Box Art / Packaging / History

Academy have produced a newly boxed iteration of the 1999 Revell Leopard 1A5, parts are well molded and very little flash was observed. The box art is glossy and depicts artwork of a Leopard in German Markings and NATO Camouflage scheme. The instructions did not give any history of the MBT, but briefly, the Leopard 1A5 was the main service version of the Leopard 1 post 1987 when some 1800 Leopard 1’s were converted to the new variant. The newer variant improved on fire control systems, gun stabilization and night fighting capabilities adding a laser rangefinder and enhanced thermal imaging. Some are indeed in service today in Ukraine.

The Leopard 1 itself has been in production since 1965 with the last models rolling off the factory floor in 1984, some 4700 MBT’s were built. With a significant operational range (600km on road, 450 cross-country) and a top speed of 65kmph the Leopard 1 was the backbone of many military tank regiments from Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Greece, Italy amongst others. As of September 2024 the Ukrainian 5^th Heavy mechanized Brigade were operating Leopard 1A5’s with local upgrades for armor and drone protection.

The Kit

The kit comprises 4 sprues of relatively soft plastic which I was thankful for due to the small parts that they were not brittle and did not easily break.

There are no clear parts or PE parts provided, tracks are link and length style and are a tight fit, almost seemed like an extra link or two would have been useful, in particular, if one is damaged or broken, you will be short on the track links.

The part count is pretty low, most numerous being the lower hull and wheels, but they are well molded and easy to work with.

The Build

This is a straightforward build. Construction of the kit took a few hours.

Fit was excellent, some care is required removing some of the smaller parts from the sprues due to the size, but none broke and there was no flash / very little cleanup required.

Assembly begins with lower hull, wheels and tracks. These take steps 1-10.

Fit of all parts are snug and presented no problems at any point. As mentioned earlier, the tracks are tight and only enough pieces are provided to complete the fitment, take care when removing the single threads as if any are broken, you will be short.

Steps 11-19 complete the remaining hull construction and accessories. All equipment is molded into the superstructure, no loose tools are provided, so details is sparce on this equipment.

Turret assembly and its associated armor plating and grab handles, EMES fire control system, laser rangefinder etc is completed in steps 20-32, turrent and hull are mated in the final step, 33.

No figures, interior or exceptional detail of any kind are provided in this kit.

Paint

The finished article was painted completely with Tamiya acrylics and alclad primer and microfiller.

The overall kit was painted in alclad primer/microfiller to give a base to the planned NATO scheme. Initially I had planned to mask and airbrush the tank, however, in the end I decided to complete the painting by hand with brush freehand. I applied over the alclad microfiller coats of NATO Black, NATO Green and NATO Brown to the tank before dulling everything down with a tri tone wash. A gloss coat of alclad was applied to apply the decals before a final green earth pigment was applied liberally over the entire model to dull down the stark Camo significantly. Additional pigments were applied to the running gear and some metal pigments applied to the tracks to give them a slight metallic look.

No additional weathering was applied.

Kit decals were applied to represent the Leopard 1A5, Armored Troops School, German Federal Armed Forces. The decals were quite uncooperative and difficult to work with but once on and in position they behaved.

Pros

• Superfast build due to well-engineered parts.
• Excellent fit, no flash.
• Good price point, affordable quality kit for the price.
• Nice packaging and presentation.

Cons

• Decals were not so good.
• No additional track links provided, could be a problem if there are any breakages.
• Very little additional detail, molded detail is basic.

Many thanks to MRC for providing the kit and to IPMS/USA for facilitating the review.