Can someone identify the vehicle in this funny little dio? Does anyone know what kit that is?

Thanks in advance.

If I'm not mistaken this is the U.S. Marine Corps M 50 ONTOS armored anti tank vehicle. It has 6 mounted M40 A1C 106mm Recoiless Rifles. I think this was extensively used during the Vietnam war for perimeter defense. I ran across this type of vehicle while reading a photographic history of the Vietnam war.

Alex is spot on , it is indeed a M 50 ONTOS.

Hobby Fan do a resin kit, don't know if there are any plastic kits of this. I'll see if i can find one while i'm surfing.

ONTOS is a greek word meaning "THING".

Aren't those little buggers the neatest thing???

Not to mention they'd look great sticking out of your garage!!!

And as Alex said "Thing" fits the bill!

Mike

The only one i can find in plastic is a 1/32 kit made by a company called Renewal in the late 60s. The moulds were then bought by Revell who released it in the 80s. It was again released in the 90s by Matchbox, same mould. Other than that it seems to be on everyones wishlist.

Lots of fire power, but it had to be reloaded from the outside. Not a good choice if under fire. Definately an eye catcher. "Q"

Remember this thing was developed for the airborne and light forces to supplement the Jeep mounted recoilless rifle.

I've got the Revell kit I built in the 80s and an original Renwal kit a friend gave me back in 2001 (parts kit to rebuild my original one). I didn't know Matchbox reissued it in the 90s, too bad I missed it.

A while back I was doing some reading on these, and I found out that they were pretty useful, that with the one shell they used, with all the barrels going off at once, they could level a lot of jungle, they claimed better then napepon could, I don't know if I got that spelled right, but I think you know what I mean.

That the Vietnamese were scared of these vehicles, but things got screwed up, and they never could get the right ammo for them, so they just ended up setting.
Kerry

it's spelled napalm.

Thanks for the information everyone. It does look like a mean son of a gun. This one's going on my to-do list.

Yeah, I always liked the M50. It has everything for the guy who likes odd AFVs. Short, strange looking, lots of guns, no appreciable amount of armour, reasonable amount of service and a really cool image generated in your mind any time you think about what the results of six 106mm behive rounds would be on an infantry attack...

:-)

I built the Renwal kit back in the 80's. I replaced the barrels with aluminum tube, detailed the .50 cal spotting rifles and 106mm mounts and breeches, changed the engine louvres, added the fuel filler bulge(which made it an A1), scavanged the .30 cal & mount and scratchbuilt the brush guards. The only thing I couldn't fix at the time was the GD track, which was too stiff to sit right. I ended up putting about 3-4 oz of lead inside just to get the bloody thing to sit flat instead of nodding like a rocking chair.

Still, it looks cool on my shelf and you know that the effects of the 106 rounds _had_ to be a surprise to anyone who was exposed to this diminutive vehicle for the first time.

Paul

A number were used in the Hue counteroffensive to good effect (set to retake the northern city of Hue during the '68 Tet offensive). I believe that a couple mounted M-60s or a .50 to support the vunerable loader.

Jeff