Introduction

The Russian Plavayushchiy Tank or PT-76 is a light, amphibious tank developed in the early 1950s. About 12,000 of these amphibious tanks were produced for domestic and export markets from 1958 to 1967. About 2,000 vehicles were exported to various countries including Cuba, Indonesia, North Korea, India, Hungary, China, Afghanistan, Vietnam ,Egypt and Russia of course. It is still in active service for fire-support, reconnaissance and troop transport operations with about 25 countries across the world. The light tank is still in service with several naval infantry units across the world for its excellent manoeuvrability at varying depths of water.

PT-76B (ObIekt 740B) in particluar which is this set designed for is armed with the new D-56TS 76.2 mm gun,the PAZ , improved observation devices, an automatic fire extinguishing system, improved TShK-2-66 sight, NBC protection system , improved electric equipment, a new V-6B 6-cylinder 4-stroke in line water cooled diesel engine
and additional internal fuel tanks for which the shape of the armour had to be slightly changed. (Produced from 1959.)

Contents

This Photo-etched set does not come in the the usual slide-open box,but in a small bag (As seen on 1. picture).The set includes:

• Instructions,
• 4 Photo-etched sheets,
• 2 metal and 2 plastic rods,
• Single tow cable,
• 2 turned brass parts.

So that's a lot of stuff for 16$ and can really improve your model,because it improves almost all the lows of the kits,only a metal barrel and tracks are the stuff you would need to make a perfect model.

Parts brakedown:
The instructions are printed on 2 papers,which are approximately A4 paper format. It shows all the tools you should have,and all the skills you should have.This set is not for beginners,it requires a lot of different skills and i wouldn't recommend it to beginners,only to advanced modelers.
They show all the assembly's and sub assembly's in separate boxes.The instructions are clear and everything is shown.The hardest part of the set are for sure the complex folds of some parts,PE folding tool recommended.

The turned brass parts
To be exact two of them - one is replacing the 7.62 mm SGMT coaxial medium machine gun and the other is a aerial base.

Fret C contains only few parts and I have to note that it is thicker than other frets (for better 3d look of the part).The most important part of this fret are the metal guards for the lights which look really good.The other parts are mostly some handles and small details.

Fret Fconsists of a a lot of different parts for both the turret and the hull. The periscopes,handles,hatches and all parts that are over sized on hatches, as well as lots of handles that are also over sized on the kit.(Nice part is that several more are included than needed,so if you lose a couple, no worries). Next we have parts that upgrade the tools and they're attachments. The Hull upgrades are various handles and the side fenders which are too thick on the model.

Fret G consist mostly of small parts which replace various oversized or simplified details and make the model look more accurate and better than it would look without those parts replaced. Different handles,very detailed reflector base,canister straps and a lot of other different parts. The hardest part of this fret is for sure the reflector base which has a lot of parts to be bent,but in the end it looks excellent.

Fret H is a little bit thinner than other frets,which is nice because in reality this part are really thin. It contains grills,some kind of circular mesh housing (they are located nearby the tools),different housings,few bolts and few other details.

Conclusion

This big, but cheap set is a very nice addition to the Pt-76 kit from trumpeter,which is not amazing,but is very good.Replacement tracks and barrel will be needed for a better model. Voyager model showed us that they are "The best upgrade solution" as stated on their PE sets and I think you should really invest 16$ more in this set and improve the kit drastically.

Here is a nice walkaround of the Pt-76 for the 1:1 parts:
Pt-76 Walkaround