Bedford QLR 79th Armoured Division NWE

Bedford QLR 79th Armoured Division NWE 

At the outbreak of WW II, Bedford was contracted by the British War Office to produce a 3-ton 4 x 4 general service truck. A pilot model was ready in February 1940 and quantity production started in March 1941. The Bedford QL was in production from 1941 to 1945 and was Bedford's first vehicle series built for the British Armed Forces and evolved for use in numerous different military activities during the conflict, several of which have been produced as Oxford scale models.

This version is based on the Bedford QLR, which was a signals vehicle. For its second deployment, it comes as used by the 79th Armoured Division during the North West European Campaign in 1944, when smaller detachments from it were engaged in the Battles of Normandy, the Scheldt, the Geilenkirchen Salient and then in 1945 as part of the Rhine and Elbe Crossings and the Roer Triangle. The QLR was used in the main by the British Army although Canadian and American units were also trained to use this specially armoured vehicle to its best advantage. The Unit insignia was a black bull’s head with flaring nostrils superimposed over an inverted yellow triangle, which appeared on every vehicle.

Our model is presented in an olive drab colour scheme with white lettering and military markings, one of which is worthy of note - the finely detailed Unit insignia – the raging bull, as described above.