Dragon

1/72 SdKfz. 251/1 Ausf. D

Kit Number 7225

Reviewed By Kip Rudge, #40597

MSRP: $11.98 USD

I first saw this kit in July 2005 in Atlanta at the Dragon Expo held in conjunction with the IPMS National Convention. My buddy and I ooohed and aaahhed at the well done micro detail and sharp molding.

When I finally got this honey in my hands, Dragon did not disappoint. This is not a scaled down version of the 1/35 kit. This thing is engineered from the ground up for small scale.

The 251 was the workhorse armored personnel carrier for the Wehrmacht and SS throughout WW2. The “D” was the last – simplified – version of the halftrack series. As such, the marking and variant possibilities are nearly endless.

The kit contains about 110 parts molded in Dragon’s trademark gray styrene along with a fret of photo-etch, a very complete decal sheet and a piece of fine steel wire for the radio antenna. Again we get full color instructions that include a dozen color and marking options – SWEET!

Assembly begins with the running gear and if you’re a ham-hand such as myself, you will love this. At Atlanta, my buddy and I both speculated that assembling the very detailed running gear would require an electron microscope and nerves of steel – we were wrong.

Dragon has taken a running gear that features 14 road wheels per side and simplified them into five pieces per side – and preserved oodles of detail.  This may ultimately limit any articulation of the suspension, but I liked it a lot. Essentially, the each inside set of road wheels has been molded as a single unit. The middle unit features a set of bridges across the axles and between the road wheels. The only individual road wheels are the three that are outermost. The suspension looks killer when assembled.

The lower hull was also very well detailed. The interior is nicely done with lots of detail and a suitable number of small parts. Your tweezers will need oiling after working on this kit.

A word of caution regarding the fighting compartment floor - there is no real positive lock when placing the floor. When gluing, make sure it is level. It can tend to slope down towards the rear of the fighting compartment. It will be noticeable when details are added. Don’t ask how I know this.

The driver’s compartment is well detailed, but unfortunately that will become all but invisible once the upper hull is attached. I completed and painted the interior prior to attaching the upper hull. Watch the fit here, as the rear wall of the lower hull is a little warped and wants to leave a gap.

I chose to close the rear doors because they are thick. Once the upper hull was attached, I added the sponson lockers and exterior details. I used the photo-etch machine gun shield because it looked very in scale as opposed to the styrene part.

The very nice Dragon styrene treads fit like a glove and attached nicely. Viola!

Painting consisted of a black primer and increasingly opaque mistings of Dunkelgeld.

This is a very nice effort from Dragon and will compliment any builder who takes the time to detail and paint. It’s simply a very nice kit that pays a lot of dividends when assembled and painted.

Thanks to Dragon Models for the sample copy.

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