My dad just bought me the 1/35 Trumpeter French Hotchkiss 39. Upon opening the box, it is a 1/48 kit. The pieces fit poorly and there is no photoetch. The tracks are the rubber band type, and I doubt they fit properly. Generally I enjoy Trumpe kits, but this one must be the manufacturer at its worst.

The H-39 is one of trumpeter's older kits (they come in the grey-green striped box. Generally the quality is mediocre by today's standard (that goes doubly for any H-39 kit in plastic since no-one seems to have done proper research before designing theirs). The Trumpeter version is more or less a copy of the old Heller. The kit being 1/48 is probably a wrond assesment. Remember that the H-39 was a very small tank with a two man crew. In reality it isn't much bigger than, say, a schwimmwagen.

Agree with Ben here, it is one of the earlier trumpeter kits, and if you look at a hotchkiss next to a man say, you can see it is a very small vehicle. what i would do is suggest anyone checks reviews before buying a kit as a gift, or as something for themselves. also, are you account sharing?

What is account sharing?

PMMS has comparison reviews of H-39 from Heller,Trumpeter, and Hobbyboss. Very informative. I built the Trump version and yes, it was pretty basic but went together OK. Tracks need to be shortened about 2 links. I added cast armor texturing where needed, a definate improvement. Your milage may vary.
Cheers!

If you want to read a little more about it, check out this post by Niels Henkemans over on Missing Lynx. He's analyzed the problem very well.

If I remember right, Bronco also made one.

looks like I'll have to order some new tracks for it. I hate to do it for as basic a kit as this is, but don't want to face the aggravation of trying to shorten rubber band tracks.

Gary, you are quite correct. It is Bronco,not Hobbyboss. My error.
Rick

Well, I'm done with everything except the tracks. This is a new fastest build for me. As for researching a kit before I buy it, I normally do. This, however, was an impulse purchase my dad made. I am trying to get out of WWII and modernize with Russo/Soviet kits. This was also the smallest vehicle I have done in 1/35. I find it hard to imagine the Hotchkiss as a tank since it is no bigger than two motorcycles. I suppose this was due in part to how early on in the war it was used. I have taken some progress shots and intend to enter it in the 'Under a Different Flag' campaign. The kit, of course, being that of a Hotchkiss captured by the Germans.

Hi Matt. The fact that the kit is small, has relatively few pieces and no etch should be seen as an advantage. A mate of mines loves building the occasional 1/48 kit as a quick relaxing project. The build will go quickly and you can concentrate on painting and weathering, because no what era or period you are interested in, you´ll need these skills, and working at them only makes it better.
If you look at a finished model, what really do you see? IMO, about 10% of the effort of superdetailing and 90% of the painting/weathering work. Do the maths .... put your time and energy where it counts. Thank your Dad ... he did you a favour! We all tend to see the negative in a kit ... we can be too critical. Take a step back and see what is positive in the kit and enjoy it for what it is .... and not get frustrated for what its not.
Why not try some of the crazy French camo schemes on this. You´ll have something that stands out on your shelf, and something that´ll actually change your whole impression of early war armor. I built the Bronco 1/35 kit a few years ago and thats what happended to me, I started to upload the blog on The Assembly recently. Have a look.

I always thank my dad. Although, he usually buys me WW2 bombers. I have quite a bit of experience using putty since my Zvezda build. I think I will go with the box art for my paint scheme. Hopefully be through the camo by this evening. A couple of filters and a wash, then on to weathering. I still find it amazing that some of my 1/72 builds are larger than the Hotchkiss. I think I'll display it next to my KV-1 just to show the radical difference between armor types.

Does anyone know what color to use for French khaki? It looks a little more yellow than MM armor sand. I am going for a captured vehicle that didn't undergo field camoflage. Thanks.

Funny how the sense of scale is distorted by the big German tanks


The H35 is amongst a great number of small WWII AFVs including the universal carrier, daimler dingo, PzI and II, TKS, Vickers light tanks, 7TP, Ha Go, Matilda I, R35, AMR35 and a lot of others. People often forget that pre-war tank doctrine in a lot of countries was more about the swarm of small tanks rather than behemoths with massive guns. Even germany invaded france with very few PzIIIs and the Pz IV was seen as a heavy tank and reasonably rare

By the standards of the day the H35 was not a small tank!


as for kits, I didn't care much for the Trumpeter one I have to say. The Bronco one is better but still a great number of corners have been cut. Maybe one day someone will take french tanks seriously and we'll get some proper kits

http://www.art-paints.com/Paints/Metal/Testors/Model/French-Khaki/French-Khaki.html

hope this helps matt.

reb

Does the Hotchkiss have rubber road wheels? The instructions leave a lot to the imagination, when it comes to painting.

Steel. The original H35 had rubber tires but that was changed with the H38/39.

Thank you Mr. Kato