The Staghound Armoured Car was produced in America for the British Army and other Allied forces. It first went into action in Italy in 1943. The Staghound Mk. III had a modified Crusader turret with an Ordnance QF 75 mm gun. The bow machine gun was not fitted. It was supplied to some British armoured car regiments during 1944. I have seen the number produced listed as 37 and as 100.

Bronco Models has released this vehicle as their first 1:48 scale kit. The kit consists of 5 sprues of dark yellow plastic parts, one of clear plastic, a small photo etched fret, a length of nylon string, a small decal sheet for 2 vehicles, and a 15 page, 22 step construction booklet. All the parts and the decal sheet are in plastic bags.

My first impression on looking in the box is…break out the optivisor, there are a lot of very tiny parts here. The parts are cleanly molded and the detail is very high. There is no flash and no ejector pin marks to deal with. There are 2mm subassemblies consisting of 3 parts that require a very good set of tweezers and eyesight. Cleaning some of these parts is next to impossible. The sprue attachment point is sometimes larger that the part. I lost a few just getting them off the sprues, and I was being very careful.

The small PE fret also has some very small parts. However, the fret is sealed between 2 layers of clear film. When you cut parts, this film keeps them from escaping. Very cool idea, and it works. I lost a headlight guard while taking the review pictures.

The instructions are good overall, but a little busy in some places. Sometimes it’s hard to see how to bend some PE parts, or exactly where a part goes.

Other than the main gun breach, there is no interior. But I can see some third party and scratchbuilt interiors in the future. All doors and hatches are separate and have interior detail, but if you leave them open, there is nothing to see.

The suspension is well detailed and the wheels are two-part plastic items that look good to me. There are clear plastic periscopes and windows as well as clear headlight lenses. Photoetch mufflers are provided, as well as mud flaps.

Nylon string is included for the tow cable; however, it is oversized and unusable. The plastic cable ends are dwarfed by it. I left the cable off till I can find a replacement.

The decal sheet is well printed and provides markings for a New Zealand vehicle in Italy in 1945 and a Manitoba Dragoons vehicle in Germany in 1945. I live just a few miles south of Manitoba, so I used those markings, aye. There was some silvering, even after several applications of Microsol. The decals are just a bit on the thick side.

This is a very nice kit and, if you can handle the very tiny pieces, is a fun build. I would recommend it to any modeler with good tweezers, eyes, and some building experience.

I would like to thank Dragon Models USA for the review kit and IPMS/USA for the opportunity to review it.