Trumpeter 1/35 Russian BRDM-2 (EARLY)
By Morgan Girling
History
The BRDM-2 (Boyevaya Razvedyvatelnaya Dozornaya Mashinai or Armored Reconnaissance Vehicle) is an armored patrol car . If the BRDM-1 looks like an armored sports car, this is the armored SUV. The truck-like BRDM-2 uses the same conical turret as found on the 8-wheeled BTR-60PB, sporting a 14.5mm KPVT heavy machine gun with a coaxial 7.62mm PKT secondary machine gun. Unlike most Soviet turrets, there is no hatch. For that matter, the only crew hatches are in front, above the front seats - a feature unpopular with crews who quickly ascertained that, should the vehicle be disabled in an assault, they'd have to exit into enemy fire.
Another intriguing feature of the BRDM-2 are the pairs of small chain-driven, semi-retractable wheels situated on either side between the main wheels. When lowered, they prevent the vehicle from becoming high-centered when crossing trenches and other barriers.
What's in the Box
Trumpeter ships this kit in a sturdy corrugated cardboard box of standard configuration (i.e., one can use it as a tray during construction). Good artwork adorns the cover., with the vehicle in the foreground accurately portrayed, while the background vehicles and troops are rather more approximate. The brief history of the BRDM-2 (which strongly resembles the Wikipedia entry for same) on the side of the box is pretty much all the text you'll get with this model. There are a few places in the instructions which call out where to drill new holes or "repair" (fill) existing holes.
Inside is the 16-page, saddle-bound instruction booklet, a color sheet of "coming attractions" from their catalog, and a color painting guide, giving a 5-view of the vehicle. The decal sheet has a range of digits, pairs of markings for Soviet armor, airborne and (I think) navy/marine units. The painting guide seems like an elegant solution to the wrong problem, however. While it calls out the colors in Mr. Hobby, Vallejo, Model Master, Tamiya and Humbrol numbers, it shows only a single paint scheme of green overall, sporting only the armor unit markings. There is no indication or explanation of the airborne and navy/marine markings or where the digits would be used (if at all). Also, while it's hard to go wrong with Soviet armor green, the BRDM-2 was used in a variety of areas, some of which used more interesting camouflage – the sort of thing that model manufacturers usually go to great lengths to show. Alternate schemes and decal placement is, in the words of my math teacher, left as an exercise to the reader.
The box is divided athwart ships into a small compartment containing the hull upper and lower parts, vinyl tires (main and trench-scaling), and a small PE fret, all in separate bags. The main compartment contains 6 sprues of parts in grey plastic and 1 in clear. All the grey parts are flash-free and with a matte finish. I suspect Trumpeter uses electrical discharge machining (EDM) to cut their molds, because all of the edges of raised or sunken features are slightly soft. The transparent parts are wrapped in foam and their own bag to prevent them becoming scratched – a very nice touch.
The kit is delightfully complete, with a fully-detailed underside, complete with separately molded propeller tunnel, propeller and cover. The wheel wells are separately cast, as are the leaf springs, 10-part differential and prop shafts. Each of the funky trench-crossing wheels has a 2-part hub with a separate chain drive. These go into subassemblies (another 5 parts each) with the option of building them extended or retracted. The detail here begs for them to be modeled extended, though they normally spend most of their lives retracted. I can only guess at fit, but they look no more challenging to construct than Tasca Sherman bogies.
The tires for the trench crossing and main wheels are molded in a black vinyl-like plastic with excellent tread pattern. Here I must plead ignorance of the way of armor when it comes to rubber tires, but I don't think they will lend themselves to heat-flattening like styrene tires would. This is going to result in a vehicle that looks weightless, unless you add mud, grass or other view blocks to obscure where the rubber meets the road.
The hull appears more complex to assemble than most tanks because one assembles the lower hull, main wheel wells, then adds the side armor and ends to form the hull box. One adds the hull top after filling the interior with details. And fill it one does! There's a central cover over the gearbox and drive shafts. The steering wheel and shift leavers are all molded separately. The rest of the interior is filled with bulkheads, seats, ammunition paniers,instruments and a huger radio stack. Each of these items is composed of several parts each. Much like the trench-crossing wheels, you'll want to model it with all of the hatches and window shields open so that you can show off the interior. (I'm reminded of the 1:48 Bandai armor from the '70s – the interior looks like it will make up into quite the jewel.)
The instructions have you add a fair number of the hatches, mufflers tools and other greeblies to the hull top before gluing it to the hull bottom. This is one area where you may wish to diverge from the instructions and first glue the hull together before adding the fiddly bits. Much like the interior, the exterior is well represented in small parts count with most everything that would be bolted or welded to the hull (e.g., grab irons and brush guards over the headlamps) provided as separate components. Curiously, while the engine hatches can be glued open or closed, there is no engine provided. The retractable bow shield is molded separately, along with the 4 arms used to raise it. This looks like it will be one of those frustrating assemblies to get right, because it will be pretty floppy until the glue sets.
The last steps in construction are for the turret. 37 parts give you the breech, turret cone, barrels, periscope, traverse and elevation cranks, and gunner's seat. Chock-full-o-details, most of which only you will know are there. (Sigh, the curse of armor models...)
Conclusion
This looks like a kit that will be fun, though one which begs for the modeler to keep checking alignment as they proceed. It also looks like it will make up into a very attractive model (or as the box top claims "detailed scale kit for adult collectors to assemble." My thanks to Stevens International for the review sample.