Morris Light Reconnaissance Car (LRC)

FC Modeltrend, 1/48 scale

Reviewed by Brett Green

Summary

Introduction

The Morris Light Reconnaissance Car (LRC) was a British light armoured car for reconnaissance use produced by Morris Motors Limited and used by British and Commonwealth formations during the Second World War.

The Nuffield Group had been brought in to supplement production of light reconnaissance cars by Standard Motor Company (Beaverette) and Humber (Humber LAC, also known as "Humberette").

The vehicle had an unusual internal arrangement, with the three-man crew sitting side by side by side with the driver in the middle, a crewman manning a small multi-sided turret mounting a Bren light machine gun on the right, and another with a Boys anti-tank rifle (mounted in brackets in the hatches on the hull roof) and access to radio set on the left. From 1940 to 1944, over 2,200 were built.

The vehicle was used in the North African, Italian and in North-West Europe campaigns. Some served with the RAF Regiment, others were given to Polish units.

One of the surviving vehicles is on display at the Imperial War Museum Duxford, another at The Tank Museum, Bovington, and another at the Military Museum at Port Dickson, Malaysia.*

F i r s t L o o k

FC Modeltrend has a growing range of 3D printed accessories and full kits. Their newest 1:48 scale 3D offering is a full kit of the Morris Light Reconnaissance Car.

This is a jaw-dropping example of its type. The kit is supplied in just seven main pieces – hull, turret and five wheels – plus thee smaller parts for the rear wheel weel covers and the grille for the rear hull.

Detail is stunning. All smaller detail elements are printed directly onto one of the six major pieces including the gun, smoke discharger andvarious hinges and hollow handles. The only design issue is that one of the fine and delicate rear vision mirrors had broken off in transit, and the other one broke off as I was unpacking the parts.

Printing quality is excellent although there are some striations visible, particularly on the engine deck. These are parallel marks on the surface that are sometimes left by the 3D printing process. Careful sanding will eliminate these.

The main pieces have been supported during the printing process with seemingly hundreds of fine strips / rods. These taper inward where they attach to the actual kit parts, so clean-up may be a bit tedious (although less so than assembling individual link workable tracks) but certainly not difficult.

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I would recommend nipping the rods as close as possible to the kit part with a good quality sprue cutter and then cleaning up any residue with a new hobby blade and a sanding stick. This should be a good task to undertake while binging your favourite streaming series on TV.

Once the six parts are free and the supporting strips are cleaned up, assembly will be a breeze. The breakdown of the parts will be ideal to paint each separately then bring them together. Super Glue or epoxy cement will work for this job.

Instructions are not included but they are not really required for assembly, which is pretty self-explanatory. The only part I wasn't sure of was the grille on the rear hull.

Decals are not supplied either, which is a bit more problematic.

C o n c l u s i o n

FC Modeltrend’s 1:48 scale Morris Light Reconnaissance Car is a pointer to the future of our hobby.

3D printing will allow very short runs of even the most esoteric subjects with no compromise in terms of detail or quality. Parts breakdown and assembly will be very simple in these scale models of the future.

If you are a modeller who prefers the painting and weathering stages of a project, you will love these next generation kits with minimal assembly.

I've already started mine!

* Historical text courtesy of Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morris_Light_Reconnaissance_Car

Thanks to FC Modeltrend for the sample www.fcmodeltrend.com