Modeling Madness
Every now and again, my nature to justify everything I do hobbywise just slips and the crazy escapes.
Years back Richard Crawley ran a participation game under the SOTCW banner at the Gauntlet show in Broughton, North Wales. The game was set in a fictional eastern European country which had fallen in chaos following the break-up of the Soviet Union called Andrevia (similar to one of the Balkan states). Now I didn`t own any Cold War era kit, but wanting to support the society I decided to build a NATO peace keeping contingent.
Because of my usual anarchistic need to "not walking the path well travelled" in our hobby, I decided on a Spanish force.
They had M60A3 tanks and M113 carriers, this is the one and only time they ever saw a tabletop.
Ever since, every now and again I find a model which would fit into my orgnisation - an M113 mortar carrier, an M113 with Milan, a recce unit with AML60s and VAMTAC (Spanish Hummer copies) and so the force grows a little bigger. After our visit to Museo de Militar Cartagena back in May the seed of a vague idea has been growing to build and add an M113 with Roland-2 surface-to-air missile system.
My somewhat blurry photos from Cartagena
Spanish vehicles during the National Day parade
These photos are of Roland-2s on AMX30s in French service
All-weather self-propelled anti-aircraft missile system Roland-2 with a radar tracking system for target and missile
tracking was developed by the company "Messerchmitt-Bolkow-Blohm"
(Germany) together with "Aerospatiale-Matra" (France) and is capable
of destroying targets flying at speeds up to Mac 1.2 at altitudes from 15m to 5.5
km and ranges from 500m to 6.3 km.
The layout of the
Roland-2 SAM system is a rotating tower onto which are mounted: two beams
to accommodate missiles, radar antenna detection, radar antenna to escort the
target and missiles, optical and infrared tracking systems and antenna command
transmitter. Inside the casing of the launcher mounted transmitters and
receivers of the target detection radar and target and missile tracking radar,
counting and resolution device, remote control, two revolver magazines with
eight missiles in transport and launch containers, a radio station,
instrumentation and power supply. Beam holders with containers in the angular
plane are automatically guided through the target tracking line, in the azimuth
plane - by turning the tower. The unit can be fitted to any suitable
vehicle chassis – Marder (Germany), AMX 30 (France), M109 (USA) plus several truck mounted variants.
Roland-2 SAM
system fires the same missiles as Roland-1 which it was designed to replace. The solid-propellant
missile has an empty weight of 62.5 kg and weighs 6.5 kg, including 3.3 kg of
explosives. In addition to the contact fuse, the BC also has a radio detonator,
which provides firing at a distance of up to 4 m from the target. The radius of
flight of 65 fragments is about 6m.
Roland-2 was used by Iraq during the Iran-Iraq War, in 1982 Iraq claimed a F-4E Phantom and a F-5E Tiger
During the Falklands War on June 1st 1982 an Argentine Roland operated by 601st AA Artillery group destroyed Sea Harrier XZ456
During Desert Storm in 1991, Iraqi Rolands claimed an A-6E TRAM Intruder, a RAF Tornado GR-1 and an A-10 Thunderbolt
Full disclosure
I errored the Spanish bought Roland-2 mounted on AMX30 NOT M113s D`oh! I totally miss-identified the vehicle in Cartagena. But I`ve decided I`m just going to fudge it as this is just a fun project and live with it.
