"Der Tiger von Eschnapur", Italy 1944
Posted: 18 Aug 2016, 01:53
Greetings everyone - let's build a Tiger!
This Tiger to be precise:
This particular Tiger was made in June 1943 and was one of eight sent to Italy with Schwere Panzerkompanie Meyer shortly afterwards in response to the Allied landings. Except for the sole survivor of 2./sPzAbt 504 that made it back from Sicily, these were the first Tigers on the Italian mainland. They saw some action around Anzio in January 1944 and were attached to sPzAbt 508 in March of that year. The photos above show the tank after that date as part of 1st Company. And some joker decided to name it "v. Eschnapur" - after a famous German adventure film of the time. Bison Decals released a set with the markings over 10 years ago, and I had it for almost as long. All that was lacking was a proper Tiger kit, but thankfully that problem has now been solved.
I have written down all you could possibly want to know about the kit right here, so let's start with construction already.
The instructions suggest starting with the turret, but I was more interested in the hull. After about 2 hours of work here's where I am right now:
The torsion bars are designed to lock in place but are fully workable if you cut off a little tab. I chose to do the latter, I can still glue them in place later if they decide to cause problems.
I also had some minor fit issues on the rear hull plate, which were quickly fixed with a little sanding on the lower sides. The plastic itself is fairly hard, but I didn't have any problems so far.
Thanks for looking, next update soon. Feels good to be building again
Philipp
This Tiger to be precise:
This particular Tiger was made in June 1943 and was one of eight sent to Italy with Schwere Panzerkompanie Meyer shortly afterwards in response to the Allied landings. Except for the sole survivor of 2./sPzAbt 504 that made it back from Sicily, these were the first Tigers on the Italian mainland. They saw some action around Anzio in January 1944 and were attached to sPzAbt 508 in March of that year. The photos above show the tank after that date as part of 1st Company. And some joker decided to name it "v. Eschnapur" - after a famous German adventure film of the time. Bison Decals released a set with the markings over 10 years ago, and I had it for almost as long. All that was lacking was a proper Tiger kit, but thankfully that problem has now been solved.
I have written down all you could possibly want to know about the kit right here, so let's start with construction already.
The instructions suggest starting with the turret, but I was more interested in the hull. After about 2 hours of work here's where I am right now:
The torsion bars are designed to lock in place but are fully workable if you cut off a little tab. I chose to do the latter, I can still glue them in place later if they decide to cause problems.
I also had some minor fit issues on the rear hull plate, which were quickly fixed with a little sanding on the lower sides. The plastic itself is fairly hard, but I didn't have any problems so far.
Thanks for looking, next update soon. Feels good to be building again
Philipp