Road wheels for Sd.Kfz.6
Uncommon off road tread pattern + QW mask
Quickwheel 1:35 Scale Set No.QWX-024 & QWX-025
Review by Terry Ashley

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This second set of replacement road wheels for the Sd.Kfz.6 series of vehicles from Quickwheel has early style off road tyres with a distinctive aggressive tread pattern along with a set of Quickwheel masks.

At present there are only two mainstream kits of the Sd.Kfz.6 available being the Bronco Models Sd.Kfz.6/3 ‘Diana’ (kit #CB-35038) and recent Sd.Kfz.6/2 3.7cm FlaK36 (kit #CB-35043) with the similar Trumpeter Sd.Kfz.6/2 kit to appear shortly.

All of these kits are based on the later production Sd.Kfz.6 BN 9 chassis but the only generally available images of the Sd.Kfz.6 with this style of wheel are on the earlier BN 1 7/8 chassis, the set instructions also include the most common image available with the BN 1 8 chassis. This means at this time there isn’t a kit available to accurately use  these wheels as they certainly were not fitted the Sd.Kfz.6/3 “Diana” or the Sd.Kfz.6/2 3.7cm FlaK 36 but well have a look at the set in any case.

There are two wheel sets released, set #QWX-024 with the two front wheels and a QuickWheel Mask set to aid with the painting and set #QWX-025 with three wheels, the two front wheels and a spare wheel plus a set of QuickWheel Masks.

Wheel and mask parts

The wheels are designed with the central hub separate plus an additional separate hub cap or towing bracket with set # QWX-024 having eight parts in light grey resin plus the double QuickWheel Mask set and set #QWX-25 with nine parts in light grey resin and triple QuickWheel Masks.

The standard of resin casting is very good with clean crisp detail free of any air holes or other blemishes other than some fine film within the tread. There are small casting plugs to cut off the hub caps and small towing brackets with the wheels themselves having a virtually non existent casting plug evident, any present is easily removed with a #11 blade.

The wheels are dimensionally accurate in diameter and width when compared to the 1:35 plans in the Panzer Tracts book listed below with the rim contours well done and include a deep indent around the outer rim for a very good appearance. The rim bolts are also well defined as is the fine valve stem along with the inside detail with riveted inner strip around the rim and equally well defined hub bolts.

Rendering of the tyre tread and sidewall detail is also very well done with excellent outer tread pattern although the tread is a little too square at the shoulder and should be more rounded, there is also a thin line of resin film running within the tread pattern that is very easily removed with a #11 blade or by brushing with an old toothbrush. Also included if a little subtle are the series of ridges on the sidewall overlapping the tread over the tyre shoulder as well as the side wall embossing with the name “DEKA GRIP” plus the tyre data all of which is legible for a good appearance.



The masks provided have holes in the thicker section large enough for the wheels to fit into snugly and on the bottom is a sticky mask that just exposes the wheel rim making painting very easy with the sticky mask allowing you to get the mask to sit down around the rim to reduce overspray when airbrushing.

The only drawback is they appear to only have ‘one shot in the locker’ as it is quite difficult to extradite the wheel out of the mask to paint the other side of the rim without distorting the mask itself due to the stickiness of the mask material. You will need to take extreme care removing the wheels after painting one side of the wheel to be able to reuse for the other side.

Despite this the masks work very well allowing you to airbrush the rims with clean even edges, you have to of course paint the tyres before the rims due to the design of the masks but this shouldn’t pose any great problems.

These sets of uncommon tread replacement wheels for the Sd.Kfz.6 are superbly done with very clear crisp casting and very good rendering of the rim/hub and tyre details with the squarish shoulders being the only area of concern.

The only problem being we don’t have a plastic kit that these wheels can accurately be used on at this time as the current kits are all based on the later BN 9 chassis, but if that fact is of no concern they will give a distinctive appearance to the available kits.

Rating 8/10

mittlerer Zugkraftwagen 5t (Sd.Kfz.6) and Schwerer Wehrmachtsschlepper Panzer Tracks No.22-3 `

mZgkw 5t Sd.Hfz.6 Tank Power Vol.LVIII Wydawnictwo Militaria No.287 ISBN: 9788372192875

Halftrack Vehicles of the German Army 1395-1945 Schiffer Military History ISBN: 0-88740-758-7

Thanks to my credit card and for the review sets.