Revell M2 A2 Bradley 1:72

Review by: Geoff Coughlin (June 2011)

Thanks to Revell Germany for supplying our review sample: www.revell.de

A little bit of inspiration…

Background

The M2 Bradley, introduced in 1983, is the standard fighting vehicle of the American armoured infantry. The main armament consists of a McDonnell Douglas Helicopter Systems 25 mm M 242 Bushmaster chain gun with double belt feed (max firing speed 200 rounds per minute), together with a 7.62 mm M 242 C machine gun mounted coaxial to right of the cannon.

To the left of the turret is a launcher that swivels up and down for twin TOW anti-tank missiles. The M3 “Devers” (the name of this version was not adopted) is the standard vehicle of the tank reconnaissance units. Both the M2 and the M3 are amphibious after a flotation screen and the trim vane at the front have been erected. The vehicle is still propelled by its tracks when it is in the water and develops a maximum speed of 6.6 km/h.

The first combat capability upgrade made to the Bradley (M2 and M3) in 1985, primarily involving modifications to the turret, including the capability to fire the new TOW 2 missile, led to the M2 A1 and M3 A1 versions. A drastic improvement of the passive armour protection in the form of appliqué armour was made within the framework of further modernisation carried out from May 1988 onwards and giving the designations M 2 A2 and M 3 A2.

Both versions are driven by a V-8 Cummins VTA-903T Diesel engine with a capacity of 608 hp (447 kW) crewed by a driver, a commander and a gunner. The rear troop compartment can accommodate six infantrymen who dismount via a rear ramp.

Initial Assessment

As you probably know I don’t tend to build many (ha, ha) armour kits, but I’ve always been fascinated by them and have built a couple in the past. I spend quite a long time looking at the fantastic creations from those of you who build armour and try to learn through talking, watching and listening to you.

This kit is a really impressive bit of tooling with very fine levels of detail across the board. The images in this review should speak for themselves and you can decide what you think, especially as armour maybe more your specific area. So I offer a basic insight into this Revell kit that I think may date back as much as 10 years according to the small date stamped into the inside of the lower hull.

The Package

5 sprues moulded in brown plastic, a set of instructions and small decal sheet make up the package.

Click to Enlarge/go back.

Sprue trees

You can see that the hull top is very clean and crisp, as is just about everything else. The tools, for example, are cleanly and accurately moulded onto the surface but will look excellent when spray painted and given a subtle wash and maybe filters (see your Techniques Bank for how to apply these weathering techniques) in keeping with the small scale.

The road wheels have fine moulded detail and although I can’t give an opinion on accuracy, they certainly look consistent with some of the images I have seen on YouTube where there’s some great footage of the Bradley on manoeuvres.

Other highlights include: the detail on the Rear access doors, track links and sprockets. There are some ejector pin mould-release circles left during the making of the kit, but these are well placed in out of the way or hidden locations. The engine grills look fine for the scale and I can just see that they will look good after a wash and dry-brush (again, see your Techniques Bank for how to dry-brush).

The tracks are broken down into small sections that should allow you to pose them fairly naturally. In fact, if you add the side skirts them much of the track section along the upper run will be invisible, so what’s provided looks to be just fine in 1:72 scale.

There’s no flash or excess plastic on any of the parts, so this will help build time greatly.

Decals

There’s a small sheet with the respective numbers and unit badges for the options contained in the kit. These are:

• M 2 A2 Bradley IFV, C Companie, 2nd Bn of 6th Infantry Reg., 1st Armoured Div. 2002 in bronze green, tar black and brown (all and only Revell colour references are given)
• M 2 A2 Bradley IFV, A Companie, 2nd Bn of 6th Infantry Reg., 1st Armoured Div, 2001 (colours as above)
• M 2 A2 Bradley IFV 4-7 INF/3rd Infantry Division, Desert Storm, Feb. 1991
• M 3 A2 Bradley CFV, 3rd Armoured Cavalry Regiment, Desert Storm, 1991

Instructions

These follow the usual Revell format, with Revell colour references, parts and sprue layout diagrams followed by a 42-Stage build and finishing sequence. The sequence looks to be logical to me, but of course you will want to leave off all the small, delicate parts like the aerials until near the end of the build to avoid damage.

To sum up…

Well, I really like this well-detailed little kit.

I built an armour kit in this scale was when I was about 7 – you’ll remember the old Airfix range – fantastic fun at the time and you know, looking at this, it might just be time to get reacquainted with the scale…? I might just have a look at this one myself and there’s an equally nice looking Panzer IV staring at me, so be sure to check out that one in Here Now very soon.

Highly Recommended.

Geoff C.