Hello Hivers!
It's Time For A model Kit Review!
This review is for a 1/35 scale plastic kit for a 1930s and 40s era Soviet railroad 18 ton capacity 2 axle gondola. When the real gondolas were built in the 1930s, they originally had a 16.5 ton load capacity. At some point in the late 1930s, they were upgraded from the original spoked wheels to solid wheels, and also had heavier springs installed to give them a load capacity of 18 tons. These cars stayed in use at least through the 1940s and into the 1950s. They were used to haul all different kinds of cargo, including bulk commodities such as coal.
This kit is currently being produced by the company MiniArt of Ukraine. This kit is one of their line of Soviet WW2 era railroad cars that includes 2 different flatcars, this gondola, and several different versions of the standard 2 axle boxcar. The MiniArt railroad car kits can be built to be displayed on European standard gauge track, or Russian wide gauge track. Their railroad car kits include a section of track that you can build to display the car on. This kit is produced with styrene plastic parts that must be assembled to build the car, and also includes photo-etched brass parts for some of the finer details. The kit includes decals to reproduce a car from 1 of several different regional areas and also different time periods. This particular kit also includes fuel barrels for a load, and 5 figures.
I also did a model kit review of one of the 1/35 scale MiniArt Soviet 1930s and 40s era flatcars last spring and posted it on my hive page back then. You can read that post here.
@amberyooper/model-kit-review-135-scale-soviet-railway-flatcar
This is the video for my review of the Soviet 18 ton gondola kit. This video is a bit longer than my usual review videos because of the time it took to look at all the parts.
I hope you found this model kit review interesting, or at least entertaining!
