A model I’ve wanted to build for *years* is one of the Small ICBM “Hard Mobile Launcher.” There were three different vehicles manufactured by three different companies; the one on my mind is the Boeing variant on non-display at the Hill Aerospace Museum. The time and effort involved in such an endeavor, with dubious hopes of payoff, have kept me from this one.
A recently mentioned, Revell later this year is going to re-release the 1/32 “Atomic Cannon.” It dawned on me that the two vehicle would look good next to each other. But a 1/32 scale model of a 110-foot-long truck would be a big, big thing, and thus kinda expensive. I have recently been making good headway with display models (I will shortly post photos of some recent and ongoing efforts), and so my thought for a large-scale HML would be to produce a limited number as finished display models. I half-jokingly posted this notion to another forum and did get one expression of interest, interest which apparently remained when I mentioned the pricetag. “Interest,” of course, does not count until money changes hands.
So, my question here is twofold:
1: Anyone interested? The price would be substantial, but less if there are more interested & paying aprties up front.
2: Is 1/32 the right scale? Seems that 1/35 is a more common “armor” scale, and is of course slightly smaller. Wouldn’t affect price a whole lot, but a few inches off the length might matter (about 41 inches for 1/32, about 38 for 1/35). However, the Atomic Cannon is only available in 1/32… and another difficult-to-find and expensive version at 1/40 scale (33 inches).
8 Responses to “1/32 HML?”
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Here goes commie Bruce again (J/K-just kidding) but I personally myself like the tulip launch
pad (the one that Russia uses and has been using since the early days of the R-7s (Sputnik
and Vostok) for example at Baiknour and still uses currently to launch the Soyuz rockets to
the ISS. There is a drawing of it on SuzyMchale.com website if you look in the right place. I
forgot the other website that shows models of it but if your modeling skills are right to make it
function right you might just have a neat and unususal model rocket launcher. Good Luck if
you decide to build one and share some pictures as well.
Yeah, I always wanted a model of that pad also. It’s a perfect subject for a photoetch and resin kit in 1/144 scale.
I once saw an ad for a Japanese model of a “Vostok rocket with launcher”, and thought they meant the pad, only to find out it was this bizarre thing: http://modelarchives.free.fr/archives_P/boxartbloopers/img1.gif
A Vostok rocket riding around on a weird wheeled carrier and being launched like a FROG missile…under WWII Wehrmacht control!
I think that 1/35 would go over better with military model collectors than 1/32, as it’s the standard scale for larger armor models, and the 1/32 stuff suffers in sales due to its odd scale, and inability to get figures and equipment to use with it in dioramas.
You might also look into doing it in 1/48 scale, which seems to be making a comeback, especially in Japan.
I hadn’t know that they’d built actual prototypes. I only saw artist’s renderings in the press when the Small ICBM was being politically-debated. Although I think it’s neat-looking, l’m not into models anymore…
I could never understand why they had to build a separate missile rather than just taking a Navy Trident II and putting it in a mobile launch tube.
A: Midgetman = 30K lbs; Trident D-5 = 129 K lbs
B: Trident uses propellants that you *don’t* want to use in a vehicle that’ll be driving around unimproved roads.
Hi Scott…Define substantial please as to price… Similar to the 1/35th Dora Railgun price?
In that range, yes. While that’s heart-attack expensive (well, it is for *me* at any rate), keep in mind that the HML would be not the product of a whole company doing their best to stamp oput thousands of units, but *one* *guy* slaving away on his own to make at best a handfull. So it’d be something of a rare collectors item.