Verlinden’s Humvee tire and wheel set will add a level of authenticity to any 1:35^th scale Humvee kit that is unsurpassed by conventional injected styrene parts.  The four pieces in this release are molded in a light olive green resin and attached to individual pour stubs which are easily removed with a razor saw.  A light sanding will ensure full contact with any display surface.  The resin used for this release exudes none of the horribly noxious odor of many of Verlinden’s previous releases though caution should still be exercised when working with any resin-molded parts.

            The kit includes the location-specific front and rear wheel hubs peculiar to the Humvee, with the unidirectional tire tread particularly well depicted.  For this reason, the location instructions must be followed precisely.  The inner hub surfaces are molded flat, lending themselves to easy adaptation for use with the Italeri, Tamiya, or Academy kits.  No tire manufacturer names are cast into the tire sidewalls, though in today’s litigious society that is fully understandable.  The castings are bubble-free, with only minor flaws noted on the tire sidewalls which are easily removed by light sanding.

            When this set was released I compared these pieces with their full-size counterparts on a brand new Humvee in our motor pool.  Size, shape, and details are spot-on in accuracy, not always a given with many of Verlinden’s other upgrade kits.  In fact, this is one of the few items manufactured by that company that does not require massive amounts of hand-massaging to make them work--it’s a shame that Verlinden no longer catalogs them.  I recommend this set as a better alternative to the plastic wheels and tires in any of the currently available Humvee kits.  If a modeler does nothing else to one of these models, find (and use) this set.