Now THIS is a gun ...

It might not have arrived with a bang, but a heavy-metal addition to Dardanup Heritage Park has Bunbury RSL military collection curator Gerry Tyrrell excited.

Set carefully in place on Thursday morning, the 40-tonne Leopard tank is one of 30 decommissioned tanks donated by the Federal Government to RSLs and veterans associations around Australia.

Although coming close to being deployed in East Timor, the German-made tanks did not see action outside of Australia, never firing a shot in anger.

Now outdated relics, Mr Tyrrell said in their day the tanks were capable of stopping anything in their path and would now serve as a tribute and valuable drawcard for the collection.

‘‘We want to present it as a memorial to everyone who has ever served in the armoured corps,’’ Mr Tyrrell said.

‘‘We’d welcome everybody including school groups to come and see how big and how awesome these machines are and how scary they would look.’’

The tank will be housed at the Dardanup Heritage Park in an extension of the old army drill hall to be built after Anzac Day and expected to be open to the public mid year.

Bunbury RSL president Glen Stoddart welcomed the addition which he said would provide good exposure for the RSL.

‘‘Gerry has done a wonderful job preparing for it and it was good to see the culmination of this endeavour,’’ Mr Stoddart said.

‘‘It’s good to have that sort of memorabilia — it’s a piece of history.’’

Although the Bunbury RSL had been the first to have its application to receive a tank accepted, two changes of government and red tape meant there have been many delays.

Collie has also received a Leopard tank, with the Government forking out an average of $22,000 per tank to cover transport costs.