I am planning to purchase one Leopard 2 from Heller and one from ESCI via the net.
the main reason are the dutch smoke dischargers which are in the ESCI kit. they are at least shown on the box art of the Heller kit. But: does anybody know, if they are definitive
included?
I assume that the Heller kit is not a reboxed Italeri one as Heller released the Leopard and Gepard earlier and it was their own development, but could it be that the ESCI kit is a reboxed Heller kit?
would appreciate any infos and experiences. I built Hellers Gepard ages ago and it was no
real amusement but maybe these Leo's are better than the Italeri one.

thanks, werner

The Esci, Heller and Italeri Leopard 2s are all different kits; however, I recently bought a newer boxed Heller Kubelwagen for my daughter and it was the old Italeri kit (as opposed to it being an old Heller kit). If the Leopard boxing is newer, there's no telling what's really inside.

Hi Werner,
well I myself haven't heard anything good abouth either of these kits ... Why don't you go for the Italeri 2A4 and build the NL goodies scratch? Might be the better choice ...
Andreas

I need a couple of Leo 2 kits for promoting reasons anyway. IPMS Austria will release a decal sheet for Leo 2 and early M60A1 this year and there is a need to have some kits with these decals on it to show them off.
so as I need the kits anyway, I thought it would be beneficial to purchase those which already contain these smoke dischargers rather than to scratch them or purchase
Italeri's Leo 2A5 which also contains these parts.

regards, werner

just a short update. got me now Heller's Leopard 2 and ESCI's Leopard 2.
I ordered them via the net and so I was very curiuos about the contents.

Heller: although shown on the box art, the kit does not contain the dutch smoke dischargers. this is no surprise, because this is Italeri's kit, with very small alterations.
interestingly Heller's kit is designed to house batteries and a motor--so there should be motorized kits of it available somewhere too. Unfortunately the drive sprocket has been reworked and is lacking some details and thus is is a candidate for the wastebin or heavy weathering...

ESCI: has made their own tooling and is superior in some details to Italeri/Heller, but also
some weak details could be detected. the kit is 2mm taller and 2mm shorter than
the others. I have not investigated what is correct.
the kit includes individual tracks AND dutch smoke granades and a belgian MG for the turret. it is interesting that the instruction does not reflect this and only provides the construction of one german tank. the german smoke dischargers and the turret MG is also included.

now its time for construction..or at lease issue a number to this project..:-))