This new set from LionMarc Model Designs provides a resin M4A1 Direct Vision Hull designed for the Tasca kits M4A1 Sherman Mid Production (kit #35010) and M4A1 Sherman Late Production (Kit #35012) and would have to have the most unfortunate timing for any aftermarket release in recent years coming just weeks before the release of the Tasca full kit of the British Army Sherman II Direct Vision El Alamein 1942 (kit #35014).

Not withstanding that we will have a look to see what is in the set for anyone who wishes to update their Tasca kits with the set consisting of just five parts, the full resin upper hull, two separate vision port cover flaps and two small fitting for the inside visors.

The standard of resin casting is very good without any blemishes such as air holes or warping with just some minor resin flash to be removed from the lower edges of the hull and small casting blocks on the other smaller parts.

resin parts

The DV upper hull is actually a resin reproduction of the Tasca M4A1 hull with modifications for the direct vision ports at the front and therefore has all the finer details inlcuded on the Tasca hulls such as the detail around the turret ring , the fuel filler caps and subtle cast surface texturing.

The lower lip of the turret sides includes the square bolt brackets from the Tasca kit but with the excess resin to be removed it is easier to cut away the raised brackets leaving smooth lower edges as most later hulls had these brackets removed in any case. There is also inner visor details included along with the small resin knob supplied but as there are no instructions with the set you have to rely on the box top image afor the placement of this knob.

Unfortunately due to this liniage there are a few issues with the hull, the most prominent being the raised contours on the glacis from the non-DV hulls driver's hoods are still there with just the recesses for the DV ports and the glacis should actually be flat in front of the ports without the raised contours.

The vision port recess are also too small either side of the flap hinge and the front hull cut-outs have sharp edges where these should be more rounded and also the front of the recess blended into the glacis without the noticable ridge, this can be smoothed while removing the raised coutours from the glacis.

The separate visor flaps are too thin and should be thickened with plastic card or simply rebuilt from a section of plastic card for a better appearance with all of this making for a fair bit of work to get the details correctly depicted.

View of the hull front with the contour bulge in front of the vision ports remaining from M4A1 Mid hull.

The antenna are superbly done with tapered antenna that are fine enough to not look over scale when fitted to any applicable vehicle with no cleanup required before use, with a small base included on the antenna.

Views of the vision port recess and flap covers in place (right)

Image of actual vison port and hull recess

If you are the copyrigth owner of this image, please contact me
and I will add the appropriate acknowledgment, thank you.

Dimensionally the actual 2m antenna equals 57.1mm in 1:35 and the brass antenna is all but spot on and any variation is in the fraction of a millimetre with a small locating pin under the base for easy fitting to the target kit.

Head on view and inside vision port detail

Fitting the antenna may require a small hole drilled depending on the kit and test fitting the 2m antenna to the Dragon Panther G was simple as there was already a hole in the base for the separate kit antenna and it would be best to add the antenna after all building and painting has been done to limit the possibilities of damaging the thin antenna.

Views showing good fit of resin hull to Tasca lower hull and transmission
Resin hull dry fitted in these images


This is a simple antenna set for the standard German 2m vehicle antenna with no cleanup needed and simple fitting to the target kit. The antenna is dimensionally accurate to within a fraction of a millimetre with nice taper on the antenna and looks good when fitted to the kit.

Recommended with some work to do 7.5/10.

Thanks to Leo from LionMarc Model Designs for the review set.