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Rooikat 105 Armoured Car by William Marshall
This
is a new kit in 1/72 scale of the South African Rooikat 105 Armoured Car by. It
is always a great pleasure to review a new locally produced kit. The Rooikat is
the first of a series of modern AFV kits by Aerografix. The kit comes in a sturdy brown box with an attractive picture of a completed Rooikat model on the box top. Instructions are included and consists of a one page A4 leaflet. The model is wrapped in bubble wrap plastic and consists of the hull, turret, eight wheels, barrel, turret basket, two mirrors, towing cable and some brass rod for bush protection rails.
The price is R150.00 (approximately US$20). This is quite expensive if compared to injection moulded kits that retail between R70.00 to R80.00. I am not sure if it is going to sell at this price. I suppose it is aimed at the serious South African armour modeller who just must have one and will fork out any price for the privilege.
The
kit goes together quite well with no major construction problems. I did find the
following to be a hassle for me: a.
No location pins and holes for the wheels and turret, these I had to
make myself. b.
I did not like the smoke grenade launchers or their attachment points,
the launcher tubes were oval and should be attached to over-scale attachment
points which gives the turret a very broad profile. I replaced my launcher tubes
with thin aluminium tube glued directly to the turret sides, after removing the
attachment points and sanding the turret side smooth. c.
The angle at which the main gun barrel is attached to the turret is
unnatural and I would have liked to see a more flatter position. Maybe it could
be variable ? The kit is very accurate dimensionally and scaled out to within an inch or so of the real thing. Moulding is crisp with very few air bubbles.
A
piece of cable is given which should be attached to the vehicle, the only snag
is that the cable eye attachment loops are not supplied, so I left mine off. As
I have seen a lot of these vehicles in the field, I know that the crew leave off
the rear view mirrors as they get damaged very quickly in the African bush. I
chose to leave mine also off. I initially added the turret rail, but after checking my references I noticed that the 105 does not have the rail like the 76mm version. This was then deleted from the model.
The vehicle is very easy to build and an inexperienced resin builder would be able to complete it without much trouble. The barrel comes drilled out but I wanted some more depth so I drilled it out again and increased the depth to smooth out the sides. Wheels were painted dark Grey. I airbrushed my vehicle with Humbrol 29 with some white added for scale effect. The model was then given a coat of Future gloss and washed with some Black poster paint. A final coat of matt varnish was given to seal the model.
All credit should go to Aerografix with their first effort, I hope it is not he last. Since building this model a 1/35 scale version of the Rooikat has also appeared. For details Aerografix may be contacted directly at their website. ( www.i.am/aerografix ). Do I hear rumours of a 1/35 Ratel ?
Click
the thumbnails below to view the images full-size.
Aerografix
Kit Number AG7201, Rooikat 105 Armoured Car, is available from Aerografix, 124
Golf Avenue, Clubview ,West Centurion, South Africa Model, Text and Images Copyright © 2000 by William
Marshall
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