Pegasus Hobbies 1/72 MAUS By Kent Kirkpatrick

Overview

In 1943, Hitler approved a super-heavy tank design by Porsche. It was intended to be impervious to any Allied tank in use at the time. The Maus weighed an incredible 180 tons with more than 9 inches of frontal armor. The main armament was a 128 mm main gun with a 75 mm coaxial gun. Since this vehicle was too heavy for most bridges it had a snorkel-breathing tube for fully submersible river crossings that certainly would be encountered. The Maus was capable of only 12 mph powered by a 1200hp engine. A crew of 6 manned it. The proto-type was built in November of 1943 and tests completed later that winter. Six vehicles were ordered but only two were completed. Remains were captured by the Allies with the Russians having a complete Maus that is on display at the Kubinka tank museum. This kit is based on that actual vehicle.

The Kit

The box art on this Pegasus Hobbies kit is very well done as a reference when you get ready to paint. This MAUS kit contains 6 sealed bags, two vinyl tracks, 2 metal axles, decals and an instruction sheet. Together this kit contains 150 parts. There are 3 styrene sprues with separate turret, upper and lower hull parts. The styrene parts are molded in light grey with no sinkholes or flash residue. Injector pin indentations are pronounced but are on either the inside of the part or on the sprue itself. The individual parts contained on the sprues are very well numbered for assembly. Pegasus Hobbies seems to have used softer styrene for this kit. This is good in that small parts may bend but not break when mishandled. All parts appear to be well defined and in scale. The detail on the one-piece black vinyl tracks is very fine and well done. They are also very flexible. The turret and hull has a rough texture to simulate rolled steel. Dry brushing would really make this effect stand out. The nicely illustrated kit instructions are bi-lingual (English and Chinese) and include a parts legend. Too bad there are no facts about the vehicle itself that are found traditionally in the instruction sheets of other kits. The 10 sub-assemblies are very well documented and are easy to follow. Step 2, suspension assembly, will be the most time-consuming of all the steps, which involves 12 8-piece suspension units. Upper hull assembly is the easiest to do. There are 2 external fuel tanks that are made up of 4 parts each. Building these will be simple and straightforward. A nice detail is the 128mm and 75mm gun barrels are already opened and do not require any drilling out. A suggestion would be to drill out the engine exhausts. There is a painting guide suggesting the use of a tri-color (dark yellow, dark green and red brown) camo scheme using Tamiya color references. Which brings me to the decal sheet. The quality is excellent in that the decal film is very thin and the printing of the 4 Balkan crosses is fine. Positioning of the decals does not appear to be difficult as they are all located on the flat surface of the lower hull sides and turret.

Conclusion

Pegasus Hobbies venture in producing the Maus is a welcome addition to small-scale German armor subjects. It will be interesting to see how this Maus kit compares to the same kit announced by Dragon. This kit does not lack for quality and is reasonably priced. You will not be disappointed purchasing this kit from Pegasus Hobbies. My review kit was purchased at a hobby shop.