Hugine 15 Channel 1/20 RC Tank USA M60 review

I have had quite a number of RC vehicles over the years. Mostly they’ve been cars. At one time, I even raced them off road. This is my first RC tank. I hadn’t heard of Hugine before but a quick look on Amazon showed that they do many of the more unusual RC vehicles that all look very cool and to scale. This USA M60 battle tank is no exception.

When I pulled the retail box out of the packaging I was very pleased. The packaging is nicely done with a flip-up front that reveals a window through which you can see the tank. Removing the tank from the box was only mildly challenging. The polystyrene that encases it slides out and then you just have the tank fixed in place with wire ties and plastic anchors.

Inside the box you get:

The main tank
The controller (This requires a 9v battery which is not included)
An AC adapter for charging the battery
A couple of small boxes. One contains small plastic BB pellets. The other contains the driver and a couple of machine guns with mounts. (They only need minor assembly.)
A pre-cut cardboard target
A manual with instructions in both Chinese and English.

The Tank

I always loved models, especially RC models. In these, I look for a combination of form and function. I like them to look believable with scale details and minimal exaggeration. The M60 fullfills all of these requirements and looks like a very nice pre-painted scale model. It looks freshly painted straight out of a military production factory. It arrives with all the hatches closed and a few small parts (driver and choice of two heavy machine guns) that need to be added. There is an antenna but again they made it pretty to scale. The antenna is a firm springs wire antenna with a coil at the bottom that slips over a metal post at the back of the tank. It has a small plastic nub on top to protect the eyes but still looks good.

In Use

The manual is adequate. The one thing it doesn’t contain is information on whether the battery needs to be charged before use. I plugged it into the included charger and left it overnight to be on the safe side). The controller takes a standard square shaped 9v battery (not included). As a result, to test the tank I used a Li-Poly rechargeable one from my camera equipment.

The tank battery is located on the underbelly under a skid plate and is reasonably easy to access. One of the port covers on the top conceals a red switch that turns the tank on. I would advise you to turn the controller on first to avoid any runaway vehicles.

On starting up, the tank makes a strange honky whine and is ready to go. The controller is covered in buttons without any thumb sticks. There are many with three forward and reverse speeds. There are also regular turning on the spot and buttons to turn in a reverse or forward maneuver. You can also pitch the main gun turret in both directions or rotate it about 45 degrees in both directsion off center. And lastly you can fire. There are two fire buttons. It took me a few minutes to realize that both must be pressed together for the tank to fire. Not a bad thing since it can be loaded with actual projectiles.

Driving the tank

The tank is not particularly fast. It travels at a walking pace. To be honest I’d almost like there to be a slower speed because it accelerates instantly whereas a real tank’s speeds “to scale” would be much slower. It makes it hard to control in a realistic fashion but is nonetheless a lot of fun to drive.

The instructions say not to drive it on the grass. I did try it briefly and the tracks get grass caught up in them and tangle quickly so the tank soon gets stuck. But on hard surfaces like concrete and hard flooring or carpet it works great. It even sounds a bit like a real tank with squeaks and rattles from the wheels and tracks. Normally, those sounds would annoy me but if you have ever heard a real tank, those are quite authentic sounds. The tank has some red LEDs mounted in scale lamp housings that light up when the tank is powered. The third one lights up when you start the firing procedure.

The turret

The turret is cool. It moves slowly and smoothly at a scale speed that looks very convincing especially when there is no juddering. It only rotates so far before it reaches its limit at which point you can hear a ratchety sound but doesn’t break. It’s a bit tricky to control with all the buttons, but it is possible to control the turret while the tank is driving along which is also really cool.

Firing the big gun is fun. It simulates the motion of a full recoil: the barrel kicks back into itself and the whole tank judders and even tips backwards with simulated sounds of firing. You can fire pellets but I kept that to a minimum because I have three small dogs, the pellets are hard to find afterwards, and I didn’t want the dogs to eat them.

Conclusion

The tank is great fun to drive but also makes for a very nice scale model. I’d recommend it for sensible children from 8 years up to adults. This is partly because the tank shoots projectiles, but also because this is a detailed scale model and isn’t as rugged as a regular toy might be. You don’t really want to drop it from a height because it is quite heavy and all those scale cargo boxes and other details would probably break if dropped from four feet. It’s as much a model for hobbyists as a toy.

My husband really likes it and has it on display. It looks very cool and is fun to drive. Unfortunately, our three dogs are extremely aggressive towards it. So my husband doesn’t get to play with it as much as he would like. As far as he is concerned only two things would make this better. If it came in a kit form that you built (because he likes building models) and if it were designed to run outside in the grass. Soon after he got this model he so wanted to take it off road that he looked for outdoor RC tanks but didn’t find anything. Still, this is a really nice model for the right person but not really a toy to be thrown around and beat up on. Very nice indeed.

Disclaimer: I received this RC tank in exchange for an honest and fair review. The opinions expressed are my own.

Hugine 15 Channel 1/20 RC Tank USA M60

Product Name: Hugine 15 Channel 1/20 RC Tank USA M60

Product Description: Hugine 15 Channel 1/20 RC Tank USA M60 Patton Main Battle Tank. Shoots Plastic Pellets (Camouflage Green)

Offer price: $99.99

Availability: LimitedAvailability

  • Design
  • Model Detail
  • Features
  • Value
4.1

3 Comments

  1. Christian Benavides January 5, 2017
    • Adrian January 8, 2017
  2. Pete December 14, 2020

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