MiniArt 1/35 Railway Covered Goods Wagon 18t 'NTV' Type Kit First Look

By Michael Benolkin

First Look

As Germany moved into surrounding territories in the early days of World War 2, the Deutsche Reichsbahn was responsible for integrating the railways and rolling stock into the German logistics machine. Since most of these railways were interoperating with the Deutsche Reichsbahn as well as the pre-war German private railways, that integration process was rather straightforward. A different kind of 'iron curtain' existed at the Polish/Russian border as the Russians used a different track gauge (distance between rails) and the German/European engines and rolling stock were not compatible with the Soviet rail system (and vice versa).

After the start of Operation Barbarossa in 1941, the Deutsche Reichsbahn had the task of getting the captured Soviet rail assets into service as well as converting those assets to work on German gauge tracks as German engineers converted the Soviet rails to German gauge. While the Germans had converted an impressive portion of the western Soviet rail network, the Russian winters rendered German locomotives inoperable, but that's another story.

MiniArt has produced an interesting array of detail and acessory sets to render different types of rail lines, as well as released two European tram cars. Here is their first installment of rolling stock, an 18 ton covered goods wagon (European boxcar). I believe this is the first styrene kit of a covered goods wagon in this scale, while DML and Trumpeter have produced flat cars and hopper cars (among other things). This kit is molded in light gray styrene and presented on 26 parts trees (duplicate trees not shown), plus one fret of photo-etched detail parts.

Among the features and options:

• Wheels can be set to European or Russian track gauge
• Nice underside chassis detail
• Sliding doors and windows are positionable
• Detailed interior and exterior

Decals are provided for six examples, some in Soviet service, the remainder under 'new management' with Deutsche Reichsbahn markings.

MiniArt has filled a void in 1/35 rolling stock, and I hope they'll also render a typical German covered goods wagon (though this kit could be modified, if you don't want to wait). With this subject now available, there are many options for dioramas and vignettes featuring this kit along with rolling stock from other manufacturers and perhaps one of the Trumpeter locomotives. Having a single covered goods wagon with a supply truck backed up to the door and material being loaded or unloaded would make for one of those interesting vignettes.