Japanese trucks in WW2 build by Hasegawa

Hello!

After finishing all the Japanese tanks in 1/76 scale, I am focused on the other japanese vehicles in small scales.

Sadly, the offer is not so great!

While Fujimi was specialized on tanks, another Japanese firm, Hasegawa, has 2 trucks in his own product range.

Code MT 16 Fuel Truck Isuzu TX-40

Code MT 17 Toyota Truck Starter

Before beginning with the construction, I would like to give brief information about the company.

Build in 1942, their first production were wooden models more for education.

Their first plastic model was a japanese warship "Yamato" in 1/450 scale.

After selling about 150,000 (yes, one hundred and fifty thousand!) pieces, they decided to produce in 1/90 scale, F-104 Starfighter, and in 1/70 scale, P-51 Mustang.

These two models reached also a very good sales numbers, so that they stopped the production of wood models, and focused on plastic model.

Their scales of production:

1 / 24 car

1 / 32 - 1 / 48 - 1 / 72 - 1 / 200 aircraft

1 / 72 land vehicles

1 / 350 and 1 / 700 ships

Recently, they created "Maschinen Krieger" series for children.

About company products, in my opinion, there is no need to comment more!

Both the mold, and plan and stage of crating is never falling below a certain quality, especially Hasegawa's 1/72 scale models of aircraft maintained to accept the market itself.

The company, cooperates in the European market with Revell, and in the North American market, with Revell and Dragon.

Our model is

MT 17-coded Starter Truck Toyota GB

Model's short history:

Kiichiro Toyoda, produced Japan's first truck Toyota G1 in 1935.

it was 6 meters long, and sould transport 1.5 tones(yes, one and a half!).
Ford and GM trucks were copied by the production of this truck.

19,870 units of our model "GB" type, were produced between 1938 and 1942.

There is a note in the production sheet:

"if you want to build a late-war model truck, due to the raw material shortage in Japan, you can leave one of the headlights or fenders."

Only this note is a proof for the quality of Hasegawa products!

The content of the box:

There are 51 parts in 2 separate sets.

8 parts belong to three figures, 9-parts are for the aircraft bomb and the carrier vehicle. There are 6 parts for building of the lift on the truck.

So, for building the main truck we just have 28 parts.

That means we have a model with a small number of parts, really relaxed to build!

Before starting to glue, the truck driver and truck tires have to be painted.

Used colors are khaki, black, tan, white and rust!

Please have a look for the photos (text in turlish):

http://worldin172scale.blogspot.com/2009/07/merhaba-176-olcekteki-tum-japon.html