K is for Khaki Kit Figures

Not the post I envisioned but I'm sick of encountering them (Esci's British Paratroopers) in Picasa so it's time they went-up, and the main missing item (box art) will be in the next post, so let's clear this little lot as more of a box-ticker!

As with all the other figure sets, there are the two runners in the box (some of the AFV's got three I think?) and it's an odd selection of Airfix rip-off's and rather good original sculpts, some with a reasonable degree of 'multipose' opportunity.

The early Esci (and Revell-branded) sets had a colourful painting guide on the back with the limited assembly information; this was later (1980's - and Humbrol-branded?) reduced to a black & white line-drawing slip included with the contents of the box.

Strangely the instructions seem to depict the back-packs which ended up with the US Soldiers Marine Corps set, suggesting both sets (probably the whole figure-range of the kit line) were being developed at the same time and that the art-workers were slightly ahead of the tool-shop!

Airfix clone wanders-off to exit stage-right, while the more original figure sculpts are seen from the back. The PIAT gunner was a useful addition to peoples armies in the 1970's, and the influence of the Airfix 54mm set can be seen in the officer and radio-operator's berets, something we would see again from Esci in the 1980's when they followed the horse-leading cuirassier and Highland piper/casualty poses (among others) from Airfix's older (1:76th) sets.

Direct piracies (with added packs), taken from the 54mm set, we can be confident that all the Esci 1:72nd's were taken from the 1:32nd scale sets from Airfix, as it would be like working with master sculpts for a skilled pantograph operator.

One of the enduring myths of Airfix's production on some sites/in some books is that some of the later 54mm sets were 'scaled-up' from the HO/OO range - utter nonsense; but the myth persists.

The kneeling firer has some similarity to the earlier 1:32nd scale set, but I suspect that's more co-incidence than design, and with a very different kneeling firer in Airfix's second set (slim, leaning and bereted), one of the more original sculpts in the set.

The PIAT gunner is totally new.

All of them together; like I say, not one of my best posts, but it'll do and it gets them in the tag-lists! They will of-course return on the Airfix page under both Paratrooper posts/pages, hopefully with better imagery.

Dave Kean's Plastic Soldier Review (PSR) has chapter-and-verse on uniform and equipment accuracy and so forth.