Kit recommendations for an Armor beginner

That's too vague.  What kind of armor are you interested in?  I personally love Tamiya kits except their ancient ones.

I would have to say mid "Cold War" to modern armor interests me, not saying that I wouldn't build a WWII kit, just want a little more experience before I tackle a Panzer.

I found the trumpeter AS 90 spg to be a cheap and easy enough build. No internals to worry about, basic two tone nato camo, and turns into a nice model. If you are feeling adventurous there is a photo etch set and, metal barrel available for it. and workable track sets too if you are a masochist.

Tamiya kits are good for beginners; a decent level of detail and easy  to build.  For Cold War, I recommend the M43 Walker Bulldog, M48A3, or M60A1.   For more modern, the M2 and M2A2 Bradleys, M1A1or M1A2 Abrams.

I just put together the Tamiya Tiran 5. Coming on the heels of two Dragon builds and a difficult conversion project, it was a snap. $ 40 at Amazon.

It's really detailed though, but you just crank along sticking parts on the thing. No built in traps, and it's a really good looking tank. One color paint scheme too. Highly recommended.

How about the Tamiya M60A3 for Cold War and Tamiya M4A3 Sherman for WWII. Both build a rather good model and have supported tracks so no need to worry about the correct amount of sag.

Tamiya's Cromwell and Centaur kits are excellent choices as well. Beautifully detailed, simple assembly, logically engineered... A perfect introductory kit for anyone with some model building experience now wanting to try their hand at armor.

Hi Souda99,

The Tamiya Hetzer would be my starting point for WWII:

www.perthmilitarymodelling.com/.../tam35285.html

Do not worry to much about the Camouflage, the basic assembly is superb, parts count is limited, the kit is a real shake and bake.

Cold area/modern I would recommend the Trumpeter T-62 or the Tamiya M1A1.

Lots of reference pictures around!

Apart from that agree with all of the above and I think HA has put down some nice US kits.

Best Regards

Johan

Hi Souda99.  I'm just getting back into the hobby myself and I chose the Tamiya M41 Walker Bulldog as my first kit.  I built it back when I was a teenager, but destroyed it with a firecracker, so thought I'd give it another go!  It's a simple kit and fairly accurate for a kit that originally came out in 1970.  And its very inexpensive - I got mine for $10.84 at Scalehobbyist.com.

Tamiya Ford GPA amphibious jeep; if it must have tracks, then perhaps the M5  or M8.  Any of those will  build up simply; all are monochrome, all thaave enough detail to allow for experimenting with more, or for leaving as is.

My 2¢

Hello!

I have recently built the LAV-25 from Trumpeter and that thing was really pleasant to build. The fit was really nice. There are some fiddly suspension bits at the bottom but they are manageable. It was $26 on Amazon.

If you are pretty confident in your skills and want to dive off the deep end and get something I would say get the Zvezda T90, its $32 on Amazon and is really detailed and the fit of the parts is really good, it just requires some finer sanding and such.

If you like American stuff, theres a Cyber Hobby M1A1 kit for $30 on Amazon as well, and I hear thats pretty good.

Honestly, just buy whatever suits your fancy around the $25-$35 price point.

Just to add my 2 cents to this thread I found the Tamiya T34/85 as a very easy build.

Yes, their T-34/85 is a  simple great kit. And straight OOB does not require any corrections or modifications. Their T-34/76 Chtz is also in that category. Their older T-34/76s are good sample kits as well, but need a tiny bit of fixing.