Bolt Action A34 Comet Cruiser Tank

We've covered the lighter Cromwell tank before (the resin kit in 2013 and the plastic kit in 2014 - only in German), and we're following up on this class of British tanks, with another draft from 2018's backlog we're completing today - the A34 Comet Cruiser Tank.

My attention to the Comet Cruiser tank came from World of Tanks, as I really enjoyed playing the Tier VII medium tank back then. So, when Warlord Games added the kit to their range, I just had to have and now want to share the build report / review with a bit of delay with you.

It is available as a 28mm / 1:56th scale resin kit, and costs 36,50 GBP / 44 EUR. The Comet came into service near the end of the second World War during the Allied invasion of Western Europe. It was developed from the earlier Cromwell tank and was armed with a new 17 pdr gun. While it entered active service in January 1945, it stayed in service until 1958 with the British, and those units sold to other countries even until the 1980s. The Comet tank was later succeeded by the Centurion tank, which we covered on here as well. But the Centurion didn't make the Comet obsolete, it was used alongside.

There were two variants of the hull, Type A with cowls redirecting the exhaust fumes (similar to the Cromwell, but split into two covers not a larger single one) and a Type B hull with twin fishtails. The Type B is a post-war variant and Warlord Games went with this design, probably to make this model more fitting for the larger portion of its service (1945 vs 1946 to the 1980s).

And based upon the Comet were prototypes / further development. Similar to the Churchill Crocodile, there is documentation of a Comet Crocodile fitted with a flamethrower and fuel trailer. Finland as one of the countries putting the Comet into service post-world war 2, have experimentally upgraded a single Comet with an adapted turret to carry a 20 pdr gun. Another up-arming experiment was done by the British, with the FV4401 Contentious, using the Comet as a base to build a tank destroyer with a 105mm L7 gun, creating something similar to the Swedish Stridsvagn 103. None of these went into series production. South Africa anyhow used Comets as a base for maintenance vehicles to support their Olifant Mk1A MBT (a variant of the Centurion). We've covered ARV variants of the Sherman and Panzer III on this blog. If you're looking for a British variant of an ARV for World War 2, the Comet came too late to the party, a good option would be the Cromwell.

As with the other tanks we've covered in our caught up from the drafts, this is an older production batch without a cardboard packaging just wrapped in bubble wrap with a sticker. This was prior to the release of the resin handling leaflet, I assume that you'll get one of these with it nowadays.

The main parts of the hull, classic cut of hull, left and right tracks as well as the turret are casted from resin, with the details in metal, along with a single crew.

Without packaging (as it provides a diagram and / or product pictures) it can be difficult to build these, so I added this picture to the review in case you have still questions after the build report.

The cast was clean. No air bubbles or impurities. Yet smaller details have broken off, that were easily reattached using super glue. There was no warpage and the sides aligned neatly with the main hull.

As there were no pins or grooves for the sides to align, just a flat surface I scratched the insides a bit to create a better surface for the glue to connect onto.

While you could just glue the barrel through the gun mount, I felt it would be a wiser decision to pin this, to create a stronger and more reliable bond, especially if you intend to use this as a gaming piece. Don't just pin it to the gun mount but to the turret as well, and you could even go for a small brass rod instead of just a piece of paper clip as I did.

And we're almost there. Already sleek looking tank.

The details can be something requiring a steady hand, especially the protection bars for the head lights. If you lose or break those you can replace them with wire. Beyond that, as every of these pieces is glued into a pin hole and not freely aligned on a flat surface, this was easier as on other tanks.

As for the crew, I went for a closed commanders hatch and to not use the vehicles commander.

Here is a comparison with the smaller Comet tank. You can see the parallels of the design.

And the final set of pictures on the Comet Cruiser Tank.

Conclusion

I got this tank years ago, when it was the only option to have a Comet tank and prior to the price raises. At 44 EURs this is a hard pill to swallow. Overall, a clean kit, well-made and but the fixed Type B hull (it would have been nice, if they added the cowls as an option) is a bit of a let down.

The conclusion would have been much more positive back then, lower price and no competition. But in the meantime, Rubicon released a Comet plastic kit, covering Type A and B (so giving you a proper World War 2 variant of this tank) and even a tarp cover for the gun mount for half of the price. So, this is a no brainer and probably the main issue with the range of resin kits nowadays. Unless they are so niche, that they don't have a plastic alternative, where you can justify that price to some degree, they are a bit obsolete, especially if they don't provide additional value to a plastic kit.

Yet, for me as part of a North-Western-Europe Allied force, it was a must have and I can see this tank for some Cold War or other post WW2 scenarios.

Bolt Action is a brand of Warlord Games.