Do you think it is possible to build and paint a 1/35 scale tank in just one day? A working day, to be precise?
Subject: German Kugelpanzer
Scale: 1/35
Made by: Attack in 2008
Parts count: 4
Four parts! Thats true!
Here we go!
First part:
This is a wheel. A mainwheel. One of them. The "cleats" were a bit brittle. Lost some while in the box, more during handling. Had to rebuild a good number using strip styrene. The slot between the "wheel rims" has a curved shape, that made the fit of the replaements a bit fiddly, but it was doable. Good news: The "cleats" are cast in place. No need to glue a gazillion of PE onto the wheels. Well done, Attack!
But before doing so I had to grind off the pour stubs. There were 4 large pour stubs: One at each wheel, two at the tank body. The full size of each parts back. Thickness 5-10 mm. It took me two full hours to saw and mill them off, not to forget a good amout of wet sanding on coarse grit paper. Now we have this:
After gluing two main wheels and a tiny tail wheel to the body it looks like that:
OK, I HAD to superdetail this
Doubled the parts count by adding a step (got broken off), a handle (broken off too) and two exhaust pipes (the white parts, a too much sanding here...).Final count: 8 parts forming a full size German WW2 tank
You don't know what a "Kugelpanzer" is?
Well, this is no hoax and no "what if". This one was really made by the Germans in WW2 and captured by the Rssians in 1945. Here the stories differ: Some say, it got exported to Japan an captured in Manchuria, other say it was found at Kummersdorf (german testing range) beside the Maus supertank. Whatever is true: Nowaday it rests in Kubinka, Russias armor collection. Thats all we know. There are no surviving documents, so we don't know what it was intended for. It is a one man tank, has an engine of 25 hp and an armor thickness of only 5 mm. An educated guess is that it was intended to be a selfpropelled obsevation post; mayby for artillery observers. But it went not into aproduction or service.
To get an idea about the size of this thing a photo together with a Pz. IV model::
Just the work of an afternoon and an evening. Now we need a setting for our little Panzer.
Enjoy!
- dutik
