I found an informal local club at Ft. Knox. It consists of just a few members. I spent the afternoon at the Patton Museum building models next to a man who is working on the master for a Hobby Fan interior for both the Tamiya LVTP7A1 and AAV7A1 w/UGW.

This man does some outstanding work and also had the test shots of a resin MICLIC trailer he did the master for. Very impressive little kit there.

He gave another member the new AFV Club Tiger I Late (is it even out in the states?). The molding on that turret was superb and it was a shame that the casting detail would be covered by zimmerit. Heck, I thought it would be ashame to cover that beautiful kit in paint. It was nicely modled in a light olive color that Skybow used for the Walker Bulldog and M38 Jeeps.

He said the person who did the tooling on the Tiger was the one behind the Skybow kits.

Speaking of Skybow, he gave me the AFV Club/Hobby Fan catalog for 2005. Inside there were quite a few familiar Skybow kits, kits I was aware that were coming and kits that made me stop in my tracks.

Hobby Fan is doing a conversion for the M48A1, ERA for the M48H (M48 turret on M60A3 hull), M60/88/48 engine and pack sling, and several other conversions for the AAV7A1 like EAAK add-on armor set and a set that just adds the mounting spots.

Other AFV issues are a limited Free French M3A3 available in France only, a JGSDF M41A2 (only in Japan), Taiwanese Marine M41A3 (only in Taiwan) and AFV Club kit number AF35S25 is the return of the Skybow M41. This kit is the M41(G) German version of the Skybow kit.

There were plenty of figure sets, a couple of different Marines in the new MARPAT camouflage uniforms.

The man who got the new Tiger is also doing the box art cover of some of the new MARPAT unifiorms. He's mainly a figure painter and was painting the figures to be used on the boxtop.

I had a lot of fun and learned a lot from those two.

I envy you Rob. Sounds like a great day.
Was there any mention of the M-42 Duster?


Chuck

The Miclic traile should be great ! with some conversion possibilities

Thanks for the info Rob. Now i guess i'll start saving my $$ to buy some of them. Any idea of release dates for the AAVP7 interior and the MICLIC trailer?

Thanks
Matt

I did not ask about any release dates. No sign of an M42 but there is a picture of an M52 105mm SPH.

I liked the AVLB conversion pictured in the catalog. I should have asked for a couple to spread around. He said he got 50 copies, piled on top of the kits in the box!

Yup Rob, I gotta admit, I am jealous. Not only for your contacts, but for being able to build armor at the Patton Museum. Yeesh, a treadheads dream come true! :-)

And also, if there happens to be a extra one of those AVLB's just gathering dust, consider throwing one my way. And I even have a good reason for it: Friend of the family was in Iraq as a AVLB crewman and ended up being jumped and stabbed in the hand, so he got sent back stateside. Needed a fair amount of surgery to do what they could to keep his finger, and he has some nerve damage, but all is well that ends with 10 fingers! This happened about a year ago. But of course, he wants a model built of his AVLB...that is until I told him about the price tag! SHould have seen his eyes bug out! Now he is waiting to see if a model of one comes out at Target...

Anyhow, enjoy armor building Mecca!

Yes Sabot,the Tiger 1 late was at my LHS this past weekend.