Aber stuff is always very nice.

Hi, Bill! THAT IS SO TRUE!!! Even though ABER made their GORGEOUS 1/35 US CCKW-352/-353 and 1/35 US "Jeep" PE sets specifically for the ITALERI/TESTORS "Jimmies" and "Jeeps", I STILL love to use these sets to dress up the much more recent offerings from TAMIYA, etc. And DITTO for their US M8 and M20 Armored Car sets! Their PE sets for the TAMIYA CROMWELL/CENTAUR kits are equally stunning!!!

Well, this is well timed. After a 4 year break from building I decided to start again choosing the Trumpeter 17cm Kanone 18 from my stash. I've been wondering what to do about the barrel. Great stuff

See, Dennis, we do find areas of agreement.

And That's a GOOD thing!

Does anyone know where these pop up for sale first after a release? I need that 17cm Barrel but can’t find it anywhere for sale yet. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Hi, Nathan! I'm afraid you MAY have to wait a few more weeks in finding this new 17cm Barrel. Sometimes manufacturers will announce certain products, but then it MAY take a little bit more time before these new products are actually put into "full production". Then it MAY take even more time before new products are distributed into the general market. I would try the Eastern European retailers first, as ABER is based in Poland... You might want to try RB BARRELS- I don't know if RB BARRELS manufactures the 17cm Barrel that you're looking for, but I think it might be worth your time to check their product listings. RB BARRELS, by their own admission, used to manufacture aluminum barrels for ABER. RB BARRELS is also based in Poland, so it might behoove you to check the Eastern European retailers first, as I said above about the ABER Barrels... Good Luck!

I have some experience with the 1/16th scale .50 caliber rounds. This is the second release, the first release came with a highly detailed .50 caliber box. The rounds are very nice, complete with the fluted casing and a primer. However, the links are a nightmare to assemble. They come with a bending jig that also has to be assembled (a nightmare in itself). The jig does a pretty lousy job of giving the correct bend to the link, but joining anything but a few of the rounds together becomes quite difficult. I needed a run of about 40 rounds for a diorama I was building, and ended up resorting to soldering the rounds together with lengths of Albion tubing to represent the links. I used the links from the pack bent in a modified jig to represent expended links-- but then, you also need expended rounds-- and Aber has forgotten those. I cut off the pointy end on about 20 rounds, and drilled out the casings for expended rounds. They do look the part though, if you want a .50 belt in 1/16 scale. VR, Russ

Good to see a barrel set for the Miniart T-54-1. I recently discovered that Aber had withdrawn one of their 100mm barrels for either the T-54 or T-55, which makes me wonder that they are planning to release all barrels for the different Miniart T-54/55 kits on the market. Why not add the new Type 59 as well, although that should be an exact copy of the T-54A, if I am not mistaken.