Hip to be square: Italeri/Fabbri 1/100 Mil Mi-8 review

Used by soldiers, spooks and warlords the world over, Mil's Mi-8 Hip is probably the world's most produced helicopter (although Bell's Huey is another contender for the title if the whole 204/205/212/214 family is included). Yet, much like the CH-47 Chinook, it is not very well represented in 1/100 scale.

QRF make two resin and white metal models in their modern 15mm range: the Mi-8TV Hip C armed transport and the Mi-8TVK Hip E attack variant. While I own neither, I do have a few of the 1/100 diecast Hips released by Italeri/Fabbri a while back. These were made in two civilian liveries: an Aeroflot one or a Maldives-based Hummingbird Helicopter one and I can heartily recommend them although they are sadly getting harder to find at reasonable prices.

Helmand workhorse: QRF 15mm Pinzgauer truck mini review

Along with the WMIKs and Snatch Landrovers, the Steyr-Daimler-Puch Pinzgauer truck is one of the iconic vehicles of the early days of British operations in Helmand province and QRF happens to have a very nice one in its British softskin range.

The diminutive Pinz is a very simple model with only six parts: four wheels, a truck body and a tilt. It is nicely detailed with a well-captured shape and casting quality is pretty good with very litlle cleaning up required.

Being modelled with a separate tilt makes it possible to portray a stripped-down vehicle simply by adding a wire-cutting bar and the canvas supports from plasticard. 

All in all, this is a very nice little model, and the photo on QRF's website doesn't do it justice.

Pocket MBT: QRF 15mm FV107 Scimitar Mk1 review

For a bit of armour support when the Warriors and Challengers are not around, the Scimitar armoured reconnaissance vehicle can stand in as a pocket MBT (well, that's what the Treasury seems to think anyway). This is produced both by QRF and possibly MJ Figures. The latter is sold as a Falklands-era Scorpion but the gun looks like something of a cross between a 76mm low pressure and a Rarden so a replacement gun will give you either version. As for the QRF model, it is modelled after the current configuration of the Scimitar Mk1 even though the photo of the company's website is that of an older model in Falklands-era configuration.

The QRF model is a very nice, simple kit with four pieces: turret, hull, two track pieces. The fit is excellent throughout and the tracks are particularly well designed to ensure that they are level. As with the Warriors, the 30mm Rarden was rebuilt from brass rod and tubes in the interest of longevity.

Open hatched would have made it perfect but you can't have it all. As it is, it's basically perfect for a Telic Scimitar and could be modified to an Afghan configuration with additional ECM although adding the bar armour would be a challenge in this scale.

Castle of steel and Dorchester, part 2: Building a better Telic 1 Challenger

While I think there are issues with the QRF Challenger 2's turret (see Castle of steel and Dorchester, part 1: QRF Challenger 2A1 review), it is a nice model which can make a relatively convincing rendition of an Op Telic tank.

Now just to put this statement in context, there was a time when I would whip out my ruler to check that a model was scaled correctly and refer to scale drawings to check that important detail wasn't omitted. And then bitch about it if there were errors. The trouble is that, unless they are drawn by very committed people who spend their time clambering all over museum exhibits, scale drawings are mostly one person's interpretation of what some piece of machinery looks like.

In light of this, I've converted to the philosphy of TLAR. I'm happy to fiddle with toys until I reach the point of This Looks About Right (though I will refer to as many photographs as possible to determine what looks right to me). If the US Army could get away with fiberglass VISMOD to make a Sheridan look somewhat like a T-72, I can surely get by with plasticard, filler and a file.

The hull was mostly left alone although I did trim some of the camouflage netting so it didn't get in the way of the rotating turret. The main addition was a couple of dust skirts cut from 10 thou plasticard as I think this really sets the Telic 1 Challengers apart from other uparmoured Challys such as the KFOR ones. This was simply cut to fit the model's armoured side skirts by trial and error and will attached once the model is painted. Part of the original side skirt was cut to expose the drive sprocket.

The turret was the one item which required the most work and although the result is far from satisfactory I reckon it looks somewhat more like a Challenger 2 turret than it did out-of-the-bag.

Castle of steel and Dorchester, part 1: QRF Challenger 2A1 review

My latest order from QRF included a Challenger 2A1 because nothing says "tank support" like a big Chally! QRF has four Challenger variants, with each of the Challenger 1 (Op Granby) and 2 (Op Telic) available in a plain vanilla or up-armoured versions. Three of these variants are unique to QRF since the only other 15mm Challenger, that offered by Skytrex and Old Glory, is a plain vanilla Chally 1.

Despite some minor quibbles (and one not-so-minor one about the turret's shape), the up-armoured Challenger 2 is a nice model of the "world's best protected tank" (cue dispute of this claim by fans of the Abrams, Leopard II and Merkava, not to mention Leclerc).

Please note that in my haste to start this model, I forgot to take photos of the out-of-the-bag turret so all of this post's photos feature a turret in the process of being modified by myself. I'll update this review if I buy another model but, in the meantime, there are some good photos of Challenger 2s with what I think are mostly unmodified turrets (though they look like they have been deepened with Milliput because mine came with cleaner lower edges) on the Big FoF blog: here and here.

The model is quite well cast and comes in 11 parts: hull, turret, main gun, two track assemblies, two external fuel drums, commander's hatch cover, roof machine gun and two smoke grenade dischargers. There may in fact be a 12th part which I have lost as the turret roof appears to have a locating hole for the fire control system's meteorological sensor but I'll simply replace it with some brass rod.

QRF 15mm Modern British infantry review

As I wanted to field a modern British infantry platoon for Force on Force, I looked at the then-available ranges, namely Old Glory’s and QRF’s before selecting the latter.

The Old Glory range seemed adequate (although some of the poses are hit or miss as usual with OG) but the packaging made me pass them over. Not only is the actual pack content unclear but ordering something like 150 figures and using 1/3^rd to field a platoon didn’t seem like a really good idea even though OG’s per figure prices are quite competitive. Flytrap Factory has since released a pack of “Royal British Marines” which look good but are limited to small arms at the moment.

On to QRF’s figures! These are sold in packs of 8 figures covering the whole gamut of smallarms and support weapons which has the advantage of minimizing the number of leftovers. While the photos on QRF’s website do give an good idea of the content of each pack, they are not very detailed. The close up photos at the bottom of this post should give you a clearer idea of what they look like.

15mm CH-47 Chinook testbed

As indicated here, I ordered the fuselage of an RC toy Chinook to check its compatibility with 15mm and was pleasantly surprised to see that it was in fact the correct size.

Here is a closer look at the beast which was quickly slapped together without too much care. It is still lacking engines and wheels which are on their way to me. Rotors also need to be added and I plan to use clear acetate disks to represent them. These will be held to the model with rare earth magnets in order to make storage easier and swap them from model to model.

Searching for an affordable 1/100 CH-47 Chinook

Lil' Flying Fokker Chinook

As a general rule, I use 1/144 models for flying gunships and air support with 15mm figures. However, transports helicopters which are depicted on the LZ obviously need to be in the same scale as the figures. While quite a few 1/100 helicopters can be found from a variety of sources, one of the most glaring omissions is an affordable CH-47 Chinook suitable for use with 15mm figures.

Basically, if you want to have a model of the workhorse of Operation Enduring Freedom your choice is limited to Lil' Flying Fokker's very nice but expensive CH-47 Chinook. This a resin and metal kit which looks outstanding but carries a hefty price tag of £30 which, alas, is far more than I am prepared to pay for a model.

While browsing eBay, a photo of a Chinook toy caught my eye : the Syma S026G radio-controlled micro helicopter which looked to be about the right size. Interest suddenly picked up because the seller's description included a fuselage length which appeared to be reasonably close to 1/100. However, paying the same price as the LFC kit for a toy and then gutting it wasn't really an attractive option.

On the other hand, spare parts for this toy are widely sold and it is possible to buy the body separately. This is actually quite cheap (about $7 US) and one was promptly ordered to check its usefulness as the base for a 15mm model. And the good news is that the fuselage actually measures 16,5 cm by 3,6 cm which makes it 1/94 in length and 1:105 in width, i.e. well within the usual variations found in 15mm vehicle scales. The result of my tinkering with the toy can be found over at the Chinook testbed post.