Sonderwagen M8, Pt 1

Greetings to all forum members.

On this occasion I wanted to show you a project that I quickly realized in the last weeks.

Going through my boxes, I found an old Italeri kit: the M8 "Greyhound" armored vehicle. It is a kit that already has many years on top of it, and that the passage of time is noticeable, compared to current kits. It is a kit that has good fits, but with a somewhat soft plastic and with a somewhat shallow detailing.

To make the project more interesting, I decided to go for a little seen version. I am referring to the "Sonderwagen M8" or SW-1. This is nothing more than an M8 "Greyhound" used by the Bundesgrenzschutz or Federal Border Guard, the first national armed service of West Germany, created in 1951. The vast majority of the Bundesgrenzschutz personnel were former members of the Wehrmacht. The portable armament consisted of MG-42 machine guns, 98k and Enfield MkI rifles, and Beretta M1938/49 and DUX 53 submachine guns. They also used MG1 machine guns, which were MG-42s recalibrated to 7.62 NATO caliber. The guns used were Walther P-38 and Astra 600/43.

The first armored vehicle used by West Germany was the Sonderwagen M8. They were M8 "Greyhound" donated by the USA. For this, all the armament they possessed was removed, as well as the stowage for the ammunition. After some time of use, an MG-42 machine gun was placed in the place where the 37 mm cannon was originally located. These vehicles were used until the 1960s, when they were replaced by the SW-2 designed by MOWAG in Switzerland.

In this first part I will show the assembly and the final result before painting.

I hope you like it and any comments are welcome. Thank you very much and best regards.

12 additional images. Click to enlarge.