First delivered in November of 1941, the Pak 40 saw service on all fronts and was the primary German anti-tank artillery piece for the remainder of the war. Some 23,500 units produced. About 6,000 of those were used to arm tank destroyers, such as the Marder. The piece remained in service with several European countries after the war.
Contents
The kit contains three sprues. There are two gray sprues containing the 87 parts for the gun. The third sprue is light green and has the 19 parts for the three figures and their accessories. There are two instructions sheets, one in Japanese and one in English.
the PAK
The detail on both sprues for the gun is very crisp. There are only a few ejector pin marks that will need to be addressed, most notably parts A21, A24 and the inside of the lower shield, part number B4. The rest are in places that will not show on the finished model.
The barrel is molded in two halves and will require careful clean up after assembly to removed the seam without creating an out of round gun tube. The recoil cradle will also require some seam filling. The gun shield is thick for the scale but careful sanding prior to assembly could thin it down closer to scale thickness.
Several of the parts are extremely small and fragile and will require special care when removing them from the sprue or they will break.
the figures
There are three figures included, a commander, a gunner, and a loader. Again, there is very minimal flash and no ejector pins to deal with.
Detail on the uniforms is crisp, especially the collar tabs and belt buckets.
The faces on the loader and the gunner are passable but the commander's face has the molding seam running vertically down the center. This will require an extremely delicate touch to remove.
The personnel equipment is adequate if somewhat "static" looking. The gas mask containers are missing the clasp that holds the top closed.
the instructions
The instructions, while clear as far the the actual assembly is concerned are vague when it come to painting instructions. The colors referenced in the instructions are dark yellow, German gray, red brown, etc. Tamiya paint colors are called out on the back of the box but new modelers will probably miss them since everything on the reverse side of the box is in Japanese. An update of the the English instructions referencing the Tamiya paint colors would be a plus.
SUMMARY
Highs: Quick and simple build. Very minimal flash. Crisp detail.Lows: Poor quality faces on the figures, dated color references. Verdict: Great starter kit or model to throw together over a weekend. Somewhat dated and much better version are available but I think the kit has held up pretty well considering how old the tooling is.Can't beat the price.
About Shaun Keenan (keenan) FROM: INDIANA, UNITED STATES
48 years old. Have been modeling since I was about 12. Will build almost anything in 1/35th scale. I really enjoy building dioramas. Current interest include any armor and dioramas WWII to present.
Thank you for the review, Shaun. I really appreciate when older kits like this get some attention.
I very much agree with Brian and have fond memories of building this kit as a kid. I just finished building the DML PaK 40 Premium and in comparison, the Tamiya kit holds up surprisingly well, especially considering the age gap. If you have both in your collection, you can steal the leftovers from the DML kit to spruce up the Tamiya kit (gun shield, wheels, tires, barrel, muzzle break, and some minor stuff).
I sense another towed gun build in my near future.
-Doug
Me too As the review says it's a good starter kit. I also used the gun to spruce up an Italeri marder. I would definite replace the crew if I were buying it again though.
Dean tell us what problems I'm sure someone here can help
In the last step, when we place the completed cannon piece onto the wheelbase, there is no way that it slots into the hole and is able to swivle. I had to cut off a piece of the ridged half circle piece that hangs from the bottom of the cannon, and it still is not a nice fit!!!
Sorry Dean but it's been so long since I built it I don't remember the breakdown of parts but I don't remember there being any fit problems with my one.Can you show us a picture of what you mean?
I remember building this kit about 21 years ago. I is a nice kit. Very easy assembly. I mated it with a German tank, of which one I'm not sure. And, made a nice little vignette out of it.
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