diff --git a/compose.yaml b/compose.yaml
index 8c2aa709..f8996ff7 100644
--- a/compose.yaml
+++ b/compose.yaml
@@ -46,6 +46,8 @@ services:
     environment:
       - ANSIBLE_CONFIG=/mini-lab/ansible.cfg
       - ANSIBLE_INVENTORY=inventories/partition.yaml,clab-mini-lab/ansible-inventory.yml
+      - KUBECONFIG=/mini-lab/.kubeconfig
+      - K8S_AUTH_KUBECONFIG=/mini-lab/.kubeconfig
       - CI=${CI}
       - DOCKER_HUB_USER=${DOCKER_HUB_USER}
       - DOCKER_HUB_TOKEN=${DOCKER_HUB_TOKEN}
diff --git a/deploy_partition.yaml b/deploy_partition.yaml
index d9a7e08a..349b1f4f 100644
--- a/deploy_partition.yaml
+++ b/deploy_partition.yaml
@@ -78,6 +78,25 @@
         pull: true
       failed_when: false
 
+- name: Install python client and generate deployment token
+  hosts: localhost
+  connection: local
+  gather_facts: false
+  pre_tasks:
+    - name: Wait until the metal-apiserver is running
+      kubernetes.core.k8s_info:
+        kind: Deployment
+        name: metal-apiserver
+        namespace: "{{ metal_control_plane_namespace }}"
+        wait: true
+        wait_sleep: 1
+        wait_timeout: 600
+  roles:
+    - name: ansible-common
+      tags: always
+    - name: metal-roles/common/roles/metal-v2-client
+    - name: metal-roles/common/roles/metal-deployment-token
+
 - name: Deploy pixiecore on leaf01
   hosts: leaf01
   become: true
@@ -86,6 +105,8 @@
       tags: always
     - name: metal-roles/partition/roles/pixiecore
       tags: pixiecore
+    - name: metal-roles/partition/roles/image-cache
+      tags: image-cache
 
 - name: Deploy monitoring on leaf01
   hosts: leaf01
diff --git a/inventories/control-plane.yaml b/inventories/control-plane.yaml
index f6d4f244..42af64e0 100644
--- a/inventories/control-plane.yaml
+++ b/inventories/control-plane.yaml
@@ -3,3 +3,4 @@ control-plane:
   hosts:
     localhost:
       ansible_python_interpreter: "{{ ansible_playbook_python }}"
+      ansible_connection: local
diff --git a/inventories/group_vars/all/release_vector.yaml b/inventories/group_vars/all/release_vector.yaml
index f801fffc..7aee7e4c 100644
--- a/inventories/group_vars/all/release_vector.yaml
+++ b/inventories/group_vars/all/release_vector.yaml
@@ -33,12 +33,15 @@ metal_stack_release_vectors:
 # ...
 #
 
+image_cache_sync_image_tag: migrate-to-metal-apiserver
+image_cache_sync_image_name: ghcr.io/metal-stack/metal-image-cache-sync
+
 ##
 ## for ansible roles
 ##
 
 # ansible_common_version:
-# metal_roles_version:
+metal_roles_version: migrate-metal-image-cache-sync-to-metal-apiserver
 # metal_ansible_modules_version:
 
 ##
diff --git a/inventories/group_vars/control-plane/metal.yml b/inventories/group_vars/control-plane/metal.yml
index 9e5568d9..6e914d6e 100644
--- a/inventories/group_vars/control-plane/metal.yml
+++ b/inventories/group_vars/control-plane/metal.yml
@@ -3,6 +3,8 @@ metal_set_resource_limits: no
 metal_check_api_health_endpoint: http://api.{{ metal_control_plane_ingress_dns }}:8080/metal/v1/health
 metal_api_headscale_control_plane_address: "http://headscale.{{ metal_control_plane_ingress_dns }}:8080"
 
+# metal_helm_chart_local_path: /helm-charts/charts/metal-control-plane
+
 metal_api_pdb_min_available: 1
 metal_api_replicas: 1
 metal_api_view_key: metal-view
diff --git a/inventories/group_vars/partition/image_cache.yaml b/inventories/group_vars/partition/image_cache.yaml
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..71709675
--- /dev/null
+++ b/inventories/group_vars/partition/image_cache.yaml
@@ -0,0 +1,6 @@
+---
+image_cache_sync_metal_apiserver_url: "http://v2.api.172.17.0.1.nip.io:8080"
+image_cache_sync_excludes:
+  - "/pull_requests/"
+  - "/stable/"
+image_cache_sync_expiration_grace_period: 100
diff --git a/inventories/partition.yaml b/inventories/partition.yaml
index c42cbbd3..be146d19 100644
--- a/inventories/partition.yaml
+++ b/inventories/partition.yaml
@@ -6,6 +6,7 @@ partition:
   hosts:
     localhost:
       ansible_python_interpreter: "{{ ansible_playbook_python }}"
+      ansible_connection: local
   children:
     dell_sonic:
     leaves: