Hi all you German tanker types. I'm not really an armour modeller, and the few I've done have been softskins and Vietnam-era tracks.

However, I've been following a lot of German armour builds just for the tips, and I've noticed a lot of questions on the use and application of Zimmeritt. There are also lot of 'how to'features on getting it right. So my question is, how come there are no kits coming out with the Zimmeritt cast on the plastic? Since some of the new kits are so intrictely detailed, is there no way the manufacturer can cast Zimmeritt? Or have they done it and have I missed it?

It's been tried and was not readily accepted. Italeri did a Tiger with it molded on and also marketed a set of injected plastic zimmerit panels.

Dragon and AMC have both marketed some vehicles in 1/72 scale with zimmerit molded on. Dragon's Tiger I and Berge Tiger both have zimmerit molded on the surface as does the AMC Berge Tiger.

Thanks for the info, Robin? Why was it not accepted. Did it not look convincing?

i doubt serious any cast zimmert would look convincing. put it this way... would you like for the shovel, spare track etc to be molded to the chassis? this has been tried and was not well accepted at all. it used to be the standard and a great shortcut but it looks so fake and people are starting to see that. i havent used zimmert yet, but i have done lots of looking around. i even started a topic a few days ago asking people what their best results came with. i was looking because of my king tiger im thinking about building soon. i was unclear as the use of it tho. i thought it was so the tank was easier to climb on, then somewhere i read it was to keep russians from sticking magnetic mines to tanks. i guess it goes well for both tho...

I picked up a Dragon early version Jagdpanther a few years back that had the zimmerit molded on, and to be honest I liked it. Putting it on yourself is extremely time consuming, messy and you run the possibility of screwing your kit up. I have used the cavalier super-thin resin sheets and absoluely loved them, but they cost around $20. So if it were molded on, I personally would love it....as long as it was as well done as the one kit I did have with it on. Tamiya and Dragon seem to always have very crisp well molded parts. Italerie and others I have found to be a little soft.

I'm not a German armor expert but if not every tank of a particular type/model/style had zimmerit then by molding it on you could not depict a vehical that was not zim'd. You would then have to take it all off. So by doing a plain tank, it will be up to the builder to decide if he wanted to zim or not to zim.