Here comes the Sdkfz I A.

Hey, where's the rest of the vignette? Nice job all around, these things take patience to put together but are very nice little kits. What method did you use to apply the mud "spatter"?

Hi Benny
You've done an awesome paintjob! I find it so hard making these monotone colors look good, but you maneged to perfection.
Best regards
Jacob

Benny:

Hey! That looks AWESOME! GREAT paint job, and, yes, as Jacob remarked on above, you have done a super job with that "montone gray"! And I like the little mud spatters and grunge, too

The Pz 1A is perhaps my fav tank and I have, oh, let's see, maybe 10 or so kits of it and a couple of variants... OK, A bit over the top... what can I say?

And yeah, I'll second Jer on these little things taking PATIENCE! Why build a big Tiger kit when you can spend more time on something about the size of that Tiger's turret?

Your's looks mostly the part, and I guess you have shown the needed patience!

There are a couple of things I think could have gone better... 1 trivial, and a matter of opinion and preference, the other serious technical

The opinion one: Those muffler heat-shields. They ARE heat shields - to protect crew and equipment from touching a really hot muffler. Those shields probably never got very hot, or they would have been re-done early-on... so why so rusty-looking? I mean, your rust really looks GREAT - as rust (you have IMO captured the look of rusty steel really nicely and hit on the subtle shades of the real thing), BUT those shields probably should not stand out as being so rusted - more so as the fenders beneath don't show either rust-stains nor rust of their own... and they were about as thin and tinny as those shields! BUT this is just my OPINION about the effect portrayed, and you did a fine job with it!

The serious technical bit

WHAT HAPPENED to your weld seams around the top of the upper hull (seam between hull-top and hull-sides)?

Sadly, I think I know the answer... the Dragon kit's upper armor was applied in pieces over an inner shell, instead of being supplied as an entire 1-piece upper shell?, as is in the case of the Tristar Pz IA in my pic below... and when you glued the hull-top on, you did not go back and fill in those gaps! "bad bad"!

Alas, this is a pitfall Dragon has also put in place on its Pz 1B kits, which I have built (I've not built a Dragon 1A straight tank yet...) ... - D supplies pz 1 upper armor as applique pieces.

Tristar (which I have built - see below the weld seams) at least avoids this sad trap!



The real tank's upper hull was, of course, a welded box. There should be no gaps along the welds between the hull sides and top. This one is a serious build fault. Sad to have to point this out, and probably not really fixable, but there it is

I really like your tank, but those weld seams are pretty wrong!

Bob