Armory

G4 Staff Car off-road wheels with weighted tires

This set is marketed as a "universal" set, so I would suppose that it could be used on both the ancient Hasegawa G4 or the much newer ICM release, though I would suspect that they would look best on the more accurate ICM kit. The package comes with 8 wheels with off-road style tread pattern. Four wheels are for the twin rear axles, 2 for the front axle, plus a pair of spares. The way to differentiate them is by their wheel hubs. The tires are also weighted, that is, there is some bulge to them. Personally I think the bulge is a bit overdone when compared to period photographs. It appears that all the wheels are from the same mould, so the bulge is in the same place on each tire and the lug nuts will be all aligned on the model with the bulges flat on the ground.

Casting is excellent. There are only a few small holes to fill. I did notice that the hubs for the front wheels are not too round. Tread pattern looks decent and as far as I can tell, accurate. The tire size and manufacturer (Dunlop) is delicately moulded to the sidewall and there is even a small representation of a valve stem. Unfortunately my sample arrived with a broken hub on one of the wheels.

According to [2] the 750x17 BF Goodrich tire they sell is approximately 33.50 inches in diameter, or about 0.465 inches in 1/72 scale. My dial caliper measures out to 0.47 inches on one of the spares, pretty close to 1/72 in my books.

All in all a decent set of wheels and very useful for those that wish to replace the soft vinyl-like tires that come in the ICM kit, or the atrocious tires of the Hasegawa kit.

References

[1] Allied-Axis Issue 14, Ampersand Publishing, Delray Beach, Florida 2004 p.47-53
[2] Coker Tire BF Goodrich Blackwall 750-17 (see Specifications tab)
[3] motoimg.com
[4] wikipedia
[5] autoevolution.com

Preview sample supplied by Taras Karabyn of Armory.

Article Last Updated: 03 March 2017