T-34-76 Mod.1940
Dragon Kit #6092
1:35th Scale
Review by Terry Ashley
This kit has been a while coming having first been announced last year but held back due to their work on the Karl and Leopold kits, but has now arrived and yes the wait was worth it.
The kit consists of 416 parts (including 189 for the individual track links) in the usual Dragon light grey plastic with two clear lenses for the headlights, two short lengths of twine and a small decal sheet.
The moulding quality is again very good with crisp details on the parts that include many weld seams, bolt head details and no flash even on the small parts. There are a few small pin marks to contend with on parts with detail on both sides, most notably the commander’s turret hatch but should be easy enough to deal with.
The kit has all the features of the early Mod.1940 including the L-11 gun and mantlet, small driver’s hatch, periscope on the turret hatch, square engine access hatch on the rear and the front idler wheel with rubber tyre.
The Lower Hull:
The lower hull tub with the separate spring channels and axles is the same
as in the previous T-34-85 kits but from there it’s all new. The road
wheels, idler wheels and drive sprockets have excellent details from the
bolt heads to the rubber tyres with all wheels having separate centre hubs
for good detail definition.
The rear hull panel has excellent weld seams around the final drive housings
and the towing shackles with contours top and bottom as they should be while
the separate front lower hull panel again has good bolt head detail and weld
seams.
The Upper Hull:
The upper hull shell has many additional panels for added details. At the back
there is a separate rear plate with separate square engine access panel with
separate exhaust pipes and armoured covers while on the engine deck all the
access panels and intake grills are separate although the mesh on the rear
cover is moulded in plastic which will no doubt be addressed by aftermarket
etched metal makers. The central top engine hatch is also separate and all
these separate hatches will make adding and engine/transmission very easy.
At the front is a separate glacis plate with additional separate parts for
the driver’s hatch and the MG fairing, these also have some very nice
weld seams included especially around the MG fairing. The two headlights have
separate clear lenses that again add to the final good detail definition. The
front fenders are included with the glacis moulding and have nice crisp details
as does the towing shackle attachments and the well defined bolt heads and
weld seam along to front of the plate. At the front is a separate nose cap
that hides the join between the upper and lower hull parts so you don’t
have to worry about any filling.
Along the hull sides are the four square storage boxes seen only on these early
T-34s, the boxes also have separate securing straps that add to the detail
definition as well as separate tie down cleats adding further to the details.
The Turret:
This is an excellent assembly with engineering that all but eliminates any
need for filler. The turret shell is made up of four parts, the front curved
panel (part H1) and the two sides (parts G4,G5) with a separate rear panel.
One thing to watch with the front panel (part H1) is the sprue pour point
is in the middle of the top weld bead and care is needed when removing the
part from the sprue so as not to damage the weld bead.
The front panel joins
the two side panels along the actual joins of the real
turret,
the
fit of
the parts is excellent and the design holds the parts together securely only
requiring the application of some liquid cement to finish it off. There are
nice weld seams along the edges of the side panels and not needing any filler
leaves the seams intact after gluing.
Additional small fittings such as the three lifting eyes which are quite thin for good appearance and the securing latches on the main hatch add to the overall good appearance of the turret assembly.
The Tracks:
These are all separate links with nice details on the plates but there are
minor pin ejector marks on the inside face of each plate which should be
easy to remove but a little tiresome. The links are designed to be glued
together and are not movable after assembly but their assembly shouldn’t
be a problem.
The Decals:
The sheet has a series of numbers only allowing any combination but these early
tanks were mostly devoid of markings so check your references before applying
the numbers. The instructions show two schemes, one in overall Russian green
on an unnamed unit on the Eastern Front and the other of the attractive three
colour cam scheme of the 1st Moscow Motorized Rifle Division, July 1941 although
there are only side views of the scheme provided so other sources for the
top, front and rear pattern will be needed.
The Instructions:
These are again in the photographic style showing the construction sequences
and I personally prefer the normal line drawing style which Dragon reverted
to in their recent Karl and K5 kits. One of the reasons for this is that
some of the sequences are a little confusing as some parts are shown already
fitted in place while others are shown in the exploded view, but as this
kit is fairly basic there shouldn’t be any real problems understanding
the images.
Conclusion:
This is superb little kit with excellent details and engineering that almost
consigns the filler tube to the museum and from the layout of parts such
as separate glacis and rear panels as well as a couple of the sprues marked
T-34-40/41 means we will most certainly see more kits in this series, this can
only be a good thing.
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Page created 17 December 2003