The pak 40 with crew is fantastic ! I wished that they made there latest howitzer crew just like this !? I allso love to see the re-birth of the E-100. A nice kit and a great subject. One thing puzzles me ? Wy does the gun loader of the E-100 have an IR device ? Wy is there no IR device attached to the guns aiming device / range finder ? The panther ( IR B solution ) had this feature !? Enough of the nitpicking. I know this will be a fantastic build ! These Two kits are deffinitly worth every penny. Can't wait to buy them. Frank.

Nice to see the PaK 40 getting the Premium treatment, both in the figures and the pre-formed brass shields for the gun itself.

Thanks Jim. The E-100 news was a welcome surprise considering the older release is hard to come by these days. Special Edition: so that's the reason for the "X" suffix (?).There was a thread the other day on this, and we were wondering if this was a erroneous post in PMMS. This may be DML pre-empting Trumpeter's upcoming E-100. Do hope someone comes with the Krokodil soon -- injection moulded, that is.

Personally, I feel that the Pak 40 being re-worked is the REAL gem in this News report. It was essentially a good enough kit, but with the new shields...

The crew looks nice indeed. I think we'll have to wait for a re-release of the howitzer. Or a re-rerelease... If I recall correctly, the first version of the pak-40 was plain, the re-issue having slightly reworked figures from the "Frozen battleground" (Moscow 1941) set serving as a "heer guncrew". I think I see a pattern here. The first issue of the howitzer has a tweaked Karl artillery crew figures manning it, perhaps the second edition has a new crew.

Thats right Eetu, while their original Pak 40 was nice (I have built both of their versions), the heer crew were simply the frozen battleground set who you had to cram the 75mm shells into their hands that were supposed to be holding Kar 98's and the fallschirmjager crew were from their 'Leichtgeschutz' set which used the same spruce twice to create some very similar looking figures who should be holding much shorter shells. It's like they rushed their first kit and have now had chance to finish it properly, with a decent heer crew and some nice PE sheilds, that being pre-formed will be much more user freindly than the aber set! Dragon did something similar when they released their Flak 38 without a crew (but with PE sheilds) then released the crew later without the gun, but with the trailer for the gun, meaning if you wanted to get the figures you were left with a spare useless trailer! Is it me or would anyone else rather wait a bit longer and get the decent kit, rather than having them rush things out then finishing them properly later (my moneys on a Flak 38 being released together with the crew and some other gimmick at some point). Of course they make more money out of us this way as we rush to buy the first release, then will buy the second one later and let the first collect dust at the back of the stash! I've commented on the E-100 on the other thread, that although is a good way to get your hands on the OOP kits seems like a bit of a waste of time to me, just dragon trying to cash in again on a simple bit of re-branding. I know this has turned into a bit of a rant, please dont get me wrong, I love DML kits and think they are great, it just annoys me when they fleece us with the tactics described above! Cheers, James

I think perhaps 'fleecing' is going a little far I think the E100 is actually a good (re)release as (for reasons unknown to myself , it remains a popular subject. As for the Pak 40, perhaps it would have been better to have gone the way of AFV Club and do it with the metal shield(s) on the initial release? I'm just wondering if the spacer bolts are included though.. Personally, I really do wish that they'd start doing artillery crew with something OTHER than full-uniform. I have NEVER seen an arty or mortar crew NOT removing (at least) their webbing gear. It's certainly NOT the kind of item you want when there's the possibility of recoil - MY rant for the day!

Hi All: While I'm delighted to see Dragon upgrade the PaK 40 (I'm sure I'll get one of these), the gun crew figures raise a question that I've had about most gun crew figure sets I've seen released. I admit some ignorance of how antitank gun crews actually work, but shouldn't there be an actual gunner in the crew, somebody manning the gunlaying controls and peering through the sight? Purposeful loading of the gun is one thing, but that all seems irrelevant unless somebody is ready to fire the weapon once it is ready. Or am I missing something here? Cheers, Scott

You are absolutely correct.. I sure would lick to see a gunner looking through the gun sights.. The only one's, that I know of is Tristar’s 007 German Self-Propelled Gun Crew Set Vol.2.. You get two nice gunner.. Both doing what they are suppose be doing..