Introduction

This set contains 12 resin parts and replaces the suspension for any of Tasca’s Shermans needing only the return skids from the Tasca kit.

One of the most tiresome parts of building a Sherman is the assembly of the suspension. Each part has to be trimmed of flash and the road wheels have to be sanded. In this set Graham from Resicast has done all the hard work for us lazy modelers. He has even added the rivets on the road wheels plus the four bolt holes on the forward face of each bogie.

Parts

The parts come in a ziplock bag wrapped in some bubble wrap inside the obligatory stout cardboard box. Each suspension unit is made up of two parts: the upper bogey body complete with springs and return roller molded in place and the lower bogey truck with the wheels molded in place. As I said in the introduction the eleven little rivets and the four bolt holes missing from most plastic parts are here cast in place. All the parts (All two of them) are crisply cast with only a little resin film in some areas which can easily removed with a sharp number 11 blade.

The instructions come on the lid of the box printed in red ink, They just << clic >> together, and indeed no more instruction is needed.

Assembly

It took me only a few seconds to separate each piece from its casting plug with a sharp razor saw (I use one from UMM) and another few seconds to remove the thin film of resin present on some pieces. Depending on how neat your sawing is you might need to sand the top of the bogie, then it’s just a matter of clicking the pieces together. The set offers some degree of articulation before gluing in place. I have several Tasca Shermans so I took the return skid from one and it was a drop fit into the Resicast bogie. I test fitted the bogey in place on a Tasca Hull and it was a perfect fit. With a little bit of tweaking I imagine this set can be adapted to other Shermans also.

Conclusion

This is a really good idea and a neat shortcut by Resicast. Don’t get me wrong I love the minutiae of modelling and have often achieved a Zen like happiness while sanding 16 Sherman road wheels but next time I’ll go the Resicast route.