Tamiya’s 1/35 Kübelwagen Type 82 in its Africa-Corps form: the Volkswagen-based light car that carried German officers, messages and men across the North African desert.
The history
The Type 82 was developed from Ferdinand Porsche’s Volkswagen design as a light military utility car. Its simple, boxy body suited mass production, and Tamiya puts production at around 50,000 between 1938 and 1945. It served as a liaison, reconnaissance and light transport vehicle on every front.
Its air-cooled four-cylinder engine was a particular advantage in North Africa, where it was shipped from 1942: with no radiator and no coolant to boil away or leak, it was easy to keep running in the heat. For the desert, many were fitted with wide balloon tyres to improve their performance on sand.
The build
Built from Tamiya’s Africa-Corps kit, Military Miniature Series No. 238. The kit reproduces the Type 82 with balloon tyres, a folding windscreen and doors that can be assembled open or closed, along with the dashboard, seats and underside detail. The model is finished in a desert scheme with a “J” tactical sign on the doors and rear and a WH registration plate.
Gallery
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