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Accurate Armour
A053 Challenger II Update Set in bag review. |
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This set is made up of nearly 100 resin parts and nearly as many PE parts and 2 Brass Tow Cables. Included are new Mud flaps, Commanders sight, Gun Barrel, Loaders cupola with GPMG, Exhaust ports, Fuel drums, Gun cradle, Drivers periscope, Side skirts, Head lamps and a myriad of other small parts to improve Trumpeters Challenger II. The set comes in a plastic bag, mine had a lot of the parts already broken off the moulding blocks 2 of witch were broken (but these will be easy to fix). After spreading all the parts out on my bench and looking at the instructions, which in my view are the poorest part of the set, as they just show 12 pictures of a made up Challenger with numbers pointing to the different parts to match up to the parts list at the back of the instructions and they don’t all match up the fuel drums and commanders sight are mixed up as are a few others, but again it is easy to figure out the right parts. AA have said that they will be fixing this problem. The best parts of the set are easily the new barrel, loaders cupola with its fine GPMG and the fuel drums. The barrel comes in 2 sections and joins just after the fume extractor and has all the clamps in place all you need to do is join it together and ad the MRS reflector on the end of the barrel. The loaders cupola is made up of 7 resin parts and 3 PE parts and is a vast improvement over the Trumpeter part. The fuel drums replace the ones Trumpeter provide and are the correct size. They have the mounts moulded on as well as the retaining straps. Other resin parts are new rear light clusters, cable drum, rear locker, draw bar and mounts rear storage frame with 2 jerry cans already moulded in place, the mounting points for the TECs and the side skirt mounts. The Photo Etch parts consist of the side skirts 4 parts per side, front and rear mud flaps, cable drum side plates and frame, light cluster guards, camo net hoops, Front splash plate, 3 different sizes of handles for the engine deck and latches and handles for the hatches. Conclusion: Instructions and packaging (is it time to put more things in boxes guys?) aside this set goes a long way to improving the Challenger. If you were combine this set with AA wheel set and track set you will have a vastly improved representation of the Challenger II. AA have also released an up armoured Kosovo set A053K, A replacement turret A053K and a Gulf set on the way. |
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Instruction sample |
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Click for larger view |
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