This article appeared in the January 1997 issue of Boresight

These days, British armored vehicles of World War II are probably the most neglected subjects for new plastic kits. When I first started armor modeling back in the 1960's there was quite a bit of interest in British AFVS, especially the desert campaign. With the Japanese obsession for German stuff dominating the armor hobby market, British armor has fallen into neglect. This is a shame, as British subjects are among the most interesting because of their wide range of designs, their intricate regimental marking system and their colorful camouflage schemes.

With few new kits to build, there are always the old standbys. The Tamiya Universal Carrier is over a decade old, and unfortunately, it shows. The basic problem is that the Universal Carrier is an extremely intricate and delicate vehicle, and the older Tamiya style was a bit heavy handed compared to contemporary kits. The kit is quite attractive, even if built straight out of the box. However, the detail is clunky and much of it is missing or unevenly represented.

What piqued my interest in updating the Universal Carrier was the appearance of a number of after-market items including Resicast's Universal Carrier update set (kit 35.128), the Eduard's photo-etched brass set, and the Model Kasten individual link track.

References are essential to this project. The Universal Carrier, although one of the most important armored vehicles of WWII, is poorly covered in available books. Luckily, I had photographed the Universal Carrier up in Ottawa at the Canadian army museum for a project many years ago to improve the old Airfix 1/76 Universal Carrier. In addition, I photographed the Universal Carrier over at the Bovington Tank Museum this past year. Some of these photos are included here. I also have collected a number of other useful references, especially those dealing with internal stowage which are detailed below.

I decided to build my Universal Carrier as a Bren carrier, that is one fitted to carry a Bren gun section (a section in American terminology is a squad). The Tamiya kit is configured as a towing vehicle for the 6 pdr. anti-tank gun. This is mostly a matter of internal stowage and the rear towing hitch. Having decided the basic stowage configuration, I next had to decide how extensively to rebuild the kit. At first, I   thought I could get away with using the kit's upper superstructure walls, plus the forward superstructure and front bulkhead provided by Resicast. The Universal Carrier had relatively thin walls, and they were topped by a piece of round pipe to prevent crew injury during egress. After having assembled the basic components, I attended a regional IPMS show in Stratford, CT in the summer of 1996 where a modeler had built up a Universal Carrier out of the box. While the finished kit was very attractive, it convinced me that the kit side panels and upper structure had to be replaced.

So I cut off all the superstructure, and fabricated this out ofl5 thou sheet plastic. These are very simple shapes, so it only took an evening's work. I was  disappointed with the front superstructure assembly provided in the Resicast upgrade kit, so I didn't use it. However, I did use their new upper bow panel, the bulkhead, and the rear panels over the rear transmission.

Overall, I would recommend the Resicast kit to anyone contemplating a Universal Carrier upgrade. I bought mine from Red Lancers at the 1996 AMPS show. It's best features are the internal stowage improvements, the resin track, and some of the replacement panels. I did not find the photo-etched sheet provided in the kit to be very useful, especially when compared to the superb Eduard's sheet.

With the basic structure complete, I turned to the suspension. I debated whether to replace the suspension bogie springs, but finally decided against it. I have found it difficult to make replacement springs that look even enough, and I would rather keep an item than replace it with something worse. The track with the Tamiya kit is in need of replacement. The track pitch much to long, and the vinyl track poorly represents this very thin and delicate design. I purchased a set of Model Kasten tracks, and spent one whole evening just cutting them off the sprues. I was very disappointed with the Model Kasten Track. They are superbly molded, but nearly impossible to assemble. As readers of BoreSight will by now know, I like individual link plastic track. But not this set! They simply don't link together very well, and even after building an assembly jig, I couldn't get them to assemble properly. I would not recommend this set. I finally decided to use the resin track provided by Resicast, with the Model Kasten only used on idler and other rounded points. Resicast also provides an excellent new drive sprocket with a proper hub.

With the suspension complete, I next turned to detailing the interior of the vehicle. Detailing the interior is the main effort on this kit. The Universal Carrier is a dream for anyone who likes small detail work, which I enjoy. The Eduard photo etch set is superb, and I most strongly recommend it. The best parts are the new grill work for the engine. I also found the many small fittings very useful. I have found that cyranoacrylate glues are not reliable when working with photo etched detail parts that are likely to be budged while painting. They tend to pop off at the least opportune moment! I prefer 5-minute epoxy. The problem with 5-minute epoxy is that you have to mix up batches of it, and it starts to harden rather quickly. I get around this problem  by preparing several photo-etched pieces by cutting them off, cleaning them up, and test fitting them. Then I mix up a small batch of epoxy, and attach all the pieces. I then go on to another half-dozen bits. I have also found that it helps to gently sand the back of the photo-etched sheet before cutting off all the parts with some automotive sand-paper. This gives the back of the pieces a little bit of "tooth" for the epoxy to grip.

The Eduard sheet only provides a fraction of all the necessary bits and pieces. I rebuilt the entire steering mechanism on the floor from bits of sheet plastic. One of the most time consuming detailing efforts was all the attachment strips on the inner walls of the driving compartment. It was also necessary to add rivet detail to the new superstructure, both inside and out. I make small rivets in two ways. For small amounts of rivets, I use the Waldron or Verlinden micro punch and die set. However, for this model, I needed a few hundred rivets. So I used a cut sprue technique I developed when scratchbuilding 1/76 armor many years ago.

I start by stretching sprue to the thickness of the rivets I need. A critical issue is the quality of sprue: you want sprue that is pliable and not brittle. Brittle sprue will shatter when you cut it. Generally, any of the better plastic kit sprue works fine such as DML or Tamiya You can tell by bending the sprue runners: if they bend and bend and bend before breaking, they are fine. If they snap off easily on the first bend, they are too brittle.

After I have stretched some sprue over an open flame and let it cool, I attach some drafting tape to a piece of index card or some other work surface. Drafting tape is like masking tape, but not so tacky. If you don't have any drafting tape, take some masking tape, stick it to your dungarees, and pull it off to make it less tacky. I cut the sprue into segments about 3/4 to 1 inch long, and attach them to the tape side-by-side to create something resembling a log raft about a half4nch wide. Then using a fresh straight edge single sided razor blade (sold in hardware stores for paint scrap-ing), I cut rivets from the edge of the log raft. This is like cutting slices off a salami. Except instead of cutting one salami slice at a time, I cut about a dozen at a time. After a few minutes, I have cut a hundred or so rivets.

The next trick is to get the rivets off the tape! I have found that it helps to use a solvent (like rubber cement thinner) to loosen the rivets from the tape. I put the rivets in some sort of container; the lid of a 35mm film can works well. To attach them to the model, I put a dab of Testor's liquid cement on a non-porous surface like a used razor blade. Then using a #11 X-Ado blade, I pick up the rivet with the tip, dip it into the glue, and then attach it to the model. This works much better than putting the glue directly on the model, as it is very hard to control the liquid cement, and it tends to puddle up, melt the rivet and generally make a mess. This seems like a very tedious process (it is!), but it is the most effective and least time consuming method I have discovered to rivet up a tank.

With all the rivet work done, I then did aconsiderableamountofsmalldetail work. This consisted mostly of small attachments and stowage points. At the rear of the vehicle, I used a Dremel tool to cut out the camouflage net from the rear rack (part C-5) and replaced it with some thin netting. I also replaced the lumpy kit tarp (part C-Il) with a new one fabricated out of thick aluminum foil.

The Universal Carrier carried a bunch small arms for its section including a Bren Gun, Thompson sub-machine gun, two LeeEnfield rifles, and a Sten Gun. I got these from the DML allied weapons set; the PIAT anti-tank projector comes from the Tamiya kit. The Universal Carrier configured for a Bren squad was usually allotted a Bren gun tripod. So far as I know, this has neverbeen done in plastic. However, Hornet has one in white metal, which I used.

For markings, I decided to show a vehicle of the Polish 1st Armored Division when this unit sealed the Falaise Gap in Normandy in August 1944. Accurate Arrnour, the resin manufacturers fmm Scot-land, have three new sheets of decals for British armor in World War II. The sheets are expensive, but beautifully printed. I used sheet DEl I which has the Polish divisional insignia, and the proper infantry regiment arms-of-service blocks. I stenciled the white oval for the Polish "PL" on the rear fender, the white allied star and the rectangular background for the lstArmored Division insignia. I also stenciled the red donut for the bridging circle on the bow, and added the white "5" and the vehicle serial number from some dry transfers. I added the "PL" letters from and serial numbers Letraset dry-transfers. The color scheme is the standard April 1944 pattern consisting of olive drab with a black disruptive pattern. I mixed the olive drab by adding Tamiya panzer yellow to theirolive drab, which otherwise is much too dark. I spray painted the base colors in Tamiya acrylics, followed by a wash of turpentine and black oil paint. Once dry, I did some dry brushing and a bit of pastel work. The base is very simple. I decided to simply use some green railroad grass flocking (available either from Tamiya or from Faller in railroad shops). The figure is one of the excellent Hornet white metal kits. I hate white metal, but the casting and pose of this figure is so good, I couldn't resist. The figure has a lot of character and is a joy to paint. The figure really brings the finished model to life, and accents the tiny size of the Universal Carrier.

References
One of the few books on the Universal Carrier is the Chamberlain & Ellis softcover "Making Tracks" (Profile Publications 1973) which is long out of print and not very useful for modeling purposes. The best single source is the material in the book "Canadian Military Vehicle Pro-files Vol. 2" by William Gregg (Canadian Military Historical Society Inc., RR 2 Rockwood ONT NOB 2K0 Canada: 1981). I have no idea whether this is still available, but it contains some excellent sketches out of the manual covering many small details. Aside from these fairly obscure references, the August 1995 issue of Military Modelling from the UK had a very good article dealing with the large-scale Verlinden Universal Carrier kit. This has some useful photos, and two extremely handy stowage diagrams. Finally, Toros Publications in the UK in 1996 has released a paperback entitled "AFV Stowage Sketches" which consists of reproductions of British AFV manual sketches of interior and exterior vehicle stowage. This is an essential reference for anyone interested in modeling wartime British AFVs, and has some very useful stowage diagrams for various Universal Carrier configurations.