Thank you.
About the decals of the kit, the bumper numbers are on an orange rectangle, but most photos I’ve seen don’t show it but the numbers painted directly on the camouflage background. Are the orange rectangles right, then?
1 Like
When the bumper numbers are black, there are usually lighter colored rectangles behind them so the numbers showed up better. The bumper numbers surround on NATO camo is usually sand. On overall green and later MERDC, the surround was often white. I think Academy was attempting sand, but went too dark.
Some examples:
2 Likes
When I arrived to my first line unit in March ‘84, the bumper codes were painted onto the MERDC camo color of whatever was there, Dark Green 34079, Light Green 34151, or Field Drab 30118 of the Temperate Spring or Fall schemes. Later that summer, we were reflagged from 3/10 infantry to 4/6 infantry and when we changed the bumper codes, we also added a light color background. That color was actually labeled as “buff” on the cans we were issued, and I didn’t see any Federal Standard color number listed on the paint can. I was already a modeler at that time and paid attention to such things.
1 Like
So these decals are not usable. I can look for numbers without background and put a collage of them on a buff area. Thank you for your suggestions.
By the way, the optics for the Dragon missile are missing on the kit. I hope to recover them by a set of US infantry of Tamiya.
1 Like
The optics probably wouldn’t be mounted most of the time, though. They clip onto the launch tube before firing and are removed when the tube is empty.
1 Like
Yes, the sight only takes a few seconds to mount. But if one is taking them into combat, it’s best to mount them before the shooting starts.
1 Like
Most of the M113s photographed with a Dragon launcher on the commander’s hatch were not going into combat, though 
1 Like
Am I wrong, or the smoke grenade tubes of the Academy kit are way too thin and pointed of the real ones?
They are pretty much the correct size. The pointy end you see is a rubber cap that goes on the top to keep debris out. In most of the above pics, the pointy end has been pushed in and looks like a concave cap.
1 Like
Am I wrong, or the kit of Academy doesn’t include two extra tracks for the front plate? They are drawn on the box and shown on the photo of the built model, but I can’t find them between the parts of the kit nor in the instructions sheet.
1 Like
If you have the plastic indi-link track sprues, they are on there.
1 Like
Unfortunately it looks that M113A2 kit has only flexible tracks, there is not that sprue, not even on the instructions sheet.
1 Like
There must be multiple issues of it. I built the M113A2 kit around 25 years ago, and it came with the separate-link tracks, but when I looked it up on Scalemates, those weren’t on the instruction sheet. I got the image above from the M113A3 kit there instead.
1 Like
Seems that the parts for smoke mortars are not the same in M-113a2 and A3. In A2 they are numbered F29, 30,19, 10,11, but on the M113A3 instructions sheet they are numbered A31,32,33,34, and the protections are made in multiple parts, not in one. I think to have found their worst variation of the kit.
My kit has a lot of loads that I don’t know how to use, while the A3, for what I see on the instructions sheet on Armorama, has storage racks. Besides, the decals of A2 are bad, the stenciling inside has many irregular oblique white traces that should be written text, rather unusable I fear. How about the A3?
1 Like
D42 goes on the front glacis fairly close to what’s shown on the box, although it needs to be a little lower. D43 goes above it. It was pretty much SOP in the 80’s to put the cammo netting and the poles in the same spot on both M113s and Bradleys.
The rest is up to you, although the water cooler would best be placed in a location where it can be used without having to move it, i.e. elevated, but secured with a strap.
1 Like
The racks were only used on 2 BDE, 3 ID M113s that were drawn form PREPO stocks in Kuwait during OIF 1 (Invasion, 2003). The Academy racks look nothing like the real ones though. The actual racks were made of all flat strips of metal.
The M113A3 kit has lots of updated parts, most specifically for the A3 version. It also offers more detailed parts for some of the common M113 parts as well. It is the latest version of Academy’s M113 kits and has the best/most details.
1 Like
Except apparently that vehicle and the ones on Prime Portal. The framework for those is made up primarily of rectangular tubing. Two inch square tubing can be replicated perfectly with .060 x .060 Evergreen strip.
For the flat strapping (just the straps on the sides) I used .010 x .080 strip.
1 Like
Right. My point being they are not made up of round tubing like Academy’s are.
1 Like
Hard to tell from this photo, but it almost looks like those cargo racks were mounted using the bolts from the track shrouds…?
1 Like