1/35 UMP .45

The 1/35 Trumpeter H&K UMP .45, is a sleek little package. I only say this because I have no need of the small PDW in 1/35 and yet when I saw the racks of weapons in my local hobby shop I couldn’t resist picking one up! The price point is very reasonable coming in at fewer than eight Canadian dollars. For your money you get four individual weapons with roughly six pieces each including photo etch slings, ANPEQ-2 laser sights, sites for close and medium range engagements, grenade launchers and a very cool fore grip with integral tactical lamp. Pictured here are two variants I have assembled for this review; the first is a rather exotic and brutish variant with a short barreled M203 40mm grenade launcher attached at the six O’clock rail position, an ACOG on the twelve, extended stock and a spare magazine.

I considered the odd format for such an op close and personal firearm and then decided that the shooter (in my case an ODA, CIA Green Badger or DEVGRU operator) would load 40mm buck shot for ‘hard knocking’ on doors, bean bag shots for HVT take downs and possibly Sabot for vehicle disabling or checkpoint duty. The next variant is a more traditional style of PDW; that is it has a folded stock, fore-grip and CQB fast reaction site.

This configuration could be stowed in helicopters or other vehicle crew compartments and could also be carried as a secondary weapon by regular NATO ‘grunts’ in theatre. I have seen various examples of soldiers carrying MP5Ks or short barreled shotguns into combat in urban environments so I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to show contemporary warriors with a similar PDW. In short I highly recommend picking up at least one of the Trumpeter weapon sets to add to your collection of spare bits and while these injection molded pieces don’t hold a candle to LiveResin firearms they do fill in the more rare niche selection of weapons. Hical, James