Hi, I'm new on the forum but I've been building armor models off and on for about 40 years.

Recently, I picked up Cyber Hobby's 1/35 upgunned StuG. This kit is evidently based on a photograph from East Prussia in 1945, and includes markings for that vehicle. It would be nice to find another upgunned C/D to represent just to do something different. I'm thinking that of 200 Ausf. C/Ds, this might not be the only one that survived to be upgunned. None of my references show such a vehicle, though. The in-box review here by Keith Middleton mentions a photo of an Ausf. C/D L/48 knocked out in Altdamm, near Stettin. That's about 300 miles west of East Prussia--so it may or may not be the same vehicle.

Does anybody here have any info on these?

I ran into the same dilemma with my kit, so that's why it sits. Anything you run into let me know too!



Oh... and welcome to the forum!









~ Jeff

Jeff-
Thanks for the welcome!

I hate blindly following the box art, but it may come down to that with this kit. It doesn't seem likely there were more than a handful of L/48 StuG C/Ds, and what percentage of WWII AFVs are in published photographs?
Ed

I PM'd Keith Middleton re his review of the Cyber Hobby kit. He kindly endeavored to rememember where he'd seen the photo of an upgunned StuG and PM'd me back a link to it, which I'll pass along here.

It's a build article by Stephen Brezinski on converting the Fujimi 1/76ish StuG C/D to an L/48 gunned version, and it starts with a photo of a knocked-out example: http://www.onthewaymodels.com/articles/StuG_%203_C_Lang/SBrezinski_Stug3C_Lang.htm

The photo is reproduced from Spielberger's Sturmgeschütz & Its Variants, Vol. II. Brezinski decals his StuG Black 3 based on this photo, but if you look closely at the picture you can make out that the marking is "123" just like the markings of the Cyber Hobby kit. Also like the CH kit, no Schürzen. In the photo, the gunner's hatch and front fenders are missing, and the engine hatches are open, suggesting mechanical breakdown. It's almost certainly the same vehicle, and CH based the kit on an earlier photo taken in Sammland, East Prussia of this StuG that finally met its end about 500km west in Altdamm near Stettin. This may be the only StuG C/D to get the long gun replacement, or it may be the only one in surviving photographs.

Comparison of the photo and model made me aware of an inaccuracy that appears to be common to all of Dragon's 1:35 StuG III Ausf. B through F/8: the small cutout in the center plate in the roof for the full traverse of the gunsight is missing. I hadn't noticed this before, but it's an easy fix.