28Mm Dog Tag Miniatures Italian WW2 Motorcycle Review

Sometimes it's worth waiting for a miniature to come along and anyone with a 28mm Italian WW2 Desert Force will have been waiting for some motorcycle borne troops to come along, we can thank Dog Tag Miniatures for answering our prayers.

A new company these were initially avaliable on Kickstarter but are now on general release, I ordered some before Xmas and thought it would be a good idea to put a review out there, having first built and painted one of the models. Link to their website below,

https://www.dogtagminiatures.co.uk/shop/italians/

Above is a short video, looking at the content of one of the packs of models, whilst below is a discussion and still photos of the same topic.

Contents of the 5 man squad code.

Above is a photo of the 5 man squad which includes, 1 Moto Guzzi Motorcycle and 1 Sidecar Combo and 5 figures (both bikes two up and 1 in the sidecar).

The models are resin cast with very good detail, the figures come with a selection of seperate heads, some of the other packs have excess heads and there seems to be plenty of variation in the ones I recieved.

Detail on the models is excellent and they are well proportioned, they do however contain quite a bit of flash (as you can see from the photo), they are easy to clean up but I advise taking great care as the resin is quite soft and I can see it would be easy to accidentally chop off the wrong bit if you got a bit excited with the craft knife.

Contents of a Despatch Rider Code showing spare head

I have made up a couple and had no major problems other than the clean up, the handlebars are cast in metal and I recall reading somewhere that the part was too difficult to cast in resin so they went for a metal option.

Trike model, built awaiting paint

Above is an example of a complete model from the range. I wanted a 10 man squad so I bought, the 5 man unit and the Trike along with an additional Sidecar Combo and 2 Despatch Riders for just short of 60 pounds, there is a 10 man unit for £35 (10 men on 5 bikes all two up) but I wanted the different models even though they were more expensive.

Above is a short video of a completed model, I did one of the Sidecar Combos as an example, I will do a full post when the unit is complete however I have to say they painted up great. The faces are particularly nice and really suit my style of painting. There is a bit of a flash mark on the front of the Sidecar which I missed on my initial clean up but otherwise I am very happy with the result.

Above are some stills of the finished model to look at. All in all a great addition to any Italian Army of the period, just be careful when you clean the casts up. Recommended 👍