Hi All. Just read a great review of Hobby Boss VK4502(P) by Darren Thompson. It states that the Turret is outstanding, with a very detailed interior. Could this Turret be fitted to a Tiger II hull? What hull would be needed and what other/missing details are needed to produce an early production King Tiger? I've got Dragons King Tiger without Zim, in my Stash. dont know the kits number, its the one that can be made into Anneliese of s Pz Abt 503. If poss this sounds like a great Kit bash. I can then use the Hobby boss hull for a Bergetiger type version. Cheers Geraint

Eddy (braille) I've just been reading the post Bill Gorm KT 133 1/s Pnz Abt 503. Any thoughts on this one? cheers Geraint

@bizzychicken – Geraint,

You should be able to use this turret for any of the early (Porsche-trum) Tiger II’s. You’ll have to add rain channels over the gunner’s gun sight and machine gun opening, as these are not present on the kit. The two small pistol port openings on either side of the turret were welded closed on the real turrets as well as the commanders view port. At least 16 of these turrets had the commanders view port. This feature left a circular flat spot on the turret beneath the Zimmerit coating. There was also a pair of conical bolts just in front of the view port on these 16 turrets that should not be removed. These are represented in the kit. You will have to cut out the drain channel next to the loaders hatch. There are other modifications that are not present on the kit that you’ll have to add depending on the production month that the turret is used for on the Henschel Tiger II. I don’t know if the turret opening is a match on the DML kits for the Hobby Boss turret? But that should not be a problem.

The forward and rearmost angled roof plates on the Hobby Boss kit represent the later 40mm plates and these would be correct for use on the Tiger II. 25mm angled roof plates were originally installed on the turret bodies, these sat even with the turret sides and left a 15mm step against the center horizontal 40mm roof plate. Hobby Boss missed this detail. The Tiger II prototypes V1, V2 and V3 turrets were the only ones without this modification. You’ll need to add Zimmerit paste for use on the Tiger II with the exception of V1, V2 and V3.

50 turret bodies had been produced by Krupp for the VK45.02 (P) when the project was cancelled. These were later surplus over to the Henschel Tiger III project, later named Tiger II. The VK45.02 (P) turrets had been designed for use with electric drives and these were later converted over to hydraulic drive for use on the Tiger II. There are some other internal differences for use on the Tiger II as opposed to the VK45.02 (P) but these are slight.

Hopes this helps and good luck with the project, post a few pics when this happens!

Happy modeling,
-Eddy

Thanks Eddy . Will do , will have to price a few things up and see how the buget will look thanks again Geraint