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Staghound Armored Car

Bronco, 1/35 scale

by Steve Zaloga


Description

Bronco continues to offer some attractive choices with their new kits, this time turning their attention to the Staghound armored car. Although built in the US, it never saw service with the US Army and was destined exclusively for Britain. The kit depicts the later, and standard, production configuration.
 


I got a partial test-shot of Bronco's 1/35 scale Staghound courtesy of Dick Taylor, and then a full test shot so the unpainted model here shows the original grey test-shot plastic and the olive drab plastic used in the production kit.

The kit is first rate overall. It is closer to Dragon in approach than Tamiya, with tons of little bits. Overall accuracy is excellent and detail is extremely good. I would quibble a bit about the shape of the bottom of the turret but this is easy to modify by filing.

 

 

The kit instructions are complex, and I would not recommend following their approach. They suggest building the right and left side, front panels, etc with all the detail attached and then combining them to create the hull. This is a recipe for assembly problems. I built the hull as one assembly then added all the various subcomponents.

The fit was generally excellent. Some care has to be taken cleaning up parts as Bronco is using the current style of sprue contacts which avoid marring the part with sprue gates but which leave pips on the contact surface.

 



I built my Staghound up in the markings of the Canadian XII Manitoba Dragoons. This required some minor modifications like the stub of the wading trunks under the rear hull overhang and the Canadian pattern side stowage grates.

The stowage items on the model are a mix of resin items from various sources including Blast, Ultracast, and Accurate Armour.

The crew is a mixture of Royal Models and Alpine.

 

 

An article on this with historical photos of the XII Manitoba Dragoons will appear in Military Modelling.


Model, Images and Text by Steven J. Zaloga
Page Created 01 September, 2007
Page Last Updated 31 August, 2007