Designed as an interim solution to the need by the US Army for a medium tank. Observations of German armor performance in Poland and France had revealed the obvious flaws in the M2 Medium Tank project. The M3 Lee was designed as an interim solution until development and production of the proposed M4 could take place. the M3 mounted a 75mm cannon in a limited traverse sponson (the same 75mm that would eventually be mounted in the Sherman and descended from the WWI era French Schneider 75mm field gun) as well as a 37mm cannon in a cast metal turret.

For years if you wanted to build a 1/72 scale M3 Lee, Hasegawa was pretty much it (unless you count wargaming models or blatant knock-offs). With the impending release from Mirage of a new-tool line of M3s (which, based on their Vicker's 6-ton family, should be a knock-out) this is not so true anymore. But the Hasegawa kit had a lot going for it during the lean years.

Modern issues of this kit are molded crisply in light grey plastic Hasegawa seems to mold most of their stuff in these days. I personally like the color as it makes painting easier. Older issues were molded in a dark olive drab. Flash on my kit was relatively minor and easily dealt with, however, Hasegawa continues to use its very hard and somewhat brittle plastic, which makes seperating parts from the sprue a little more labor intensive than normal.

Construction is straightforward and relatively problem free. The only major problem with fit, however, is where the upper hull meets the lower hull in the front. The area around the transmission cover required a great deal of filling. I accomplished this by filling the joint with shims of sheet plastic, and then carving the excess away with a new, sharp knife. Final finishing was with filler putty. With careful work you can make the joint seamless. However, whether you want (or should) do this or not will be discussed below.

Detail on the kit is adequate. Many of the rivets found on the real tank are evident, if a bit heavy at this scale. All tools are molded integral with the model but in most cases are sharp enough that with a little work can be made to look good. Suspension is basic, with return rollers that look a little overscale. Road wheels look good but are severely limited by the fact that they are detailed on one side only. It would only be evident if you picked the model up and looked on the bottom, but what is a greater sin is that the idler has the exact same treatment and this IS visible. Also, the kit comes with sand shields, but any modeller that wants to present his kit without them must also modify the front fenders to delete the excess overhang. Finally, the rear hull overhang merely butt-joins with the upper hull, such that the rivets are too low and an unsightly seam (difficult to clean without destroying the rivets) is evident. The hull machine guns are represented as little lumps of plastic, and the armored cover that protected them on the real machine completely missing.

Two of the biggest problems are with the turret and transmission cover housing. The transmission cover is wholly round (or, with the fit problem in consideration, oval) in profile. This is incorrect for the 3 piece (or any for that matter) transmission housing, and should be scratchbuilt with the bulge towards the ground. This has the secondary effect of making the axel hubs fit poorly to the drive sprocket axels. Secondly, the turret looks to be a little too narrow. This is especially evident in the turret cupola. A quick fix would be to delete the cupola ring to make it look less evident, but a real widening would be neccessary. I chose the easy route.

Tracks are of the typical Hasegawa vinyl type and use the "melted pin" technique of attachment. They fit a little tightly and the join is a bit unsightlyu, but they are nonetheless adequate for the job, if underdetailed.

Included are a few figures, but all of the figures are poorly detailed and rather lifeless.

Markings are for at least two vehicles, but I don't think they are accurate. The turret stripes and stars are printed in white, but all my sources indicate that yellow was used instead.

The model scales out to be approximately 1/72 in scale, a hit for Hasegawa (which sometimes gets this wrong...). With some work a nice kit can be made from this. I gave it 3 stars for that reason. But again the point will be moot with the impending release of Mirage's line of kits.