Kit Review: cyber-hobby.com 1/35 scale Kit No. 32 (Dragon Models Limited 1/35 Scale =9139-=9145 Series Kit No. 6481); Geschuetzwagen 38 M mit 3 cm Flak 103/38 - Smart Kit; 1,125 parts (746 in grey styrene,
240 =93Magic Track=94 links, 126 etched brass, 10 clear styrene, 2 preformed brass screen, 1 length of twisted steel wire); retail price US$42.95Advantages: another one-off/low rate vehicle from cyber-hobby.com
Disadvantages: very obscure vehicle with a LOT of left-over parts in the box!
Rating: Highly Recommended
Recommendation: for collectors and fans of odd conversions
Towards the end of the war the Germans were using anything that moved as combat vehicles, and as a result many support vehicles were hastily converted to carry weapons and provide any sort of self-propelled weapons possible. This variant, which is listed as belonging to Kampfgruppe Milowitz in Prague during 1945, uses the Gw 38 M ammunition carrier for the Sd.Kfz. 138/1 15 cm s.I.G. 33/2 Ausf. M
150mm SP howitzer as an impromptu vehicle with the 3 cm Flak 103/38 30mm automatic cannon mounted in the casemate.Basically another =93boutique=94 kit from cyber-hobby.com, this kit combines their previous Kit No. 21 (DML Kit No. 6471) Sd.Kfz. 138/1 Munitionswagen 38 M fuer s.I.G. 33/2 with parts from DML=92s Kit No.
6353 3cm Flak 38/103 Jaboschreck and basically no major new parts.The kit folllows the previous =93Smart Kit=94 Praga tank chassis releases. This kit includes the engine and other interior parts. The driveline and interior are mostly styrene parts, such as the transmission/clutch assembly, steering controls, driveshaft and shield. The ammo racks are all single molded items, but the projectiles are molded with the rack to get a =93scale=94 thickness to the rack and as such cannot be separated. Twenty full and six empty racks are provided along with two single projectiles, but the directions show you now using the 15 cm projectiles. Ergo, if you have either the cyber-hobby.com ammo carrier or the DML 15 cm SP howitzer and haven=92t built them you can =93plus up=94 the ammunition on those models from this kit.
There is one small radio with separate transmitter and receiver mounted on the right side of the casemate. Each periscope in the fighting compartment is all stryene (clear prism component, grey mounts) and may be positioned as folded or erected.
The rest of the kit follows standard DML =93Smart Kit=94 construction and the use of =93Magic Track=94 single link tracks.
Again, as this is a =93boutique=94 kit of a very low production/ conversion rate vehicle only one finishing option is provided, that of the aforementioned Kampfgruppe in Prague. A tiny sheet of three crosses is provided from Cartograf.
Assistance on this kit is credited to Thomas Anderson, H. C. Graf von Seherr-Thoss, Tom Cockle and Gary Edmundson.
Overall, this is a nicely done kit but one which is so obscure that it will probably be more popular with kit collectors than modelers.
Thanks to Freddie Leung for the review sample.
Cookie Sewell