1/35 Dragon Heuschrecke 10 Grasshopper.
So, I have so many projects on the go, I'm pulling my hair out...but, having fun!
I started this kit last week. Jumping from this kit to my Tiger 1 metal tracks. (takes so long)
Straight out of the box build but I added a few things from my spares box. Its not even close to being done but I thought I would share some pix.

I started out assembling & priming in german grey then black , like I always do. Using black + using several coats of light , thinned colors seems to bring out more depth then say..using gray primer. You get that natural dark depth around the edges.


I then use Tamiya Dark Yellow as my base..no camo.

Started the MIG dark Brown wash , painted all the little details.

Did some interior work, nothing too fancy. Adding wiring & headsets later as well as a crew.


Still more work to do on it. This kit comes with magic tracks, so that is the next step. Plus I have to finish the "arms". I changed the muzzle to a bigger one.
Hope you like it.

Looking good, David. I like what you've done with it so far.

That looks like a fun kit. I may have to try one. 40 years ago I started the Bandai 1/30 version. Unlike their great 1/48 kits, it's a real dog. I've attempted to finish it a few times over the years, but it has turned into my ultimate shelf queen.

Now you have indeed outted yourself, Bob! I, too jumped up and bought that Bandai thing about 40 years back!

And I too started up on it "back long, long ago in a place far, far away" But I quickly enough realized that the kit was a styrene thug and off to the shelf it went. I binned it a few years later.

The Heuschrecke is a cool subject and I've dreamed of doing a kit of it ever since "back then". Over 30 years passed and I discovered the Dragon item! It's on my stack and I hope to get to it this life-time!

@David; Good work, so far! Seeing this rekindles once again my interest to do this one. I'll be watching to see what you are doing with it!

Bob

Is this the Bandai kit you guys are talking about? Wow! That is kool looking box art! It can even be motorized!


They made 2 ? Or, same model , different box?

Trumpeter makes one as well.

Dragon also makes another version of this, same turret , smaller PZ IV chassis, . I have this kit also, very awesome Dragon kit.A lot of interior detail in this kit, worth the $!

The first picture shows the kit that I have, though it must be a later version. Mine came complete with the motor, where the one shown says the motor's not included. The box art is probably the best thing about it. I have no idea what the second picture is. The instruction sheet looks the same as mine, so I guess it's just a rebox.

You picked the right kit for the Pz. Sfl. IVb. There's a Trumpeter version that's totally wacked out. Here's a link to a build log for the Dragon kit (that actually shows both), if your interested:
http://modelerssocialclub.proboards.com/thread/7574/dml-trumpeter-pz-ivb-5cm

It's that slug with the motor what came along first - the second was a rebox without motor, I believe. But this was all a loooong time ago! But I'm fairly certain that I did NOT have any motor... I would have kept that part! So... there may have been yet another boxing... "Can't sell it with one picture... try another!" Still does not hide the sow's ear. Just trying to change the poke it's in!

@David;

Actually, Heuschrecke and the Pz.Sfl.IVb were different vehicles - alternative versions to meet the proposed concept-need (to mobilize the 105mm field-gun). IVb and Heuschrecke used the same gun, but different hulls and different turrets. There is yet a third version of this concept-beast - a one-off also kitted by Dragon and way-cool (IMHO). The 3 vehicles represent 3 different "solutions"...

Heuschrecke featured a removable turret which could be used on the ground (on a platform mount) and could be trailed on its carriage wheels. IVb had a permanent turret and operated as a spg-howitzer - a sort of more-versatile "Wespe". The last one-off actually featured a whole field-gun "simply" stashed inside a large armored box - which gun could be dismounted and trailed on its carriage wheels. Far as I know, this was another goofy "decision" by the Hiler regime... Heuschrecke was fiddly and complex and actually fairly pointless (why dismount that gun to make it a stationary battery?). The last one was perhaps interesting but not very sensical either - it at least was a true "weapon-carrier" and thus mobilized a field-gun, but still complex. The IVb was actually quite successful - it definitely improved on the Wespe as a firing platform and increased the field versatility of the gun by placing it into a turret allowing rapid shift-of-fire. A pre-production run of IVb saw action. Heuschrecke was a couple of prototypes used in testing. The last one-off was a single prototype - captured fully-intact by the US Army.

The IVb could be considered to be one of the real first turreted SPG - a fire-support weapon now widely - used in armies around the planet.

By me, all are cool subjects.

Bob

Thx for the info guys! Wow, that Trumpeter kit seems so small compared to the same Dragon kit!! I was going to buy it too but...not now.
That is so kool that that old kit was motorized!! My local hobby shop sells Tamiya motors for their tanks. They even have a 1/35 Tamiya Jagdtiger with motorized parts for sale their & instock on their shelves. They also have a Sherman.
This 3rd version you speak of? Do you have a name? A picture? Does Dragon make a kit of it?
I have most of the Trumpeter Russian WW 2 tanks, which build to nice models, but wow, that news is disheartening about the German kits. Trumpeter seems to go along the ways as Tamiya, not very much detail & seems like simple builds. Heck, the KV chassis is the same parts for all their KV tanks, same goes for the JS . But, I intend to collect them all.
I really enjoy building the Dragon Premium Smart kits for the T 34/85 & SU-100, top notch kits. I still have to get the T 34/85 with bedspring armor, that kit looks wicked.
Anyway, I will post more pix of this monster when I get the tracks on.
Here is my other Dragon kit of the second version of this concept. PZ IV Chassis. The model is the Dragon kit, it's not done though lol.

David - I believe Bob is referring to the "Dicker Max". Here's a link to the one Dragon offers:
http://www.dragonusaonline.com/item_detail.aspx?ItemCode=DRA6357

Two were made in 1941, sent to Russia for evaluation, and were determined less than satisfactory. The project was then dropped.

Back when the Bandai kit was made, there were many motorized models being offered. Tamiya must have had 8 or 10 in their line. I've still got one of their Jagdpanthers with the wired remote control box.

Here's the line up:






As already said the Pz.IVb won out and at least made it to battlefield testing.
The main complaints:
Turret only turned 70 degrees,they wanted 360 Degrees.
Too slow to avoid incoming return fire.

Tony lee

Hi Tony,
Ok, yes, now I remember seeing that 1st kit in your list! It looks cool. It just came out recently too init? Guess I best buy that one too for the shelf !
Was the Dicker Max an artillary or Anti Tank?

The 40/2 kit was released in Feb 2012
Max was used for both David.

Tony lee

This is the one I was referring to, though now I know it's not the one that Bob was.



It's like the IVb, but with the full sized hull and a longer superstructure.

AFV I kinda thought you misunderstood what he was referring to and that's why I posted the three that were being developed for the job.

The Wespe was the final winner.


Cheers
Tony lee

Yes. Tony posted the right kit(s) for this line-up.

@Tony:

The "victory" of the Wespe was perhaps more complicated and certainly vaguer than may be first thought... The 10 or so Sfl IVB were actually built in late 1939 - early 1940! As there was no supply of available hulls, this project languished. The demand for mobile 105 guns renewed in Russia in 1941, and the now-available Pz II was grabbed up and converted in 1942. Wespe proved to be popular and successful (and easy to build / convert). But as the Pz. II production had phased out, while need for the type increased, new solutions were sought: enter into discussion the Heuschrecke (which tried to expand on the IVb design) from later 1942 as a replacement for the "stop-gap" Wespe, and the R-B / Alkett 105 auf Geschutzwagen IV (the 3rd type) - which prototyped in 1944. The Heuschrecke was simplified a little to become the Heuschrecke 10, which was slated for series production starting in 1945. The R-B / A type was actually deemed to be somewhat superior. The original Sfl IVb thus re-born in the Heuschrecke.

Bob

Update:
So, I put the arms on instead, added flesh tone to the dark yellow to lighten it up, sprayed a lil between the panels & high areas.Doing the tracks now, magic tracks. Then after that, going to wash with black in few places, then light grey wash. Oil paint will be used with the dot technique. Then wash with dark brown. Drybrush...then see where we are at.

I like it. Nice tone.

You're getting there Dave

Tony lee

David - are the arms moveable? If not, do you have the option to show them erected?

Yes, you can make them moveable. I choose to have them stationary .However, the kit doesn't come with any chain or flywheels as depicted in this pic.


As you can see, Voyager has them for sale.
I'm not sure if the Trumpeter kit has them either.
The Dragon kit allows you to build the gun in its bunker form with the wheels on it, as seen in the below pic.

This is not my pic below. This guy built the Trumpeter kit, added flywheels & chain.

If anyone does build this and plan to add the turret trolly don't install those pallet storage mounts on the rails unless you can figure out a way for the trolly to jump over them.


The factory has it right but the example at APG does not.

Factory places them on the fenders


APG specimen has them welded to the rails


FYI
Tony lee

Tony;

Thanks for pointing out that little "change" in those turret-base attachment mounts done, I think, by the US Army / APG, "long ago"!

Ever since I saw / had my Bandai kit of this thing from long long ago, It's amused me! (and perturbed me a bit, too) The chuckles got louder when I visited APG and saw the real machine back "when" ... and asked the available curator staff about this and how did it work. They assured me that this was how the Germans built and used it.

What is perhaps more astonishing is that the Bandai kit engineers MAY have realized that something was wrong... The box-art shows the stowed vehicle with these added "wrong" mounts on the top-rails... just as seen on the APG example. But the deployed vehicle lifting the turret off does NOT show these mount-plates on those rails - but does show the chain-fall hoists as they would have looked rolling along those rails!

As clearly seen in the original pic, and "obvious" (ONLY when one actually looks AND thinks about things in a mechanical / functional way), those turret-base pieces could not be attached to that top rail like depicted in the D kit and there could not be any pegs or other mounting plates sticking out from that top rail that would block the chain-fall wheels... But apparently almost all modelers, even those getting that cool AM detail kit, somehow never comment on this!

There IS, however, some possible "right", here. It MAY be that The Germans did re-arrange and add those mounts to the rails... but they would then also have modified the chain-fall hoists to have the operating wheels further out-board to clear those mounts during deployment... This MAY be what happened. But it WON'T work as the styrene and PE kits show it assembled...

The devil is always lurking in the details!

Bob

PS: Simply cut away or don't put on those little mounts on the top-rails, and scratch in some simple mounts for the separate turret-base rails on the fenders. Specially if you want to actually add on those chain-fall hoists. It's that, or modify your hoists to move those hand-wheels out a bit to clear those mounts.

The whole design idea was first implemented in WW I which was poorly thought out. Being resurrected in WW II was still a poor concept. The start of a full field of fire howitzer on a mobile chassis was not fully fledged out until after the war. Even the Mars project by Germany for the 190mm Howitzer was first designed to be dis-mountable. Man how a strange concept just keeps on hanging around. The Dicker Max was going to be used for the invasion of Gibraltar. Which was on a PZ4 chassis.

Keeping that middle brace on the top of the fender during battle conditions probably meant loosing it. So they bolted it to the center beam for easy access & removal.
So, Tony, where is your historical written proof of what your saying? That the kit is wrong. Plz tell me my model is ok so I don't have to chop off that brace lol.