This is the 10th kit I built, again another Ebay win. The kit is by Dragon and again, the quality of fit was very good although there was a flaw (hole) in the superstructure moulding which had to be filled. I purchased a Jordi Rubio aluminium barrel, the Eduard etched brass set and a set of Fruil Modelissimo white metal tracks to fill it out. Being such a small vehicle I found fitting the etched brass tricky, I would recommend if you do buy etched parts that you leave the skirts off until you fit the wheels as it is very tricky to do if you dont ( I damaged several skirt plates !). The gun mounting is very loose so you may have to pad it out a little to stop the main armament drooping. That said I think the etched brass really improved an already nice kit and I would say this is a must for this vehicle. the Fruil tracks are tedious to assemble but the end finish is worth the trouble and the price!!! I fitted all external kit and fixtures before spraying leaving off only the wheels and tracks.
I sprayed everything with a base coat of Citadel miniatures black spray paint and started to paint using the post shading technique I tried on the Jagdtiger. First I base coated all the pieces in Tamiya khaki all over. Then I carefully sprayed Tamiya dark yellow on all of the main panels, allowing the khaki base coat to show at the edges and give a coarse shading effect. Next I sprayed on the camouflage, first the green striping ( Tamiya flat green) and then the brown ( Tamiya red brown ). I then post shaded the vehicle, spraying a mixture of Tamiya red brown and black (70/30 mix) thinned 50/50 with Tamiya thinners into all of the plate joints and areas that naturally would be shaded. I also sprayed the tracks with this mix. I then painted all of the stowage, upper machine gun and the periscopes. Finally I lightly weathered the engine exhaust and crew access hatches with Tamiya chrome silver and washed the stowage with my burnt umber oil paint/white spirit wash ( the engine grilles and exhaust pipes were repeatedly washed to build a fine heat rusting effect). The remote control MG recieved a diluted wash of black citadel wash. The sprayed tracks were gently rubbed with an oven scouring pad along the outside and the cleats to let the silver metal show through the paint to give a realistic worn effect.
Operationally, the Hetzer was a very successful tank destroyer but it arrived too late in the war to make a real difference.The brainchild of General Guderian, built on the tried and combat proved Czech t38 chassis, the machines low silhouette, powerful gun and well sloped armor made it a real winner. Serving on both western and eastern fronts, from Normandy to the last battles in Germany, it was well loved by its crews and racked up a good score, its only fault being its cramped fighting compartment The design proved so successful that it even served after the war, being adopted for use by the Swiss and Czechoslovak army for many years. |
