It may be a small item, but I will try to make a German anti-tank gun this time. It has a metal barrel, a thin shield, and a few etched parts. I checked the parts before assembly because I have recently encountered parts missing. It looks like everything is included. I should have done this right after I bought it, but I didn’t check the parts correctly, even though there was a lot of stacking. I felt sorry for the kits loaded for so many years and never had a box opened. I thought I’d make it properly. It sounds like an elementary school report.
Compared to the previous Tamiya anti-tank gun, it seems to have many parts and finer details. That’s so accurate and reproducible.
From the assembly around the barrel. The barrel is a metal part, so it’s easy to work with because there’s no need to file parts. There is no warping of the parts, and the accuracy seems high.
It isn’t easy because there are many places where metal and plastic adhere. It has to be built sturdily for its small contact surface. Because of the large number of parts, the structure is complex and challenging to assemble. It has the characteristics of an AFV Club kit.
I also build gun racks and supports. There are many small parts.
(2023/08/03)
All I have to do is assemble the wheels. This kit has rubber tires.
The shield is a double layer of thin iron plates reproduced in metal, so the thin feeling is well-expressed and good. The bolt that holds the two iron plates protrudes from the back, but it doesn’t work well because of the accuracy of the plastic parts. It is quite tricky to make them all twelve small protrusions out together. I do various things, such as cutting off the head of the bolt from the leftover parts of the Sho’t Kal Dalet I made before and gluing it from the other side. It may be quite overscale, but I think the texture is better than not doing it.
Just because it can be assembled by adjusting the angle of the gun, it doesn’t mean that it can be moved up and down after completion. If I don’t glue it, the parts will fall off.
The side that operates the gun has a lot of small parts attached. Plastic parts must also be glued to the metal bulletproof plate, so a lot of superglue must be used.
I wonder if it’s this angle when aiming at the enemy tank. I’m glad it was assembled safely to the end.
(2023/08/05)
I painted it black for now.
The AFV Club’s anti-tank guns are very sophisticated, which is good, but I would have liked them to have had some figures. I think it was a SOGA anti-tank gun crew resin kit I bought a long time ago, but this was for a PAK mounted on a half-track, so it had a driver and was unnecessary. Well, the driver will put him in a Maultaire or a truck, or something, next time. This garage kit cost more than 5,000 yen even when the yen was strong, so I wanted to use my leftover figurines.
It’s probably a figure fitted for a Dragon half-track, so the gun crew’s hand height is subtly different. I have to make some adjustments.
It was painted dark yellow in Gaia Color. The PAK I made before was German gray, so I changed my mood. It is hard to paint because the inside of the anti-tank gun is complicated. Also, the gun and gun legs are long and thin, so when painted thoroughly, there will be a lot of wasteful mist.
The expression became easier to recognize when I blew the flat fresh.
The painting examples only showed a single color, either German gray or dark yellow, but the box tri-color camouflage was excellent, so I painted camouflage.
The German soldiers handling this anti-tank gun wear warm clothes. The details of the boa on the back of the hood and the cold weather gear around the boots are excellent. It is slightly difficult to paint because of its fine uneven surface. All I have to do now is draw the details of the anti-tank gun and the figure, and I’m almost done. There’s something wrong with making midwinter figures in such a hot room.
(2023/08/07)
The 75 mm anti-tank gun is complete. They are in the position of shooting. The barrel goes up and down a few millimeters, but it goes down under the weight of the metal barrel, so it might have been nice to glue it at a favorite angle. Even if it is placed normally, it will be horizontal, so it may be fine as it is. Anti-tank guns are unnatural if they are angled too much.
The figure is a set, so the uniform has a feeling of similarity.
By the way, PAK40 seems to need five gunners. Only four people made it this time, though. Do they need that many people?
As for the layout, the middle two look like this. I wonder if the commanding officer and the bullet carrier should be on both sides.
The figure kit includes ammunition cases and empty shell cartridges. The state of the ammunition case containing only a portion of the ammunition is reproduced. If this kit is hard to get, I think the AFV Club also sold a shell set separately.
Germany has a captured weapon from Russia, a 7.62 cm gun, and they say it can shoot a 7.5 cm shell. On the contrary, if the 7.62 cm shells of the Russian army were fired by the 7.5 cm guns of the German Army, it would cause an in-cylinder explosion, so it was hazardous.
The operator of the sights is slightly face-down, so when combined with the PAK40, it’s hard to see the face.
I took the shot by focusing on the tip of the gun barrel.
After all, it is interesting to display several artillery figures. It is aimed at the target and has a sense of urgency.
I am glad the anti-tank guns and figures I had been piling up for many years were completed. The gun alone might have been a bit plain.
(2023/08/10)
