Vodnik's Red-T

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Humvee with Red-T
(M242 Bushmaster) turret
prototype

Tamiya 1/35

The model is a Red-T 1 - the prototype of a Humvee with M242 Bushmaster cannon turret (Red-T turret). This configuration was tested on a few prototypes by AM General and offered for sale, but no customers were found and it never went into production. My model was build from Tamiya old "Hummer with M242 Bushmaster" 35143 kit. For those unfamiliar with this old kit: it is old Italeri Humvee model with one additional sprue added by Tamiya. It bears no resemblance to M1025 and M1046 Humvee kits released by Tamiya recently and is very inferior to them.

Italeri model was based on a prototype of Humvee and because of this has a lot of features not correct for production vehicle. But these features, for example the lack of personnel heater intake grille and four holes in front bumper (instead of usual three) are actually correct for Red-T 1 vehicle I portrayed.

One of rare photos of Red-T 1 prototype I used as a reference.
Note that there are four holes in the front bumper.

As I had almost no references on the Red-T 1 prototype I added almost no extra details to the model. I only modified a few minor parts to make them slightly more accurate. The biggest modification was replacing the ugly Italeri plastic wheels with wheels from newer Tamiya M1025 Humvee model. I also used side mirrors from that kit. I used a couple of parts from Eduard photoetched parts set (windshield wipers, fuel can holders, antenna mounts etc.) for Tamiya 35143 kit, but most of this set's content is unfortunately useless.

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