Gramodels 1/76 FCM 2C

Already in 1916 had the French Army had ordered the construction of a so called "Char de Rupture", a Breakthrough Tank - an idea which can be found behind many of the Monster Tank projects nursed by many combatants in the late stages of the War. After some trials and prototype attempts they finally came up with the 2C.

The FCM 2C was not a bad design, considering that the basic idea was not that great - and especially if you compare with the German effort, the infernal "K-Wagen". It weighed some 69-ton, but it was well-armoured for it's day and still rather fast. The Allies planned a big war-winning push in 1919, a push that was thought to be spearheaded by British and American Mk VIII:s and this tank: the French FCM 2C:s. 300 FCM 2C:s were ordered, but at the time of the armistice in November 1918 only 10 were on the productions lines: they were eventually completed in 1921. No more were built.

The FCM 2C has only been modelled once before in this scale, and that was by the now long gone French company of ITA, and their kit had a number of faults. Now the British Company Gramodels has made a resin braille scale kit of this unique tank. And a very welcome addition it is. The kit is made in a Light Yellow, slightly brittle resin. The moulding in itself is good, and it only comes with small amounts of flash. (The MG:s are moulded with the same technique as is used by some other companies, like Ostmodels, i.e. they are reinforced by wire, which forms the core. In my copy this has only been a partrial success.) The kit is made up of some 25 parts. The main parts are the hull, the two turrets, the engine superstructure and the two driving assemblies.

The kits dimensions and outline is correct, with some small exceptions: the turret is positioned a little bit too far forward; the turret itself is some 1-1,5mm to big lengthwise; the hatch compartment in front of the turret is too square-ish in shape (no 1 on photo); and the front of the driving assembly, the part that extends to the front sprocket, is too short (no 2 on photo).

The kit has many fine points - especially if compared to the old ITA kit: the track plates are a faithful representation of the original; it HAS rivets - the ITA kit had only... holes -, but, alas, their size varies a bit, as does their spacing. An excellent point is that you are able to build early and late variants of the tank. The main difference between these variants is in the motor compartment (two are supplied), which in a later variants were protected by a anti-grenade mesh roof, in this kit represented by solid resin parts (no 3 in the photo), perhaps not the best solution, but still quite sufficient. (These roofs were removed by 1939.)

In order to build this kit you really need the Tankette no. 1/35, or better still, No. 2 of Minitracks, the new French Magazine dedicated to small scale military modelling: this issue ha a large article on the Gramodels kit, including a lot of good photos, colour profiles and 1/76 scale plans - accidently the same as in the Tankette. The kit can be bought from Blitzkrieg Models in the UK: just mail them!