This tanker crewman is Tamiya's first attempt at a 1/16th scale figure, and what a figure they have done!

The figure represents a crewman of any tank, armoured vehicle or self-propelled gun of the German Army throughout the war . The uniform modelled was used for the entirety of the war and was seen in all theaters, so, in my opinion it is a very good subject for a first try at the 1/16th scale figure market as it has the widest range for appeal.

The model itself comes in a small box, the same size Tamiya puts their 1/35 scale six or eight figure sets in. The box art is very nice with only one major flaw, they have depicted the map case as being brown, quite light in the artists rendition on the front, darker on the side panel and still darker on the back pictures of the actual model built up. In my years of collecting militaria and through many friends who are in the business I have found out that German army, as well as SS leather items were black with the only branch of service to use brown being the German air force. Of course their are exceptions to this and they are; pistol holsters seem to have been brown or black in all branches of service and officers seemed to be able to choose either brown or black belts to suit their personal choice. This aside, the rest of the box art is very helpful in completing the model and gives you the names for some of the equipment and different badges in the kit and also three different rank insignia are given to help you decide what rank to give your figure. Censorship rears it's ugly head on the box art and the swastika on the German National Insignia has been closed to form a box with a cross in the middle and the skull and crossbones have been blotted out on the figures collar patches. By doing this they are censoring an evil man who used censorship as a tool to fulfill his own agenda and in doing so he made the two symbols, mentioned above, evil. In trying to erase all memory of this man by using censorship are they not repeating his mistake?

Inside the box you get one sprue of dark gray styrene, very crisply moulded that is comparable to resin figures of the same scale. They have taken the Que. from Dragon and split the body casting in two parts from neck to ankle, but, unlike the Dragon kits, this one goes together with very little filler needed. The left arm is separate and fits perfectly with his pants pocket so it looks as if his hand is actually in the pocket. For the right arm you get a choice of positions, either straight down with a glove on, holding the other glove, or, bent at the elbow with a gloved hand with separate thumb, holding on to his belt (no sign of the other glove.) His boots are nicely molded and match the rest of his body dimensions and fit perfectly, leaving the figure to stand on his own two feet, which is more than I can say for Dragon or some of the overly expensive resin figures on the market! The neck to collar fit needed a little filler and is a bit tricky to file so I used my new found knowledge of using nail polish remover and a Q-tip to smooth out the Squadron White Stuff once it had dried and I had taken the excess off with a #11 blade and it worked beautifully.(Thanks Will) The officers peaked cap is moulded in two parts, the brim and band is one part and the top is the other. this is ingenious! If you have ever tried to paint the piping that goes around the top of the band on a one piece cap you will know why this is a good idea and I only hope other manufacturers follow suit! The two pieces, once painted, fit together perfectly and sat on the head with no filler needed. There is an M43 field cap included that is also a gem. The accessories included in the kit are a very nicely done map case, a Walther P-38 pistol holster, a very good looking set of binoculars and your choice of four different decorations to adorn your figure with, there are two Iron Crosses, the idea being to use one as a Knights cross and the other as an Iron Cross 1st Class, an Armoured Assault Badge and a General Assault Badge. There is also the ribbon of an Iron Cross 2nd Class moulded on to his lapel. You could concievably put all the accessories on or none at all. The choice is yours.

For my figure I chose to portray a battle hardened veteran of the Afrika Korps who had then been transferred to the Russian front, probably after having been wounded and was now somewhere in France, again after being wounded, looking at the grave of his Brother who has been killed in earlier fighting in that region.

I wanted my figure to be a Sergeant so I cut off the moulded on epaulets and made new ones from lead foil, stretched sprue and a button made from a 1/35th tank rivet. I put the officers cap on him, as I have always liked the look of this particular item, and NCO,s were allowed to wear these without cords and the kits cap doesn't have them moulded on, so every thing was working out. I chose the straight right arm holding the glove as I just liked the pose better. I left off the binoculars as I was thinking this figure was on leave or convalescing from his latest wound before going back to active duty, but did choose to give him a brand new map case and a pistol. The map case is the nicest one I have seen and matches perfectly with real ones that I've owned, however I did remove the moulded on straps and added new ones from lead foil. For decorations I gave him a Knights Cross, an Iron Cross 1st Class, the Ribbon of the Iron Cross 2nd Class and the Tank Assault Badge for over 50 battles. Out of the parts box I gave him a Gold Wound Badge (5 or more wounds) and out of lead foil I added a Russian Front Winter 1941/'42 Ribbon,(also known as the Frozen Meat Medal, as you had to have suffered frost bite to receive it!) I also hand painted the "Afrika" campaign arm band, "Grossdeutchland" arm band and "GD" on his epaulets, three tank destruction awards and gave him the patch of an ordinance specialist using oil paint.

The whole figure was painted with oil paint and I made the jacket an older style with pink piping around the collar as this is why I wanted to do this figure in the first place. Although the pink piping was discontinued in 1942, it was seen in use until the end of the war
With a little research, the colours you choose for the uniform can be a simple conversion. Compared to the black uniform depicted on the box top, you could choose the field gray assault gun uniform or the reed green denim uniform also worn by assault gun crews or a combination of the two. If you want to do only a tanker don't think your colour choices are limited to just the black as I have seen examples of this uniform in several different German camouflage patterns as well as pants made from Italian camouflage material worn in conjuction with the black uniform

Also with a little research some very simple conversions could be done to represent some of the changes done to this style of uniform in the latter part of the war, like the large pocket added to the front of the left thigh on assault gun crew uniforms, or, also on assault gun crew uniforms, there were different styles of pockets on the front of the jacket that would be very easy to add.

It would take a little more but you could also convert this figure to an SS crewman by removing his breast eagle and adding one to his left arm, and by altering the front closure of the jacket from the slanted one depicted, to the vertical style of the SS. You would also have to alter the officers cap by removing the wreath and cockade and replacing it with a skull and crossbones.

All in all a great first time effort by Tamiya. I was a little unsure of the pose at first and it took a long time to come up with the idea of having him looking at a grave but that was the only thing I could think of to have him looking down at. Of course, with the availability of spare heads in this scale you could change his head and have him looking anywhere you want.

When I heard this figure was on he way I ordered it sight unseen, and knowing it was Tamiya and that Dragon figures of the same scale retail for $14-$16 I figured this one would come in around $20 -$25. Imagine my surprise at the price tag of just over $11! This figure is better than Dragon and close to the quality of $40 -$60 resin figures! I highly recommend this one and can hardly wait for the next release.