Introduction

The General Service Horse Drawn wagon was first introduced for service in 1862. The Mark X Wagon came into service in 1905 and was the last type of Horse Drawn Wagon to be used by the British Army. It provided a means of transporting a wide variety of loads. Although the British Army was starting to move to mechanical transport prior to the outbreak of WW1 the Mark X Wagon was still very much in use as it could go where other forms of mechanical transport could not.

The Mark X was used by the British, Canadian and Australian forces throughout the First World War. It was pulled by a team of 2, 4 or 6 horses depending on the load. 1000s of GS Wagons saw service during the Great War.

This Resicast release was mastered by George Moore.

The Kit

The kit comes packed in a sturdy box with the product and manufacturers detail on the top, along with a completed unpainted picture of the model. Cast in a light grey resin the parts come in a series of zip-loc plastic bags. Instructions are in A5 format comprising of 12 pages, showing the part list, black and white pictorial assembly instructions and on the rear sheet is a WD diagram and a picture of a loaded wagon being pulled by two horses. The kit consists of approximately 39 resin and 19 PE parts. The quality of the casting and level of detail on the wagon is very good.

The wagon body comes as a single piece. Being of wooden construction the planking detail is present on the floor and outer side of this piece, but absent on the two internal sides. However it shouldn’t be to difficult to scribe in the side interior plank line should you wish to leave the back empty. The wheels of the wagon seem very well done. There are some small parts to deal with during the build and 19 PE parts to add so it will take a little patience and care to complete the kit. The side beams are made from styrene and rest on resin side bar supports. The brakes look tricky as they are a combination of resin and PE for detail.

Overall the build seems fairly straight forward if somewhat tricky due to the size of some parts, but these are what will give it the level of detail and accuracy one would expect.

Note Normal safety precautions apply when working with resin.

Conclusion

From the drawings I have seen and comparing them to the kit itself this looks to be an accurate representation of the original wagon. There is an absence of fine wood grain on the inside boards, but how much if any of that would be seen in a 1/35 scale model once painted would probably be of no consequence. Wagons were painted in Service Grey prior to the outbreak of WWI or Green after the start of hostilities so I would think either option would be possible. Colour also seemed to be dependent on unit choice.

It is excellent to have a 1/35 scale kit of what was probably the most widely used form of transport during the Great War. Currently no horses are available to pull the wagon so you will have to source some from another kit or await any future developments by Resicast.

As a stand alone kit or as part of a larger display this one should make for an interesting build and offers modellers yet more scope for the WW1 period.

Modellers may find this link useful

Victorian Forts and Artillery Live links