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Changing the Gepard's Spots

FlaK38

The kit parts for the Flak 38 were lacking in detail and accuracy and were discarded in favor of the Flak 38 kit from Tristar in combination with the Armorscale replacement aluminum barrel with turned brass flash suppressor. The Tristar barrel has been shown to be too long dimensionally as molded and the barrel base was retained and drilled out to accept the Armorscale barrel, which has the correct length, without issue. Reference photos show that some Gepard crews removed the splinter shields from their Flak 38s to presumably allow more room in the compartment for the crew and lower the visibility profile once the compartment sides were lowered. Just to be different, I chose this option for the Flak 38 and did not fit the shields which also required the removal of the mount arms from the bearing housings as well as modification to the gun mount tray and base areas where the shields would normally attach. The Eduard PE set includes detail pieces to construct the “lobster pot” style of spent shell catch basket and this was modified to include a support frame for the semicircular attachment using 0.5mm styrene rod.

upper hull

The upper hull fighting compartment sides were fitted, requiring some sanding and putty work to obtain a good fit all around on the upper works as well as to the front base plate. Each of the fold-down panels on the superstructure had a deep sink mark in the middle of each panel which also required filling and sanding to correct. All of the pioneer tools, fire extinguishers, jack, and jack block had their molded on clamps/mounts removed and replaced with items from the Eduard set. The Eduard grouser box was also used in place of the Alan kit PE item. The kit supplied spare track mounts on both the front hull and glacis were also replaced in favor of the Eduard items and small holes drilled out with a pin vise to accept the Eduard wing-nuts with the spare tracks installed at a later point. The largest modification required came in the form of the muffler/exhaust which was molded in the appropriate way for mounting to a Grille hull and compartment dimensions, but did not fit properly to the Gepard hull, requiring modification to the exhaust pipe and mount bracket into the side of the hull. While not 100% accurate in terms of final layout, it presented a suitable compromise under the circumstances. The exhaust was also drilled out with a pin vise and mounted using Eduard brackets to the hull.