Kit Summary

This was a fun project – my shortest endeavor yet (only six months). I particularly enjoyed chasing down all of the kits from various cottage industry vendors or the aftermarket.  Not quite as simple as going to the Sprue Brothers website!

The only real (as in there are more than 10 parts to assemble) and available kits are:

• Bull Beaverette Mk I/II
• Firing Line Beaverette Mk III
• Extratech Beaverette Mk III

Thus, I’ll just do Pros/Cons for these three. You can refer to the individual blog pages for the other kits.

Bull Beaverette Mk I

Pros: Lots of detail; three great figures. Options to do a Mk I or Mk II. Well-molded. Accessories and stowage. Friendly vendor.

Cons: Some of the resin parts are tricky to remove (rods abutted to the pour block). No decals. No chassis detail.

Firing Line Beaverette Mk III

Pros: Lots of detail. High quality instructions. Theoretically possible to do an interior as the hull is folded PE rather than a resin block. You’ll feel good after wrestling the flat PE into place as a 3D model.

Cons: No chassis detail. No decals. Be prepared for soldering. Some of the PE parts are really small (grab handles).

Extratech Beaverette Mk III

Pros: Almost as much detail as the Firing Line.  Includes decals. Twin Vickers machine guns are a nice touch. Chassis detail.

Cons: The two-part PE cylinder turret assembly is very tricky and if you mess up, recovery is ugly. The PE Vickers machine guns are difficult to assemble.

Last words

I’d buy additional kits from any of the above three vendors again – knowing that they’ll challenge me more than an injection-molded styrene kit. The vendors are serious about their offerings. In fact, I have several Firing Line and Bull Models kits awaiting work.  I’m just waiting on the right inspiring photo.

That said, if you just want a Beaverette Mk III for a diorama and don’t have time to invest in constructing one of the above kits, consider the Gramodel Mk III.  If you are lucky enough to get one without mold sinkholes, it is super easy to assemble and has enough detail to be compatible with your other vehicles. Or, find a Lead Sled Mk III for an almost as rapid assembly with reasonable detail.

Scale versus Reality

Since I went to the trouble of building all of the Beaverette Mk I and Mk III kits, it would be interesting to see how they matched up to the actual vehicle specifications. Since some kits purported to be 1/76 and others 1/72 but no two are alike in dimensions, I’ll compare against both Wikipedia 1/72 and 1/76 reference points.

Now, some caveats:

1. I didn’t verify the Wikipedia actual measurements so we’ll assume they are correct.
2. It is hard to know, especially for the width measurement, as to where the measurement is made (at axles?, at driver’s position?)
3. Actual measurements are probably accurate to within .01 inches using my calipers

And the results:

And what can I conclude from the above?

• The Lead Sled and Gramodel Beaverette Mk IIIs are closest to Wikipedia in 1/76 scale. But the first kit is very hard to find and the second isn’t a ‘rich’ kit in terms of assembly.
• The Sgt’s Mess and Extratech kits are about the same for a 1/72 kit but there’s no comparison in terms of modeling fun between the two (Extratech taking the honors by far)
• Both Beaverette Mk I’s are excellent in terms of length but apparently too wide for 1/76. Again, it is hard to know what is supposed to be measured.

 

**Update 10 Jun 2015**

I had forgotten until today that I possessed the 1/76 plans for the Beaverette Mk III from Airfix Modeling Guide 27 Modelling RAF Vehicles.  Now the source of the plans appears to be John Church of Lymington, UK (prepared sometime before 1978) and I can’t verify them against the real vehicle specs but we’ll assume they are accurate.

So, how did the models compare to the plans?

• The Gramodel and Lead Sled are close (straddling the expected dimensions)
• The Firing Line is closer to 1/72; the ExtraTech is still too large
• The FrontLine Wargaming should really be declared 1/72, not OO scale on their web site