A couple of Heller's fire appliances

 

Going back in time to 1937 we have excellent kit from Heller, based on the Delahaye chassis, this escape engine was ordered by the Monaco principality and was delivered in 1939. After 30 years of service, it was sold to the town of Bonneville and is, apparently still in use. As with a lot of Heller kits just about every detail is provided and well moulded. I think my only criticism is that some of the parts provided are broken down too far, making a number of unnecessary joins, but this does allow some very impressive fine details to be put on the extendable ladder that others would be hard to emulate.

Construction notes
The steering parts are very delicate and the holes in part 87, track rod, are a tight fit, so I recommend you enlarge the holes with a 1.25mm drill bit to ensure a smooth operation and care should be exercised when cementing the stub axle halves (parts 60-63) to ensure they turn on the king pins. The bodywork will need careful alignment, i.e. fire wall part 54 should be firmly pressed down into its location or the body panels, parts 32-33 won’t fit over the top properly. Leave these to harden then sand down the joint. Add the hinge bar part 37to one side of the bonnet (hood) part 11 and leave until firm. Mount both to the bodywork checking the edges are a close fit, then add the other side, again check location before adding the grille to the front end.
This area gave me the most problems as the locations are not too well defined and I didn’t want to spoil the paint finish I had achieved on the unassembled parts. There are some mould joint lines on the ladders which will need a little scraping clean, but take care not to remove the little location pips on the rung sections as these are to locate the side sections in the
correct positions.
I found it was possible to build up quite large sections of the turntable unit and elevator before spraying, thus ensuring few unsightly joins, but you will have to make up your own mind how far you want to go.
Heller give lots of colour information on the instruction sheets, but as I have trouble relating numbers to colours I go through and pencil in the colours by the numbers. This is a great help in deciding what to paint before or after assembly.
A very nice fire appliance model , I think it’s got to be my favou-rite.

    Heller - Citroën C4 pump and Ladder

This one goes even further back in time, but Heller has given it their usual stylish treatment with excellent detailing right down to the wooden seats for the fire crew and louvered bonnet over the lightly detailed engine compartment.
The only notes I made was how easy it all was, rather on a par with the Italeri Jeep, but with more detail. Painting was also quite easy, after spraying the Gloss Red. Most other items were hand -painted saving hours of masking. I had a slight irritation when my decals broke up in the water, but this was overcome using a brush to align them on the model. A good starter in the fire brigade market.  This is the Citroen C-4 pump and ladder,a delightfull little model,

it's easy to build and easy to paint.