Hotchkiss ambulance

In 1958 the the year in which the German Bundeswehr became alive as part of the West European "NATO" there was a new structure of the army units introduced. It became very obvious that at the time there was no vehicle in the inventory, mainly US Army equipment, that was suitable for the role of the light armoured first aid and rescue vehicle for "German combat troops".

The decision was made to order the modified version of the French Hotchkiss TT6 vehicle, which was basically an armored cargo vehicle. With German modifications it received the name "Schützenpanzer kurz" (SPz kurz = IFV short). the modified vehicle had five road wheels per side, while French original had four. The first aid and rescue version of the "Schützenpanzer kurz" got the name "SAN Panzer kurz". Inside the small vehicle is space for 5 wounded soldiers, two on hand barrows and 3 on seats. The vehicle served until early 1970s when it was replaced by M113 versions.

The kit comes in a large cardboard box , about the size of typical plastic kit box. The resin parts are packed in zip-bags and are well protected by styrofoam chips and shredded paper. Decals for three versions, a length of wire and the assembly instruction is included.

The kit consists in 332 parts, where 182 parts of 200 parts are needed for the single link track. One of the instruction sheets contains a list of all included parts. Each part is shown on drawing and is also named.

Second sheet of instructions, an 8 pages booklet, contains some general assembly guidelines and the assembly instruction giving instructiuons in the form exploded diagrams. Painting references are given in the instructions using generic color names and Revell numbers.

The resin parts are attached to casting blocks. Attachment points are quite small and they are very easy to remove even for anyone with minimum experience in working with resin kits. On some parts there are deliberately some additional resin pins and plates added to help in casting process and these need to be removed, too.

All parts have crisp and very well defined details on them.

The split of parts in the kit is similar to any typical plastic AFV kit with upper and lower hull parts (both hollow), separate suspension arms and shock absorbers, wheels (sprockets and idlers composed of two pieces each). Driver's hatch and troop compartment hatches (two on the top and two at the rear) can all be attached open or closed and have details on both sides. The interior for the troop compartment is completly provided. including the old US radio GRC 4. A lot of small detail parts for the upper hull is provided, including nicely cast pioneer tools and resin tow cable and small shield for the left hull side is given in two optional variants.