Kit Review – Cyber Hobby Kubelwagen Workshop With DAK Troops

Cyber Hobby 6338 - Kubelwagen Workshop With DAK Troops

The Kubelwagen was to the Germans what the Jeep was to the Americans. The do-it-all light gadabout. As such like the jeep it appears in a myriad of guises from ambulance to communications centre. Usually when someone makes a kit of the Jeep or the Kubelwagen though it’s just the base vehicle and it’s up to the individual modeller to tailor it to their needs. Which is why I like kits like this, because a lot of the hard work has already been done for me.

This kit comes from Dragon Model’s boutique brandname Cyber-Hobby. It comes in a smallish tray and lid type box on four large, one medium, and four small light grey sprues. Also included is one small clear sprue, three brass photo-etched frets, six fretless brass pieces, and a small sheet of decals. The instructions are a single long sheet of paper folded in four to create eight pages and are of the black and white line diagram step-by-step style with shaded limited colour illustrations for the figures and their accessories.

The original kit from which this evolved is the Bego Kubelwagen kit which DML bought the moulds for some time back. This was already a very good kit and DML have certainly given it a very good facelift. This is the fifth incarnation and there are now several Cyber Hobby kits based on this including this one, an ambulance version, cold weather starter version, and a Radio Car version.

The mould quality is very good with just the very faintest of mould seams and some very good detail, including a number of very delicate parts which have been cleanly moulded. The level of detail is also very impressive, much better than the same vintage Italeri Kubelwagen and although I do think Tamiya did a very good job on theirs this one just nudges ahead for me. With it being based on an old kit I wasn’t expecting the quality to be as good as it is so that was a very pleasant surprise.

The wheels are one piece with internal inserts and include the brake details on the insides of the hubs. The tread pattern is very nice and the bolt detail etc is excellent, only missing the small air valve nub. These are the “european” style tyres seen on vehicles mainly in europe and the east but also in the early days in North Africa until the softer sand tyres were introduced. It would however have been nice to have had the “balloon” tyres included.

The underside includes a moulded in engine lower half along the lines of the Tamiya one  as well as very good axles and exhausts though the exhausts need their ends hollowed out. There is a one piece engine that can be included as the rear engine cover is a seperate piece, though the engine bay interior isn’t properly detailed. The bottom of the floorpan also includes full detail which is a nice touch.

The body is also  very well done and gives a good representation of the thin stamped steel of the real thing. The doors are seperate from the body side panels but each pair of doors is joined to each other but it’s a simple exercise to split them in two. One of the lesser detailed areas on this is the door handles which are just moulded on and lack proper definition so photo-etch replacements are included, though only for the outer handles.

The windscreen and side windows are included on the clear parts sprue and are nicely done. They are a little over scale thicknesswise but the frames tend to disguise this so they do work. The winscreen wipers are moulded so replacements are provided in PE to redo them and give them more depth. The wipers also have parts for the wiper motor housings on the inside of the screen.

The fenders have some excellent small detail around the light mounts, though all four have two injector pin holes on their underside that will require a little Mr.Surfacer. The bonnet can be shown open though there is no interior detail. Two of the four jerry cans inluded with this kit have optional PE frames to mount them to the rear quarters. Otherwise they can be placed atop the workshop cabinets as the instructions show.

The interior includes seperate floorboards and a very nicely done dashboard as well as the under dash fuel tank and nice delicate pedals. The rest of the interior needs a little bit of modification to take the changes for the workshop, though the instructions show how to do all this. Basically you need to remove the rear seat and and cut the cross bar in half and add new bits fpr the orkshop cabinets. The seats lack any texturing so once again a call will need to be put out for Mr.Surfacer to add a little cloth texture.

The hood comes as two options, up or down ( you’re not supposed to use the up version but I don’t see why you can’t if you want to ). The folded version has very nicely done framework and in this kit comes with a second better looking folded canvas to replace the original kit one. The hood up version is likewise okay but could do with some thinning along the sides and lacks any internal framework detail ( but then it also isn’t suposed to be used ).

The workshop cabinets are made entirely from photo etch and include seperate drawers. One cabinet sits under the rear deck which is also supplied in photo etch and can be positioned up or down, the other goes across the right rear so the drawers can be accessed when the right rear door is open. These are beautifully done and the finished result is well worth the effort. The only real downside to these is that after giving us such nice cabinets with such nice drawers they don’t give us any tools to go in them. I was hoping for a small fret of at least screwdrivers, wrenches, hammers and the like but not a sausage I’m affriad.

The figures in this kit come as three seperate sets totalling eight figures, although you’re not supposed to use three of them. That just seems daft to me because who wouldn’t use them when they have them ? Basically you get the original two Bego figures, two figures from the earlier Kubelwagen with DAK Officers version, and four new figures of DAK mechanics with only these four and the driver indicated as being used. Either way you look at it you aren’t going to get all five in a Kubel that has the rear seat missing.

There original two figures are Bego ones The driver is in the middle when it comes to figure quality, meaning not up to the current standard but certinly not bin material either. He wears a soft cap with goggles, M40 blouse and ankle boots with gaiters so will work in a lot of scenarios. The second figure is of similar quality and he has the high marching boots, overseas cap and a P08 holster.

The DAK officer figures are the figure of Rommel and one of his officers from the earlier ( by one ) version of this kit. These are well moulded with good, sharp detail and good looking faces and hands. They include two pairs of binoculars and Rommels cap complete with googles with the other officer having the choice between a feldmütze ( field cap akin to the overseas cap ) and a Einheitsfeldmütze ( soft, billed field cap ).

The four mechanic figures are the Dragon Deutsche Afrika Korps figure set ( kit number 6063 ) and in fact the artwork on this kit is just the artwork from that box with a workshop kubel added to the right. These four are also very well moulded and very well detailed. They are dressed in a mix of DAK uniforms including shorts and one in a long sleeved V-neck skivvy. Two get the Einheitsfeldmütze and the other two a Troppenhelm ( tropical helmet ) with two pairs of goggles also included.

The accessories included in this set include a number of great little bonus items. On the 6063 figure sprue is included a small lizard and a small dog, both great little additions that are very well done. There are also three jerry cans with PE inserts, two of which can be used as mentioned above, the third being intended or use with one of the figures. There is also a fourth jerry can with the original kit that does not get a PE insert and is not supposed to be used. In addition there is a great little cooking stove, one large and two small water flasks, a mess tin with the lid seperate and its handle unfolded, a canteen with the cup seperate, a spoon, and a tin can with a seperate lid. These are all great little items.

The decals don’t provide any unit markings other than the generic AfrkaKorp palm tree symbol. Other markings are Wehrmacht or Luftwaffe number plates that you can make your own number for and tyre pressure markings. I’m a little surprised at there not being any organisational symbols but if you have a healthy spares box that shouldn’t be a problem.

Conclusion. These kits are possibly currently the best kubelwagen kit around. Certainly they ask a premium over what you would expect to pay for the Tamiya version, but I still think these ( and by that I mean any of the variants of this kubel that DML/CH do ) are well worth the price. There are a few areas that could use improvement, but these just require a degree of good old modelling skill, so the only real negative to my mind is once again the lack of PE for the internal door handles, the lack of desert tyres as an option, and the absence of any tools in a workshop. But those aside the quality is excellent, it builds up easily and the finished result is very nice, and the inclusion of a total of eight figures ( nine if you count the dog ) makes this kit a real winner.

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