Revell-Germany Katyusha

I've been working on Revell-Germany's 1/35th scale Katyusha multiple rocket launcher lately, gluing it together while watching the Olympics on TV. I think it's a reissue of an older kit by someone else - Italeri, maybe - but I don't know that for certain. All I know is that it's hard. The engineering of the chassis and drivetrain is particularly difficult. Who asked for two-piece working universal joints? I certainly didn't, and wouldn't have wanted so many of them if I had asked! It looks okay once it's together, but putting it together takes some doing. The front wheel and tire assemblies are okay, but the duals are tricky; the outer and most visible part of the rims have four gates that are difficult to clean up because of their locations. I like the idea of the black vinyl tires, which seems to argue that painting will be simplified, but there's no way to fit the tires onto the completed rims, so I assembled them entirely and painted them as a unit and will repaint the tires by hand later.

It doesn't help that the styrene in the kit is kind of rubbery and strangely tough. I found it hard to shave cleanly with a knife, yet all too easy to tear. The two-part cab is hard to assemble cleanly and I had to resort to putty and sanding to get rid of the major seam where the roof fits onto the rear wall parts.

But it's coming together. I just came inside from painting, where I sprayed the completed chassis with hardware store flat black paint and the cab and rocket launcher subassemblies with Tamiya RAF green lacquer. Now I just have to finish assembling the sight unit and launcher pivot tube, and paint the tires and cab interior details. Oh, and install the steering wheel, which can't be installed until after the cab and chassis are glued together.

I don't think I'd characterize this kit as a lot of fun to build, but how many Katyusha models do you see?