Renault Premium Lander truck transkit. 1:24 Resin

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Renault Premium Lander

1:24 resin Transkit from A&N Models

The Renault Premium Lander sits in the middle of the Renault Truck range, covering trucks from 17t to 23t it can be ordered at a 2 or 3 axle tractor, or a 2, 3 or 4 axle rigid vehicles, with a choice of Euro5 engines, and gearboxes it has wide appeal in the haulage industry.
A&N model trucks biased in Latvia is a relative newcomer to the model truck industry but has a wide range of conversion and upgrade parts for 1:24 model trucks. They have produced a resin ‘Transkit’ of the Renault Premium Lander and have chosen the low roof sleeper cab. Being a Transkit A&N recommend you buy a donor base model to provide items like the chassis, axles and suspension, in this case the Revell or Italeri MAN TGX to provide the chassis and running gear. Should you have the skills, and the spares box I have no doubt you could scratch build a suitable chassis, as I plan to do.
The kit comes packed in a sturdy box with a picture of a built kit on the lid. The kit is well packed with parts being in clear zip lock style bags and some polystyrene packing worms to fill the box and save the parts rattling about. The resin used is a creamy yellow and the kit is very well cast with no imperfections on the parts, there is some flash and moulding blocks to remove as expected in a short run kit like this.

On opening the box the main part you will see is the large cab casting, this is well cast and captures the shape of the cab well. I’ve popped the cab over some drawing supplied to me by Renault and the size and shape is very good, when I looked at pictures of the cab it looked flat at the front, but in real life, and against the cab plan is looks much better. The shut lines and pressings also look good and to scale. The windows and grill are flashed over, but this is very thin and I have since removed the flash over the windscreen and it was simple and quick just needing a knife running around the edge of the window a couple of times until it falls free leaving a clean hole. The cab could be easily converted to a shorter day cab with some careful measuring and cutting with a razor saw. I would have liked the option of a high roof personally as this is most popular with UK operators.

The cab floor is a single part incorporating the engine hump, a few small pins and holes are present on the underside to help locate the large wheel arches under the cab. The part is a good shape and fits well inside the cab shell.

The seats are cast well, and copy the complex shape of the real truck well, the detail on the seat is good. The bunk is also included to fit behind the seats. Some photo etched buckles are included in the kit, along with some black fabric for the belts. I will note though some trucks come with red fabric seat belts, so you may want to check before using the black stuff.
With this kit you get to choose either a Right hand Drive, or Left hand Drive option when ordering. I chose Right Hand Drive, and the dashboard supplied is very nice, with good detail and it looks like a Premium dashboard. You get a decal for the instruments, but careful detail painting will bring the details of the switches and knobs out on the build.

You get a couple of internal door cards, and the over head storage unit to add inside the cab, with a bit of care you could open up a cab door to show some of this detail off, should you decide to do this be careful the shell doesn’t distort!

The wheel arches for the outside of the cab are a complex shape on the Lander cab, as the cab is only 2.3m wide the arches need to widen the cab to fit the track of the front axle on the truck. To capture this on the kit A&N have broken these parts down into 2 parts per side, the first is the upper part and is normally painted the same colour as the cab, the lower part is normally left in the dark grey plastic, hard to describe so a picture of the real deal may help!

The parts capture this and fit to the underside of the cab with pins to assist with the location. There is some detail on the underside that will be visible above the wheels. The rear quarter arch is cast as one with this, this will help locate it, and help the model look good, but in reality this fixed to the chassis some may want to cut it off and scratch build a bracket as seen below.

The front bumper and cab steps are cast over 3 parts, they fit well together with minimal cleaning up, photo etch parts are supplied for the steps. The shape and style of the bumper is very well captures, with some great detail for the multi-lamp headlight pods.

Some clear resin is supplied for the lens, along with a large casting in clear for the sun visor that fits above the windscreen.

The clear parts are a little cloudy, this isn’t an issue on the visor as that needs painting to tint it as on the truck, but the headlamp lens this is more of an issue. It may respond to polishing to give it more clarity, but I reserve judgement until I try.

There is a multitude of little parts bagged up, the detail on these is good, there is flash on some parts so you will need to spend time with the sanding stick, but please remember Resin dust isn’t good for you, so take the usual precautions please.

Being a large vehicle the Premium has large mirrors on the doors, these are cast as a single part per side, I have a shot of the real vehicle so you can compare the shape, to my eye they look a good copy. Nothing is supplied for the mirrored surface, but some chrome tape or BMF would work very well.

Now, being a Transkit biased on the Italeri MAN the chassis will not be accurate. As said before you could scratch build a chassis, but this may not be viable for some people so A&N include some parts to convert the chassis to make it look more like a Renault. Look at references and/ or photos to the truck you are building as wheelbases and layouts do vary truck to truck.

The Renault has a rear cab mounted air intake, this feeds into an air cleaner on the chassis. These are supplied in the kit, the detail on the parts is nice, with the vents on the intake, and the engraving on the air cleaner being nicely done. An exhaust can is supplied to glue to the side of the chassis along with an exhaust pipe and outlet. They have some flash that will need cleaning. But again check as I have seen differing versions and layouts on Renault trucks.

The kit includes a distinctive D shape diesel tank, it is a nice shape but it lacks filler so you will need drill a hole and insert some rod and fabricate a cap, again though check your reference as not all trucks carry this style tank.

A sheet of photo etch is supplied, it contains various steps and details for the model, the sheet in the review kit is tarnished but as the parts will be painted this won’t be an issue. The steps are good copies of the real part, as shown below. Also on this sheet are the horizontal grills for the front of the cab, once in place they will look good but they look a little curved on the truck so I will attempt to roll them slightly for this effect.

A sheet of clear plastic is enclosed to make the cab windows, some templates are included in the instructions to help get the sizes and shapes correct, also is a nice decal for the edge of the wind screen to give the bonded look of the real window with the ’spotty effect’ at the edge of vehicle windows. The dashboard pod is also supplied as a decal with some nice detail close up.

The instructions are in my opinion the week part of the kit. I don’t think they are very clear and they lack information. For example there is no mention of the recommended base kit, nor any information on what modifications are needed to the donor kits parts. I don’t want to sound harsh but you will need to look, and take care when building the model. Look at lots of reference photos and information to get an accurate build.

Conclusion
This is a good Transkit, one for the more experienced modeller due to the instructions, and the massive amount of variations in the real trucks. A high roof would have been nice as that specification is more popular in the UK. I will note though Renault did sell this cab to other companies including SISU in Scandinavia, or as the MACK Quantum down under and even the massive special heavy haulage Nicolas Tractormas.

Review sample from please mention Britmodeller when ordering.

Walkaround photos of the Renault Premium can also be viewed Here