So almost two years later the saga continues. I had almost given up on this thing. The connecting pins are extremely fragile and pretty much every single one snapped. I had to replace them all with metal rods. If you look at the third photo from the top in the original post you will see the broken connecting pins. Even with metal rods in place, it is still pretty fragile. Anyway, this is what I decided on for weapons. The Vulcan guns are from the Academy 1/35 M163 and the gun mounts/housings and antenna mounts are from the Tamiya 1/35 Flakpanzer Gepard. I might add some smoke grenade launchers on top of the mech. The kit came molded in overall olive drab but I will be priming over that and repainting it, one day. Not sure if I will do it another overall color or maybe some sort of camo pattern.
The mech kit says it is 1/48 but I am converting it to 1/35. Here is a 1/35 figure next to it for size comparison.