For some reason allied artillery and anti-aircraft guns just aren’t anywhere near as well served in 1/35 scale plastic kit form as those used by the Germans. So when Italeri released this kit a few years ago it was well enough received that Bronco has now bought out a version of their own. Perhaps manufacturers will get the hint and bring us a bit more representing the weapons of the winning side.
This kit comes in a large tray and lid style box that is about 50% bigger than it needs to be which resluts in the contents appearing sparser than they already are. It only takes three dark green sprues to build up this kit ( two sprues are the same so I have only included one photo in the sprue shots ) so it’s a little lighter on detail than I would have liked. What you do get is accurate for a US M1 40mm Bofors with an M2 platform and the parts are cleanly moulded with only some minor cleanup needed. Assembly is straight forward and the instructions are easy to follow.
The gun and its mount are made up of only twelve parts including a separate flash hider which is hollowed out which is a nice touch. You also get a spare barrel and flash hider in a case which is also a nice touch. There are three ammo clips included, each holding four rounds, however there is no cover for the ammo feed which should be there for the gun in travel mode.
The platform can be displayed in the firing position with the trails out and the wheels up, or in travel mode with the trails in and wheels down. There is also a travel lock that can be position up or down. The platform has no underside detail, in fact it is open and hollow so if you want to go with the travel position that would need to be addressed.
You get four figures with this, they are duplicates with two each of two positions. They are also 45mm tall, scaling out at 157cm or 5’2″, and very poorly moulded. So you get badly detailed midgets that are best thrown away. They do come with four canteens, four helmets and four M1 Garand rifles which are all quite useable.
This kit deserves to be better, because this gun was so widely used. It does give you a reasonably good representaion when made up straight from the box, especially if you ditch the crew but for the modeller who wants the best in detail it so badly needs more done to it to really make it into a great model. If it were a cheaper kit I’d recommend it for doing a DIY M19 ( dual 40mm Bofors on a M24 Chafee chassis ) or one of the M15 halftracks converted to the 40mm Bofors in Australia by the Marines to use in the Pacific and if you want to do one of those then this is the kit to use. On it’s own it will come up nicely with the right care and attention.
Click on thumnails to enlarge image.
