. Enterprise D

I particularly liked the work on the sensor/weapons pod.  It is very very detailed both from a sculpting and molding point as view as well as from a painting point of view.

Let us now talk about the joins and seams.  The primary hull and secondary hull are joined nicely together.  Nice work there Eaglemoss.  Let's now look at the side and back of the model.

Oh man, where do I begin?  Well, first, let's address the neck of the sensor pod.  Because of the seam placement, I guess Eaglemoss decided that they could not do any detail work here, which of course leaves out all sorts of important parts of the ship, like the shuttle bay?

Photo Credit: Memory Alpha

Whoever mounted the nacelles did a lousy job of this on my model.  Not only does it make the join where the strut meets the nacelle stand out like a sore thumb, but it also makes my nacelles bow inwards.

And there is also a very noticeable seam on the rear bottom portion of the engineering hull.

If you are a regular to my Eaglemoss vs. The world series, you will know that anytime I review a Starfleet ship, I like to hyper-focus on the deflector dish as it usually gives me a good idea of the level of attention to details that a manufacturer puts into thier models.  Let's face it, this is a very important part of the ship and should be accurately represented.

I like that Eaglemoss opted to mold in details of the deflector dish.  And although the color scheme for painting the dish is good, the paint placement is not.  Like the windows on the saucer section, the paint here is a bit misaligned and looks sloppy.

Let's end my Eaglemoss review with me focusing on another nice part of the model.  I like that they followed in the footsteps of the Galaxy Class "model" in regards to the usage of the clear red and blue plastics on thier nacelles.  These clear blue plastics do add some different aspects that you just can't replicate with paint.

So there you have it.  Eaglemoss has produced a pretty good model with some slight painting issues, visible joins and seams, and bent nacelles.

Furuta

As I stated earlier, I didn't realize until the June 2018 re-write of this article that the Furuta model was actually of the USS Farragut (NCC-60597).  Since they look exactly alike, we'll continue with the comparison and review. 

 

 

 

 

I always like to point the following out for my first time readers.  Furuta is a Japanese company that produced a series of gashapon toys.  Gashapon toys are meant to be nothing more than cheap little $1 to $5 bubble gum machine prizes.  I like to remind my readers of this fact so that they can take any critical reviews I may make in the spirit it is given.  I am in no way expecting these toys to be on the level of a Hallmark, Eaglemoss or Hot wheels toy.  I found a neat video about these types of toys and you can check that out at THIS LINK.

Until Eaglemoss made thier version of this ship, Furuta was the only manufacturer to have produced the Nebula Class in the pre-built and pre-painted format.  That being said, they had done a fairly decent job on the ship, and this model made for a pretty good cheap fix if you wanted a Nebula class ship in your fleet,

The molded details are good although the windows are not really to scale.  

It wasn't until the second re-write that I actually noticed another molding issue with the Furuta model.  While looking at the bottom of the engineering section, I noticed that the phaser strip located just in front of the stand slot, was made into an inverse (inny) strip.

The paint is also OK although they did not put the ship's name on top of the saucer.

From the bottom, you can see that the paint isn't applied very well in spots, leaving a blotchy appearance.  

The work that Furuta did on the sensor pod is rather well done and what saved the model for me into not becoming a joke as a collector.

The nacelles seem a bot out of proportion with the rest of the model, giving the ship a bit of a clown shoe look.  The seam work really throws a wrench into the whole looks of them as well.

Another saving grace for the Furuta model is that they actually molded some details into the sensor pod support neck, including the shuttle bay!

When you take a look at the deflector dish, this is where some blatant mistakes are really spotted.  First, Furuta's dish is not a concave dish.  They chose to have a box raised up in the middle.  My second issue with thier dish is that they painted the box red and this is incorrect.  The entire assembly is just downright ugly.

When Furuta's model was the only one in the business, it wasn't that bad of a cheap addition to your collection.  However, with the addition of the Eaglemoss model, all of her cheap toy flaws leave her seriously lacking.

Conclusion

And that wraps it up for the comparison and review part of my article.  Which brings us to the pricing portion of my article.  As usual, I will continue with the tradition of rounding up the most inexpensive Buy-It-Now prices from eBay at the time of this article's (re)writing (June 2018).

Eaglemoss = $31

Furuta = $12

Micro Machine = $16

NOTE: Prices were researched last on June 1st, 2018.  As of the writing of this article, you can not order the Eaglemoss model right from the company themselves as they are currently out of stock.

We now come to the part of my article where I give you my opinion of which ship gives you the "best bang for the buck", which is my rough way of telling you which one is the best buy.  This one comes off as a no brainer, as Ealglemoss is the clear winner.  Even though you are paying twice as much as the Furuta model, she really is a nicer rendition, even with all of her flaws.  

BONUS ROUND!!!

Every once in a while, I'll have a little extra stuff to share with you that sort of fits in with my comparison articles.

Eaglemoss eventually produced another Nebula Class starship model, this time, the USS Phoenix (NCC-65420).  You can check out my review of that model and comparisons to Eaglemoss' USS Honshu at THIS LINK.

As always, I hope you found this article useful and informative.  If you have any questions, comments or suggestions, please feel free to comment below.

So for now, "Live long and prosper!!!"



Additional Links To Photos Of My Collection:

Eaglemoss     Furuta   
MicroMachine (Good Model   Broken Model)
Comparative Shots

Other Reviewers Take On The Eaglemoss Model:
Some Kind Of Star Trek
Star Trek Starship Collection