Tristar Models
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In 1944 the Flakpanzer 38(t) auf Selbstfahrlafette 38(t) Ausf.M (Sd,Kfz.140) as it was official known, was introduced to provide the Panzer Divisions with defence against the threat of low altitude Allied fighter bombers. It was based on a modified Panzer 38(t) chassis were the engine was moved from the rear to the middle and a new sloping glacis was designed. This new chassis was also used for the later Marder III and Grille SP guns. The Flakpanzer 38(t) wasn't a huge success as an AA vehicle, the 20mm gun was not effective against the faster ground attack vehicles employed in the latter part of the war. None-the-less, 140 (or so) of these vehicles were produced, so it is an important subject for modellers of German WW2 armour. Naturally modellers have wanted a kit of the Flakpanzer 38(t) for some time yet no kit of the Flakpanzer 38(t) has been available up until recently. A few years ago Alan (of Russia) released their version, while I have seen a few completed models built from this kit, it does take a lot of work to produce an acceptable rendition. A few modellers have converted/scratch-built examples too. Now Tristar have released a state-of-the-art Flakpanzer 38(t), which is the subject of this review. The Kit This kit follows on from Tristar's Panzer 38(t) series of kits. The running gear and tracks and a few smaller parts come directly form these earlier Panzer 38(t) kits. It also includes parts from their latest "German 20mm Flak 38 Late w/Sd.Ah.51 Trailer" kit (#35029) a few parts from their "20mm Ammunition and Accessories for KwK/Flak 30/38" kit (#35036) and parts (modified) from their "Panzer 38(t) Full Interior Set" kit (#35032). New parts include the mid-engine Panzer 38(t) hull, upper superstructure, gun mount and fighting compartment. This should be the first kit from Tristar of the mid-engine Panzer 38(t) vehicles, they have already announced a Marder III... hopefully this will be released and not suspended now because of the recent release from Dragon/CyberHobby. The Tristar kit is moulded in sandy coloured styrene. Moulding overall is quite sharp, in fact it is as good as I have seen in a Tristar kit, there is no flash, warp-age or short shot problems (which is a problem with new kits). The styrene assembles well with both Testors Liquid Cement and Tenax-7R. The parts breakdown follows the same breakdown of the prototype's armour plates. I like this more than the "tub" style parts breakdown, where major armour panels are moulded together. In addition to the styrene parts there is a photo-etched brass fret containing mostly parts for the fighting compartment, the 20mm ammunition clip racks and radio mounts. There is also a spent shell casing net etched in brass. Finally a twisted wire cable is included to be used as the tow cable. The instruction sheet is a ten page fold out printed in black & white. Included are sprue layouts, eight marking profiles a short description in Japanese and English. Paint references are given for Tamiya acrylics and Mr. Color. The instructions are clear and well laid out. Of note is the box, it's in the bigger sized box that Tristar uses for their Panzer IV kits. The the box art is superb too, almost photo-realistic, painted by Yuji Asano.
Interior - Driver's Compartment and Engine There is a full interior, as far as I can tell based on my references at least. A lot of the front area, especially the transmission won't be visible when the superstructure is assembled. The glacis plate's transmission hatch can be modelled open however. In general, the attention to detail is excellent. Based on photographs of other Ausf.M chassis vehicles from a few books all the parts that should be there do appear to be there. It is quite a complex assembly however, for example the driver's seat consists of 13 styrene and photo-etched parts. Assembly of the interior will present difficulties for beginning modellers as there are a lot of tiny parts and several photo-etched parts that require some tricky bending. The final drives have photo-etched heat shields that must be bent into a circular profile, this is difficult even for experienced modellers. They are best formed over a dowel of the correct diameter. The steering linkages are also complex, being made up of "sandwiches" of tiny photo-etched an styrene parts. Since this is the mid-engine Ausf.M chassis the interior layout (obviously) differs from the previous Tristar Pz.38(t) kits. The engine firewall part is right behind the driver's seat and there is no co-driver (or radio operator's seat). The engine is slightly different too with new parts for the radiator housing. Other than that the parts are the same as the Tristar interior set. For more details on the common interior parts refer to my Panzer 38(t) Full Interior Set review, but keep in mind that this review specifically describes the interior of the Panzer 38(t) tank. While not much can be seen of the driver's compartment through the single hatch the engine compartment will be quite visible through the separate engine deck hatches. Terry Ashley (of PMMS) has a photograph of the assembled interior here: http://www.track-link.net/forum/modelling_kits/7804. I wonder what was stored in the big void to the left of the driver's seat...? Extra ammunition boxes, does anyone know? I have found photographs of the driver's compartment of the Ausf.M chassis, but not specifically the Flakpanzer, there seems to be a couple of those small perforated boxes missing. If the Flakpanzer 38(t) had these boxes then they would be quite visible once fixed in place. Suspension The road wheels feature the correct detailing on both sides, they are suitably thin too. A separate tyre is included but when assembled the rim at the outer edge of the wheel does not appear proud enough. I sanded the tyre down a little from the back to make this look better. One problem that I have encountered is a slight gap (more like a large seam) left between the wheel and rim. This I have been filling with Mr. Surfacer 500. It's not a huge problem... just something to be aware of. The leaf springs are accurate featuring the correct number of leaves for this chassis (yes I counted them) but the mould release line runs straight down the middle of them. I find that scraping with an X-Acto blade can remove these lines quickly, sanding may "round" off the edges. I have noticed that the front-centres of the leaf springs now show a little shrinkage, I don't know if this is because the mould is getting old -- this is a common sprue from all of Tristar's Pz.38(t) kits. The swing arms, two per bogie, are separate and can be built as moveable. Solid rimmed drive sprockets are included, these where the most common type seen on the Flakpanzer 38(t). Other types included ones with eight small holes around the outer rim, this does appear on photographs of the prototype Flakpanzer 38(t) and not (none that I've seen) in photos of in-service vehicles. Individual track-links make up the tracks. They look accurate to me. They can be built as flexible but don't have much strength when completed. I find it easy to assemble them as just like regular non-working individual track-links. Which is by gluing them in a length then draping over the suspension while still flexible. Hull The Flakpanzer 38(t) was built on the mid-engine Pz.38(t) hull which is nicely depicted in this kit. Starting off with a floor plate, which is moulded flat (without any warp introduced through the moulding process) and thin, so it is in scale. To this port and starboard side panels are glued. There are locator tabs that provide a true positioning. This is similar to the previous Panzer 38(t) and Marder kits. Some people have reported problems with this construction... however, I still have not been able to duplicate what they did wrong... and this is after I wrecked a kit trying to figure it out! A few other people have stated that they do not like multi-piece hulls, rather preferring the "tubs", as far as this kit goes the assembly is dead simple. Tristar's previous Panzer IV kits' lower hulls could be tricky to assemble however, these newer Panzer 38(t) kits are fine. The lower hull front piece is added next followed by the glacis plate, to which the driver's hood is attached. The hood was a cast piece and would benefit form a little texturing, at lest enough to show a difference to the smooth rolled armour plates. Next the fighting compartment floor, which includes the sponsons, is attached to the rear hull. Then the left and right hull sides are attached, these have the lower side panels of the upper fighting compartment integrally moulded.Next the rear hull plate, the left and right rear panels and the front and left and right front-side panels of the upper superstructure. At this point, this is as far as I have got, the positioning of the eight upper superstructure parts should be checked. Since the upper panels fit to this they should be true: mine are! The engineering of the hull and assembly sequence was well thought out by Tristar. I left the exhaust and smaller parts that fit to the hull until I finished the major hull assembly... just in case I had start over. Each of the armoured flaps are separately moulded and can be displayed up or down. They are moulded to a thickness of 0.60mm which scales up to 21mm. While they do appear thin and acceptable they actually should scale to 15mm or 10mm. I promised myself that I would not complain about the fenders this time, so I won't. The fenders, like all kit fenders, could be improved with a little thinning out. The mounting brackets are integrally moulded and also could be thinned out or replaced with some thin sheet stock. Photographs show that the Flakpanzer fenders got beat up quite a bit so simulating damage would be suitable for this vehicle. There are a few mounting holes in the fenders for the various tools, the bigger ones will be hidden under the jack block and "S" hook box and the smaller ones are small enough that they should still be hidden under the tools even if photo-etched clamps (from Aber for example) are used. Actually... I like the fenders on this kit (a first for me :-) Fighting Compartment The Flak 38's pedestal mount fits onto (into) the fighting compartment floor. There are a few good photographs of the mount around and the kit does match the details visible in these well. The mount has 20mm magazine "ready racks" built in too, although this is not mentioned in the instructions. It would be more likely that the opened 20mm magazine boxes themselves and not the loose clips be stored here at the ready. Included is a spare Flak barrel case, this fits at the front of the compartment. It can be displayed opened and also includes the storage brackets for two spare Flak 38 barrels which are also included. Several 20mm magazine cases are included along with some clips. The smaller 2-clip boxes are mounted to the left and right sides of the compartment in photo-etched stowage racks. These racks will be difficult to bend correctly without a PE bending tool. Radio equipment is included in the form of two styrene sets and their mounting frames and the transformer. To this the power and communication cables will have to be added. The radio set is (I think) the Fu.5. There is a 2m antenna on the Flakpanzer 38(t) the base is on the left side of the upper deck so a cable will need to go from the radio apparatus to the antenna base. Flak 38 The "late" Flak 38 AA gun was mounted in the Flakpanzer 38(t), this is what photographs suggest at least. I have not been able to locate an earlier Flak 38 mounted in this vehicle. Tristar have included their Flak 38 Late which correctly depicts the later traverse/elevation gear box design. The later sight is also depicted. There are a few variations shown in photographs too. Some vehicles have the small gunner's shield, while some do not, some vehicles have the spent cartridge casing basket attached, this is also included in the kit. There is also some variation in the gun sight evident in photographs. The two specific vehicle depicted by Tristar appear to match photographs. From their Flak 38 Late kit (#35029), sprue "A" minus the gun platform parts, two different sprues labelled "C", sprue "D" and the gun shield sprue are included. The barrel is the new moulding with the correct length. Additional parts include a different version of the gunner's shield, this was specifically for the vehicle and features an extra hinged panel and the hoops for the spent cartridge basket. New photo-etched parts are included to simulate the woven netting used for the spent cartridge basket... I'm a little dubious of this. I think I'd prefer to make my own from a suitable cloth netting material. I shall endeavour to find something suitable and report back in the forums. Overall the Flak 38 gun is excellent. The gun shields are particularly well done, being moulded close to scale -- _without_ having tapered edges. Many of the smaller detailed are depicted such as the little knobs on the gunner's seat. Small photo-etched details like the tiny retaining chains for the travel locks are included. The late model gun sight which consists of a big cross hair and (what I think is) a small telescope is included too. The cross hair site is a photo-etched piece. Personally I would prefer to replace the gun barrel with a turned metal one, mostly because I find it difficult to clean the mould lines off thin barrels like the 20mm and still retain a circular cross section. There are several options available, I prefer the 1.3m 20mm barrel from Armour Scale. Finishing Options There are not many photographs of the Flakpanzer 38(t) around, and most, if not all, are from Normandy. Most of the vehicles were sent to Normandy and served with the 12th SS Pz.Div., the 21 Pz.Div. and others. Roughly one quarter of the vehicles where sent to Italy, although I have not seen any photographs of these yet. Some sources, but not Jentz, state that a few were sent to the Eastern Front.... I'm dubious of this. So marking schemes are a little limited. All schemes will be dark yellow based with dark green and/or red brown. Tristar include two markings options:
Conclusions This is an excellent kit, it is well researched with a special thanks to Thomas Jentz, and very well moulded. Based on my assembly of the hull the construction is also good, much better than other Tristar kits. It is an excellent subject too, a vehicle that many modellers of German WW2 vehicles have wished for a long time. As for detailing and accuracy, I can not see any obvious problems. With the exception of replacing the barrel, some Aber tool clasps, this is definitely a kit that I would build straight from the box. I will be posting images and comments on the construction as I progress, refer to the forum topic that accompanies this review. I totally recommend this kit without hesitation. Five stars. This kit was supplied by Tristar as a review sample to Track-Link. Other Reviews
References Currently there is no single "final word" work on the Flakpanzer 38(t), the Panzer Tracts book is good. There are a few photographs of wartime vehicles listed in the books below. Rumour has it that Nuts & Bolts is working on a new book on the subject.
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