Trumpeter

1/35 Soviet B-4 M1931 203mm Howitzer

Kit Number: 02307

Reviewed by  Ken McDevitt, IPMS# 46356

MSRP: $69.95 Website: www.stevensinternational.com Description and History The 203mm howitzer M1931 (B-4) is a rather old weapon developed in 1931 and adopted for service in 1934. The B-4 has a relatively short tube, only 25 calibers long. It has a hydraulic recoil buffer, it was mounted on a full track (but not self-propelled) carriage in firing position and for short moves. For longer moves, it was transported on a separate, two-wheeled tube transporter. The M1931 (B-4) can fire a 98.8-kg HE round to a maximum range of 18,025 meters. In the Box Soviet heavy howitzer mounted on fully tracked carriage with box trail. Kit features carriage sharp rivet and surface textures, highly detailed gear, suspension with individual link track, two-piece gun barrel, detailed breech, twin recoil buffers, recuperator, 203mm shells (x2), vinyl rims for limber wheels, ammunition crane, trail spade, separate trail limber, ammunition trolleys, cord and photo-etch parts (step plates and muzzle rifling). Assembled gun is adjustable in elevation and may be built in transport or firing configuration. Includes color painting reference and decals for a single weapon. The parts breakdown follows: Ten sprues in five sealed, plastic bags. One photo-etch fret in plastic bag. Two rubber tires in sealed bag. Cord used to simulate rope for winch. Only two decals on one sheet in sealed bag. Soviet heavy 203mm howitzer M1931, 3rd Belorussian front, summer 1944 in Soviet green camouflage. Instruction booklet: 12 pages with 15 steps. Color painting and marking guide. First Impressions I’m really impressed with the quality of this kit "out of the box" in both the details on each piece and the lack of flash. I put on the magnifying headset and inspected all the parts on the sprues. Other than one tiny (less than a mm) piece of flash, none other was seen. There are few mold seams on a few rounded parts that can easily be removed with light sanding. None of the few sink holes will show on the assembled model. So, no filling and sanding required. It looks like the two-piece barrel with separate halves will require some seam filling and smoothing. Most likely there will be seams or gaps to be filled when parts are joined. There are three sprues containing 28 tracks each for a total of 84 tracks. Assembly calls for 76. So there are eight spares. (Note: I used one of the spares)

Modeling Plan Since there is no "call-out" painting indicated in the instruction steps and the majority of the parts will be Russian Green, the howitzer will be very monotone, so I will randomly pre-shade parts with black while still on the sprues in order to start adding some color variation. Since this is a highly-detailed subject (again thanks to Trumpeter) with lots of "nooks and crannies", I decided to build up sub-assemblies and spray them with a first coat of Russian Green before putting them in place. I can address the "nooks and crannies" at the sub-assembly stage and have more control over the painting process. Construction and Discoveries The instructions were very easy to follow and there were very few problems. I’ll just mention the steps and types of problems that I had. Step 2: Part A13. The underside of carriage needed to have both ends sanded to fit properly. Without the sanding there would have too much bowing outwards and a serious gap to fill. The shell crane only had instructions for being placed in the travel mode. Be careful of joining parts D5, D22, D24 and D7 in order to allow for the proper angle of bend and fit into the supports on the side of the frame. You could construct this in the firing mode as a self option. The bottom of the plow (parts A2 – A16) has seams that need filling. Step 3: Part B2, the coupling between the Carriage and limber is shown glued onto the limber. The reference photos show it on the carriage. In Step 15 the limber is shown being attached to the carriage. But that would mean the howitzer would be in traveling mode. I recommend that you glue the coupling to the carriage for versatility. Step 4: I was right! After gluing the long and short gun barrels together, there were serious seam gaps. That was my minor problem. Two days after attaching the long barrel to the wider short barrel, I realized that I mated it to the wrong end of the short (inner) barrel. A razor saw was able to remedy the problem (caused by my inattention) without any visible damage. Step 6: The left trunnion pieces D31 & D32 will be a problem to fill the join seams. There are small rivets on both sides of the seam that would be removed when you fill and sand the seam. Step 8: My first broken part was C19. It was very fragile and I broke it sanding off material at the sprue attachment point. After cutting the cord in half and wrapping around the spools I covered the "rope" with masking tape to avoid painting it during airbrushing. Step 9: In order for the gun to elevate and lower, note the "no cement" comments for parts C35 and C17/C27 Step 14: I decided to build using the ammunition trolleys instead of the simpler wood skids, since my philosophy for a review is to use as many parts as possible. When assembling the side chairs, I broke E15 and E7. Be careful of those parts along with other fiddly parts on the chairs. I will be attaching the fragile chairs last.

The linked tracks There are no connecting pins or any other method of holding the links together other than a loose fit when joining the tracks (three-tooth side to two-tooth side). Fortunately I found a technique on a forum (Matt Oldham on the League of Extraordinary Modelers) that uses a jig to align the track edges. I did about 30 links and let Testors’ Liquid Plastic Cement soak into the joints for 30 minutes and then was able to fit the tracks around the bogie wheels. Letting that dry for two more hours produced a well-formed shape to be painted. The remaining eight links were done in the same way but not yet attached to the group of 30. That will be done after painting.

Finishing Up Since this is a build review, I don’t elaborate on painting and weathering techniques (mine are slowly developing) other than spraying the top portion with Russian Green mixed with yellow for highlights and using Russian Green with black on the lower portions. You need to break up that mass of Russian Green.

Summary On the plus side, this is a high-quality kit with fine detail; no flash and a few mold marks that would not be seen after construction. It has clear instructions with a choice of building sub-assemblies out of instruction step order. Also, the gun and plow can be moved. No real negatives here. I did not like the effort involved with assembling the separate link tracks. But the jig technique made track construction easier. Final Observations and Lessons Learned This build was certainly out of my comfort zone and I learned that most of my anxiety about the build was just in my head. Don’t be afraid of taking on the difficult. It’s the best way to learn and improve. I enjoyed building this kit and writing my first review. Trumpeter has a winner here and again, I am impressed with the quality of this kit and highly recommend it. Thanks to Stevens International and Trumpeter for supplying the kit and IPMS for the opportunity of doing this review. Also, thanks to forum members, especially Matt Oldham, for the link track technique.