¹⁄35

Building the Eduard Hetzer!

The construction of the L48 gun offered a few problems, since some of the locating points were a little vague to say the least. Two different versions of the gun can be built, and the instructions were a little confused, but it does build into a very convincing representation of the breech assembly...even with the moulded-in breech block! Very careful assembly is necessary with the gun and it’s associated sight mechanism, as part of it does protrude through the fighting compartment roof when construction is complete, and is designed to rotate with the gun itself. The tolerances are high and so very careful placement is necessary. A lot of dry fitting, especially of the two mantlet halves, is recommended.

the fiddly bits!

In the kit all the periscopes are supplied in transparent plastic, and so these had the lens areas masked off with some art masking fluid using a sharpened cocktail stick. When the upper hull was complete and the gun and all its associated mechanisms fitted, it was placed on the lower hull to see what fit problems I had to deal with. I have to say Eduard have done a great job here. The upper hull lowered into place perfectly, with everything lining up as it should, even the complicated sights for the gun peeking out of the exactly the right place in the roof, without any pushing being necessary!

The fitting of all the tools are next. Eduard supply all the tool clamps as photo etch. Now this is something I like, but I realise that not all modellers like to mess around with etch tool clamps as they are sometimes very complicated to get looking right. They could have gone down the road other manufacturers have taken and provided tools with and without clamps. As it happens these are some of the easiest clamps I have fitted, just requiring bending and no complicate assembly. I did find it necessary at this point to cut a thin strip off both photo etched triangular engine grills as they were slightly too big and would have protruded slightly. I also fitted the rear fenders at this point, and again these are something I would have thought Eduard would have provided as photo etch along with the two small front fenders. There are numerous tools, brackets, and other bits and pieces that could have been left off the main structure for separate painting, but I decided to fit everything I could to the main hull and then paint them all in one go.

the running gear

Next came the running gear. Eduard give very clear instructions for which sections of the link and length type tracks to use, and they fitted very well indeed without exception. I had decided to fit all the running gear before painting also, as I find this the easiest way to paint this type of track. Be careful to cut of the small tabs of styrene that cover the outside of the guide horns on some of the sections as these are artefacts of the moulding process and not meant to be on the finished track. I added a wire to the Notek light on the front of the hull, and replace the antennae with some stretched sprue since I thought the kit-supplied one a little too thick. Since I had decided to use the Eduard photo etch schurzen I left off the brackets as new ones are supplied in the set, and these obviously wouldn’t be fitted until after painting.