A BRIEF HISTORY OF JUNGLE TANKS

To find our inspiration for this project, we did a little research into the history of jungle tanks. You can find a lot of this information on your own, but there are a few things worth mentioning here so you can see why we made the things we did.

Crossing jungle rivers can be hazardous without the right equipment.

AVLB

Though tanks were used in the jungle during WWII by the Americans, British, and Japanese, most of the interesting jungle mods came out of the Vietnam War. One of these was the Armoured-Vehicle-Launched Bridge (AVLB). This device allowed a unit of tanks to cross rivers and other obstacles without having to wait for combat engineers to build a bridge – the tanks brought their own. The first AVLB design was a "scissor" bridge that extended high up in the air before being placed over the obstacle. However, this gave away the tank's position because the bridge rose above the tree line.

The Germans came up with a new design in the 1970's that solved this problem. Rather than extend the bridge upward, their Biber AVLB slid the bridge sections out in a horizontal fashion. We figured that the tanks of the 41st millennium would follow the more-advanced Biber design.

JUNGLE CUTTER

Though US tanks usually stayed in the less-forested savannahs of Vietnam, sometimes they had to go into the denser areas to support the infantry. We all know about the infamous Agent Orange, but the Americans also used flame throwers, chainsaws, "Daisy Cutter" bombs, and other demolitions to clear the jungle for mobility's sake. The Catachan-pattern Sentinel has a few of these features, and we adapted them for this jungle Chimera.

CUPOLA ARMOUR

A Leman Russ in the jungles of a death world

Though a tank can cut a path through the jungle, this process still leaves dense undergrowth on both sides of the tank. During the Vietnam War, the Vietnamese used this cover to their advantage to launch ambushes – they could sneak up next to the tank and attach an explosive device or shoot any exposed crewmembers. American tank crews wised up in a hurry, and they began adding an armour screen around their pintle-mounted machine guns. We made a similar screen and used it in place of the normal Chimera turret.

Okay, enough history – on to the modelling! Here's what you'll need to build your own jungle variant of the good ol' Mk IX Chimera.

ITEM LIST

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