Unboxing: Plastic Soldier Company – 1/72nd Scale Panther Ausf A
January 27, 2015 by dignity
The Tank God (John) and Justin are looking at another tank from The Plastic Solider Company. This time it's the turn of the Panther Ausf A With Zimmerit in 1/72nd Scale.
This medium size tank was originally intended as a replacement for the Panzer. It never managed to do that but served alongside the heavier Tiger Tanks until the end of World War II.
This miniature has been designed for easy assembly while maintaining a solid weight and feel.
Justin like's his miniatures with a bit of weight, do you?
Justin was right about the exhaust pipes! The ones with the cooling pipes are from a mid-production Ausf A. Someone more cynical would say more luck over judgement 😛
Those extra exhaust pipes are cooling pipes? Cool. I remember the original problem with the Panther’s exhaust (IIRC: fuel wouldn’t burn completely in the engine and unburnt fuel would accumulate and harden along the inside of the exhaust pipes until they became too hot and would catch fire) . . . but I didn’t know how extra pipes would alleviate that problem. Another great show guys. I have a box of 15mm 1/100 Panthers from PSC on the way and I can’t wait. Panthers in general are a very useful kit for anyone playing a German army. Like @johnlyons says,… Read more »
Oh, and yes, I support Justin in his preference for heavy minis . . . which for me presents a dilemma since I don’t really like resin and metal. I’ve gone so far as to try and superglue small coins into the interiors of my plastic minis to give them that “weight.” 😀
Man I can relate to that. Hate to built resin/metal kits, love the weight of them. Love to built plastic kits, hate the weight of them.
@oriskany Why dont you just base them?
I personally have all resin and metal Battlefront minis’s (two Battlefoam bags of Germans, one of Americans and one of Soviets), which I love and are easy to build. I dread building my British army in the future because they are plastic assembly kits. My other pet peeve is that Battlefront has not reduced the cost of the plastic kits. If I have to assemble the tanks from sprues and have lost the “weight” of the metal treads, couldn’t they cut the price in half?
@torros – I don’t actually base my vehicles in general, I just prefer them “free-standing” . . . and now I have 350+ 15mm vehicles, so basing them all would be a lot of work. 🙂 @acsmith7 – please don’t get me wrong, I have a lot of Battlefront metals/resin kits. I just find the detail to be not quite as sharp (especially metal), cleaning mold lines off of metals tracks is a royal pain in @$$ (especially when you have to pick the flash out from between each link of tracks), and the resin seems to break all the… Read more »
I prefer plastics all the way – I have no objection to some resin or metal components for variants/detailing but not the core structure and recognisable parts of the main vehicle.
All my PSC stuff is 1:100 and I love it.
I’ve heard of someone adding tiny tiny weights to other gaming accessories too. 😉
Hey, now! I never used those dice in a real game! 🙁
hee hee hee. They are pretty damn cool.
Hi there. It’s probably been covered before but will this scale work well with Bolt Action? Thanks team….
Do you mean for playing the game or mixing with Warlords’ range?
I have a Bolt Action starter set with US and German infantry. Just wondering if this 1/72nd scale would be okay? I like the look of the PSC Tanks, and especially like the fact you get two per pack but of course don’t want them to look stupid against Bolt Action minis.
I would say that they are too small for use with Warlord minis
Yes it will. I play Bolt Action with 28mm models and also at 20mm ( 1/72nd). No need to muck about with ranges . In fact the ranges feel better at 20mm. Tank war is really good at the smaller scale asyou can afford more models and they still look good at that size.
I think the plastic kits are better than resin. I have a platoon each of Panzer IV from BF and the plastic kits are far superior for final build quality. It’s also a lot easier to do modifications to the models to give a more realistic feel. Last week I got some very reasonable priced 15mm PSC SdKfz 251’s and they were great to assemble, everything (including the mediocre painting) was completed in a few sessions. My only issue with PSC is the quality of the actual solders are not great!
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very nice tanks as for preference’s none I’ve mess-up plastic metal and resin models.
One of PSC’s best kits imho. For an idea of what you can do with this kit, and the detail that’s on it:
http://i.imgur.com/MoZRuax.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/FdksiWz.jpg
Very nice, did you paint that?
http://s576.photobucket.com/user/BigP_from_the_GMG/media/PSC%20Work/PSCPanthersampStuGs016.jpg.html
Good unboxing of a great kit. PSC have done a lot of these over the last years and they are quite affordable. And yes its a KwK. To be precise the “7.5cm KwK 42 L/70”. 7.5cm is obviously the caliber, KwK is the abbreviation of “Kampfwagenkanone” (which loosely translates to “battle wagon canon”), 42 is the year it was first built and L/70 the barrel length in calibers. Which brings this gun to a towering length of 5.25 meters, including muzzle brake (I think), which gives the Panther a lot of his fierce look. For comparison a Firefly has 4,2m… Read more »
Barrel length is the cylindrical section from chamber to the end of the rifling – muzzlebrakes do not count as they are not instrumental in the guidance of the round.