Introduction

Armorama recently covered news from a British resin manufacturer called Red Zebra, and last week I received a number of items from their range including earlier releases. The items I have received are Fruit and Veg 1, Public Phones, Sports and Holdall Bags, IDF Bags and Equipment and 0.1mm Aluminium Foil. As indicated I am going to look at the IDF Bags and Equipment offering on this occasion.

Review

This is a resin offering from Red Zebra and arrives in a Ziploc bag with a card hanger with 4 resin parts loose inside, the package arrived in a cardboard tray with flip top lid that has ensured that the item arrived in perfect condition. I cannot of course be sure that every order is packaged the same way. The resin used in this instance is light grey and soft enough to be cut with a blade, I still advise against it as the risk of cutting yourself is high as my thumb can attest. I tried using a razor saw to remove the small pour plug and found it too difficult to control the resin part while sawing. This left me with sanding as the only option and it cleaned up the plug to my satisfaction.

This set offers six items that are all different in their lay out. The sets consist of backpacks and webbing items plus the like of water bottles. Four of the offerings have helmets included and these differ in design for the most part; one has an AFV helmet on it with the head phones and goggles being nicely presented. Two other offerings have standard IDF helmets with mesh covers present and goggles in place. The last offering with a helmet has a plain IDF helmet with a strap around it. The two that do not have helmets are the offerings with water bottles present.

The pour plugs are on the rear of the backpacks, which is fine, but I feel that a better location from a modellers point of view would have been the bottom of the packs; the reason I feel this to be the case is that the bottom will always be hidden regardless of how used by the modeller, by placing the pour plugs on the rear it means they have to sit against a surface such as a wall or vehicle. The detail presented is of a good standard and should show up well after being painted and washed to make the detail pop. I have removed the pour plug on a couple of the items in order that you can judge the final result.

Conclusion

Having taken a good look over the packs in this set I am on the whole pleased with the offering as they have a number of uses. I would have preferred the pour plug to have been on the base of each moulding as it would have increased display possibilities and it would be easier to hide any potential damage to the parts themselves. Detail is good and should look pleasing when painted and weathered.