I thought this would be fun to build alongside the AIM, plus any paint mixes wouldn't go to waste...

So far so good! The simplicity of the hull design shapes does work against you a little bit. The front hull halves were roughly cast with no clear demarcation. There is a bit of flash on just about every part. Trumpeter plastics however, are very easy to work with. Having a long, straight edge joint takes judicious use of sanding sticks to prevent an uneven area that will definately jump out at you.

I basically cleaned the joining surfaces of the hull halves leaving the sloppy areas on the nose and test fit them multiple times to check fit. It fit very well, and after the glue dried it sanded into the proper shapes fairly intuitively. The hull is completely accessable allowing additional glue to be added to virtualy every joint on the inside while its all taped up for reinforcement. The surface area is relatively small and being sparse on glue may invite the woefull 'pop' of doom if you squeeze the hull durring assembly. I put enough glue in there I could probably use it in a quikie game of two-on-two touch football in the yard...

Running gear is beautifully detailed without being over engineered. A lot of cleanup is needed but again the plastic is pretty forgiving as its hard enough its not easy to oversand, but the flash is super thin and even pressure removes it completely. You have to prefit(which you always should) but the instructions are clear with no errors found so far. Hatches require minimum cleanup and fit perfectly. No interior is included but I was going to button it up anyway.

I ordered the Eduard PE set and it has not arrived, but the website shows the instructions in great clarity so you can build everything you can just from checking that.

No filler was used, other then my staple powder/ca mix at the joints. I get the fit as near perfect as possible. After the joints dry they are shaped and some are lightly primed. I smear a little med ca in the joint and very lightly sand with an older 400 sanding stick and the powder fills the area. A couple passes like this fills it with dust impregnated with CA. After a light prime of Mr Surfacer 1000 spray any last pinholes can be quickly fixed with talc and white glue. I rarely use putty unless its a sinkhole. Even large gaps are filled with scrap styrene first and worked to shape(none on this kit need anything like that). I guess it comes from doing auto body work years ago. The less filler the better....

Props were a little 'flashy' but holding a piece of 400 wet/dry between my first two fingers and my thumb/ring finger and 'brushing' the blades cleaned it quickly. I always work in high-shaddow halogen so I can easilly spot sanding buildup on sharp edges. Fun and quick, about 3-4 evenings shared with the AIM has gotten me pretty far. Pretty much done on the bottom with full prime. The top half has some final clean up along the top of the hull joint at the rear doors, but the rest is already 'filled'. Again, the long super-sharp gap along the sides and front has no putty whatsoever....

Only real complaints are the rather simple jerry can detail with molded straps and racks(all to be replaced by leftover AIM ones and eduard mounts), the ultra dull end of the main gun muzzle(again fixed with PE), and the flash on parts. They should of included one extra tire and wheel to add as a spare(ala the box art!-hello, McFly!). And there are virtually no other extras whatsoever. I haven't gone over the figures in detail but they look so-so. They also may not authentic for the era depicted from what I understand. I guess you may consider the fairly decent small arms 'extras', the eduard set does include extra PE for them.

But its plastic and not CNC machined metal so for $23 its definately a steal of a deal, even if you spring and extra $14 for an extensive PE set added to it. Vinyl tires also look fantastic, although you can't put any sag/bulge in them. They are wide and fat tires, and there's enough sidewall detail to distract from it anyway when weathered.

hope to see more pics soon kevin. its coming on nice.
loe to see the end product.

Thanks for the update.

Two questions:

Are you planning to add the brake lines and vent lines to the front four wheels?

Are you planning to add any anti-slip to the hull?

I wasn't going to go too nuts on the undercarriage as you really can't see it too well. I was looking into anti-slip refferences and that is pretty easy to do with MrSurfacer airbrushed from a distance under high pressure(some fast drying colors may work too like lightly thinned browns or blacks). The top of the hull looks relatively easy to mask up as its pretty featureless. I cant find any photos that are definative on the anti-slip layout as its very difficult to even see it on hi-res photos.

never really noticed the turret is not in the center of the body

ok added antislip.

Your anti-slip coating looks really nice! What grade of Mr Surfacer did you use? It is subtle and not over done. Looks great!

I actually taped it up and 'stutter-sprayed' tamiya spraycan primer from a distance a few times. If you lightly warm it with a hair dryer the laquer based primer dries very quickly. then re-primed it. Any little specks in the wrong places will get knocked down with an old toothbrush or a carefull swipe with sandpaper. Its very subtle now overnight but you can't even see it on the real afv in photos. My camera stinks so I tried it outside with high shaddows to see if it's more clear. I wanted to see if I could avoid putting MrSurfacer in my airbrush again....If you hold it at near arms' length and a little above the spray can height, any sizeable drops will not make it to the model. I used to do this for undercoating on car models or some ship applications.

I just looked at the AIM's non-slip and patterned it the same way and used a little common sense. I'm used to seeing it on my boat so I'm sure its pretty much going to be done the same way on any other vehicle. Feels nice and grippy too so it would really make a good backyard football. If I get mad at this one I could get a good 40 yards out of it...

Looking good!

nice...

Thanks guys!

Turret is mostly done. These parts TAKE A TON OF CLEAN UP! The small latches, handles, smoke launchers, and particularly the rack have a near 1970's level of flash on it. It takes great care to do it, but again the Trumpy plastic quality itself makes it somewhat easy. The basket is fairly resiliant to handling and I didn't break a single part, which is often the case with cleanup on such small pieces. I am on hold now untill the eduard set comes in. The basket is glued on, but can be popped loose for I suspect it will need to add the mesh base, so I havent done the absolute last cleanup yet. Again, kind of a unique kit that it has a ton of flash like a lousy one might, yet the fit is perfect so its acutally satisfying after the work unlike a kit I would truly deem bad. The base of the barrel is tricky as it needs to keep the polygon angles straight while sanding the seam. Typically I do barrel halves the same way, leave any flash on that does not interfere with the fit of the halves, put enough med CA on the joints it will ooze out, and when dry file to shape with sanding sticks. Sometimes the flash on the ends allow you to get it flush without little 'V' groves at the end of the joints. Still, no filler used other then CA and sanding dust.

I don't know how much I am going to add as this is going to be mostly box-stock with the PE set to flesh it out. The smoke grenade launchers are a little over-engineered and look a little plain. I think I will put the PE covers on that are not 100% scale but dress them up a bit. The rack was sanded smooth with a 1/4" wide strip of plastic-backed Testors 400 grit w/d sandpaper held taught between my ring finger/thumb and middle/first fingers like a violin bow.

Man this thing has more etch then the AIM Got a lot of the Eduard set installed with a bunch more straps and the other jerry can racks to go. Nice looking stuff but SOOOO delicate. I had to put the retaining chains and covers on the smoke grenades, I know they do not go on USMC LAV's, but they look good The jerry cans are extras from the AIM, and the ammo box is from the handy-dandy acadamy set.

Man Kevin this LAV gets meaner each time I look at it. Your antislip surface look great, nice tip. Looking forward to seeing it finished man.

Joe

I think I have all the etch installed. If I hadn't gotten so far I would of replaced the taillight guards but they look ok in plastic anyway. Turret is painted in ODS sand as a prime/preshade color before modern sand is sprayed. I started with some of the straps and one jerry can but I am going to add the rest after the model is painted....Pictures aren't that great as my better camera is at work. I have to go back and clear a couple of the near microscopic holes in the exhaust grillwork. I can't find any definiative photos if the pioneer tools are sprayed over with sand or not.