I guess I could have waited another couple of days and made my in-box review of Italeri's M4A1 Sherman into a build review, oh well, here's the build anyway. for a 40+ year old kit it went together quite well and very quickly with a minimum of fuss. I expect I will have a lot more trouble with the figures that come with the kit given my rather limited figure building skills/experience.

As per usual, the build starts off with the running gear. With 6 pairs of bogies at 8 pieces each, plus drive sprocket and idler, fully a quarter of the kits total parts count is used up in this first step. With careful assembly I was able to keep the suspension pieces articulated and wheels movable. the pieces pretty much snapped together and almost did not need glue.


Once the running gear is completed the rear of the hull is assembled and attached to the lower hull.

With that the lower hull is complete. The drive sprockets are also attached at this stage. Onto the upper hull. The smooth, shiny finish of the kit hull does not show any cast texture, so I added it by stippling on Mr. Surfacer 500 with an old brush.

The bow machine gun was also added and when everything was dry, the upper and lower hulls were joined together along with the bow transmission housing, also textured with Mr. Surfacer.


Overall fit was excellent, the parts just slid togerther very easily, no warping, and only the bow plate needed a bit of adjustment. With the hull together all the accessories can be added such as hatches, lights, guards, pioneer tools etc. The guards for the lights and vision blocks are cast rather thickly and need some cleanup. Attachment points for these are rather nebulous and don't line up that well, which I put down to slight warping of the guards. The pioneer tools have no attachment points or markings on the hull, and the instructions are a bit vague so it it just the best fit you can do. There are a few ejection pin marks to fill, plus some sink marks on the hatches and two of the lights. But, it looks like a Sherman hull!




With the hull complete, it is on to the turret. The main gun comes with a basic breech assembly, and the barrel halves were pretty warped, but this was easy to correct.

Cast texture was added to the mantlet as well.

The turret top and bottom fit together quite nicely, and the shell ejection hatch can be modelled open or closed, I chose to keep it closed. The vision blocks for the commanders hatch are molded into the turret top, no clear parts are provided. More cast texture was added to the turret.


and that pretty much completes construction, took me only two days and a minimum of drama. Great kit for beginners with surprisingly good parts fit.

On to paint, I wanted to avoid the monochromatic green, so I went with the two tone green and black of "In the Mood II" of the 32nd Armoured Division, "I" Co., Normandy, France, August 1944.

Looks good! Im building the Italeri 1/35 M4a3 calliope.

Looks very nice.
I'm not sure how much you care, but there are a couple of easy things to fix (among other things) if you like. It's not too late to sand the step out of the barrel - it should be smooth from the mantlet all the way out to the muzzle.
And although you intentionally kept your articulated suspension movable, yu may regret it. The kit tracks are so tight they tend to pull the front wheels up. Easy enough to fix now if you want, rather than after you already get the tracks on.

Thanks Ezra, yes, I have seen your build in the Shep Paine Tribute campaign, it is looking good!

Robert, thanks for the tips, I will glue the bogeys in place, and see if I sand that step out of the barrel.

The problems with violent tracks was mostly with the original stiff vinyl tracks. They would accept being bent into a generally oval shape but NOT the tight corners required to get all the bogey wheels down on a flat surface. I glued my bogeys and a year later I found that model lying on its side in the display cabinet. The track had broken, the ends had straightened out with such force that it flipped the model on its side.

The newer glueable tracks should be OK with glued down bogeys.

Got the details painted, decals on and a first dot filter. The new decals supplied with the kit are great, very thin and snug right down with a minimum of decal softener, and practically no silvering. I did muck up the "In the mood" decal on one side, that is my own fault. certainly looks like a Sherman. Some more weathering, dirty it up a bit then the tracks go on and I can move on to the figures *shudder*...definitely not my strong suit...

Always nice to see these old kits still getting built . Sometimes we need a fun build , not a pull your hair out 600 pieces of track and multi sheets of photo etch adventure . Its looking great . IRC the only visible red colored light on the hull rear was the upper left one , the other three looked like black plastic

I know the paint is on but you might consider eliminating the join between upper and lower turret halves. Turrets were cast as one piece and although there was a seam line, it tended to be ground off - it certainly wasn’t a depression anyway.

Yeah,I had filled it (I thought!) but it showed up after paint, guess I didn't get as much in there as I thought...may just leave as is (heresy!), not sure if I want to try patching now.

I think your build is very cool.

Thanks Roy! finally posting some pics of the completed model, turned out pretty well, a few more corrections are really required as noted by some other members but it looks like a Sherman! Slowly plugging away on the figures, they are certainly not one of my talents so they will take quite a while.