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Excellent review - the finished models look very nice. I've just ordered a box of these direct from PSC - they said they've shipped them already, so it's a bit worrying to hear that some of you have waited for weeks for theirs to be delivered.

Jon is correct about the instructions being wrong; there was always some overlap between the various models of Panzer, but the Ausf D and Ausf A are definitely mis-identified. Only early models of the Ausf D had smoke launchers. The 'drum' type cupola was only fitted to the Ausf D. The 'letterbox' MG slot in the glacis was a feature of the Ausf D and early Ausf A, and was replaced by a proper ball mounting during the Ausf A's production run. mwnciboo - this means you've built yours as an Ausf D. Panzer Lehr's Panthers were Ausf As.

The omission of Zimmerit from the kit is presumably a problem because of the popularity of the 1944 period of the war. Initial Ausf Ds did not have Zimmerit, so the tanks that took part in 'Zitadelle' did not have Zimmerit. Most if not all Ausf As had Zimmerit (Ausf A production began in August 1943 and Zimmerit was applied from September 1943), as did the inital Ausf Gs produced. Virtually every Panther in the Normandy campaign had Zimmerit. Conversely, most (but not all) Panthers in photos from the Ardennes battle do not have Zimmerit. It's interesting that this seems to be an issue given the small scale of the model - 1:76 and 1:72 scale models have never included Zimmerit, and it's only recently begun to feature on 1:35 scale kits. Arguably, when you get down to 15mm Zimmerit would (if reproduced in scale) be relatively indistinct, so it shouldn't be a big deal. However, BF tanks seem to feature 'heroic scale' Zimmerit, so FoW players expect it on their Panzers.

Judging from the photos of the finished PSC model, it seems to sit a bit high, and there seems to be an oversized gap between the top of the tracks and the upper hull edge. Note that the front mudguards almost never included the hinged extension that's modelled on the kit - you only see this on the initial Ausf Ds before Kursk. It's a good idea to cut this off.

The boxes on the rear deck aren't standard. There are photos of Ausf Ds with something similar so you could probably add them to any version. Some Ausf Gs had the tube for the gun-cleaning rods relocated to across the rear of the engine deck, but it seems to have been a field modification.

There are similar minor issues with other PSC kits - the Panzer IV doesn't have all of the right parts for each version provided. I don't think it's a big deal in this small scale.

Not all the photos in your post are visible - I'm getting little boxes with question marks. The colour photo is of the Panther that's a runner in Saumur, right? Any idea why only 2 of the exhaust pipes are rusty?

I think the PSC Ausf D version (i.e. the correct Ausf D, not the one that's mis-identified in the instructions) is fine for this scale, even with the detail issues you (and others) have mentioned. But, as I mentioned, the smoke dischargers are a feature of early Ausf Ds and not the Ausf A.

As a completely irrelevant aside, I came across this statistic about the Panther - according to Allied reports from the Normandy campaign, the majority of Panther casualties that were examined were the result of breakdowns or running out of fuel, and not from having been hit. Also, Panthers were almost as likely to burn when penetrated as Shermans - but it took on average 3.24 penetrations to achieve this, while for a Sherman it took only 1.89 penetrations. Panzer IVs burned even more readily than Shermans.

Big P wrote:With a Sherman, you got out first, then if it wasnt on fire, went back and checked if it was still a runner. If it was, you got back in. If it wasnt, you went back to get another...

Are you really saying that tank crews routinely abandoned their tanks under enemy fire just because something bounced off the armour? I take your point about the number of crews that were issued replacement tanks during offensives like Goodwood. But remember the statistics for the probability of a penetrating hit and the probability of subsequently brewing up. Unfortunately, if a Sherman took a hit at all, the chances were it that it would penetrate the tank (after all, it was going to be at least a 75mm AP shell and quite possibly something worse). And Sherman crews bailed if their tank took a penetrating hit because the odds were that it was going to brew up - and was usually in the process of doing so when the crew were exiting. There was also a good chance that at least one of the crew was already dead (on average one crewman was killed with every Sherman knocked out).

The original point concerned the reason for Panther losses. The evidence seems to suggest that most were abandoned due to breakdowns or lack of fuel (that was certainly the case in the Ardennes). Which indicates how formidable they were - and how they overtaxed the Germans' ability to keep them in combat.

Big P wrote: For me, he is the true tank ace and the one that books should focus on instead of jumped up little Nazi fanboys like Wittmann.

I'm not sure that this is a very objective assessment. You're at risk here of making the 'good German, bad German' distinction that ignores a lot of the grey that really existed at the time. WIttman may have been a Nazi poster boy, but that doesn't mean he wasn't also an excellent tank commander. Just as the boy soldiers of 12th SS Panzer were, it appears, loyal (even fanatical) Nazis but also formidable soldiers. Wittman's record may have been embelished a bit, but it wasn't just the SS who were eulogised by the propaganda people. And even if you strip away a lot of the myth of what happened at Villers-Bocage, and allow for the advantage that being mounted in a Tiger gave him, it's still a remarkable achievement. I think Steven Zaloga makes a better point about these German tank aces, which is that they scored a lot of their kills in the East against badly trained Soviet tankers. He points out that Wittman was eventually killed (as now seems to be the accepted truth) by a 17-pdr-armed Firefly - the kind of weapon he had not encountered in the East - possibly because he had become overconfident about the Tiger's ability to withstand enemy fire. Zaloga has his own bias (he tends to big up the US tankers, usually at the expense of the Germans), but this still rings true.

Incidentally, Will Fey's book is of dubious veracity. I bought it many years ago, and chucked it away.

ArbeitsSchu wrote:The best way to achieve veracity is to compare and contrast sources. Generally, whatever they all agree on is usually a fairly accurate bash at "the truth" (given that no source is perfect.). Thus Fey's collection of other peoples accounts is as useful as anything by Zaloga, or Ambrose, or Chant, or my old grandad, or Big P.

Er, yes. And Fey's collection of extracted bits and pieces isn't very useful by itself, and many of the extracts don't sit too well with other sources.

ArbeitsSchu wrote:So don't treat it in isolation then? If nothing else its useful as a source to prove how German vets are all lying gaks (or something.)

There are just much better, more complete accounts available. Also, the quality of the photos in that book is abysmal!

Returning to the subject (!), I came across some photos in Panzerwrecks I which might be the source for the stowage boxes that PSC have provided for the Ausf G version of the Panther. It looks as though some late Ausf Gs in Italy were fitted with customised steel covers over the engine deck. These look a bit like tool boxes, but are in fact hollow shapes, apparently intended to provide protection against air attack and shell splinters. They look to be the same size as the parts supplied with the PSC Panthers.

Apparently the idea was to protect the air intakes, which makes more sense. mazingly, I found a site with some more information on this feature. In the photos in Panzerwrecks, these covers look just like the stowage boxes on the PSC Panthers. I may of course be wrong about this being the source.

http://www.panther1944.de/en/sdkfz-171-pzkpfwg-panther/technik/feldmodifikationen.html