The BAE Systems Warrior has been bringing British soldiers into the fight since the mid-’80s — and with its 30mm cannon and 7.62 mm coaxial chain gun, it definitely brings punch to the party. The most recent variant has bar armor to help protect its crew from RPGs, but the flat hull still leaves it vulnerable to IEDs.
Opening the box, I was pleasantly surprised by the number of parts — a lot for a 1/48 scale vehicle, and just about all of them are used. Some interior parts are included, which is nice. Detail throughout the molds is decent for the scale, but it’s not on a par with some of its competitors. Several parts had a bit of flash on them, but they were easy enough to clean up.
Instructions are easy to follow and include a brief history of the Warrior and a decal/paint reference guide in color. There’s no parts tree breakdown, however. The cover sheet is labeled “1/72 Scale Model Construction Kit,” but I didn’t notice any other mistakes in the 115 steps it takes to finish the model.
The build is really not that difficult, and parts fit is pretty decent. But I ran into problems assembling the tracks. An aftermarket set may make life a lot easier.
Other than that, it’s pretty straightforward. You can skip steps 5-12 if you leave the hatches shut, saving some time on the build.
The bar armor appears thick and over-scale, making the model look toylike. All of the radio antennas are included, but they also are a bit on the thick side.
I painted my Warrior with Testors Model Master armor sand. You may want to paint the bar armor and the model separately, then install the bar armor — easier than painting with the bar armor on.
Decals, though few, went on with no problems. I put the decals down over a coat of Pledge FloorCare Multi-Surface finish and noticed no silvering.
The completed model looks fine. If you get over the difficulty of the tracks, the rest of the build is enjoyable. Hopefully, a photoetched-metal detail set will appear with scaled-down bar armor.
It is great to see some 1/48 scale modern armor models hitting the shelves. I wouldn’t recommend this kit for a beginner, mainly because of the difficulty of the tracks. But an experienced armor modeler should have no problem turning out a good-looking Warrior.
Note: A version of this review appeared in the October 2014 FineScale Modeler.