Dragon 1/72 Berge-Panther mit Pz.IV Turm
By Chris Banyai-Riepl
Overview
Schwere Panzerjäger Abteilung 653 had an interesting history, and the book "The Combat History of German Heavy Anti-Tank Unit 653 in World War II" by Karlheinz Munch does an excellent job of describing its story. Present in those pages is a mention of the sole Berge-Panther with a fixed Panzer IV turret. This newest kit from Dragon provides that specific unique tank.
The Kit
Having produced kits of the Panther and the Panzer IV, this isn't that much of a stretch for Dragon to produce. In fact, if you had their Panther and Panzer IV kits, you could have bashed them together to make this subject. In this box, though, you get an entire Panther kit and the sprues for the Panzer IV turret, which means that there's quite a few parts for your spares box. The kit is molded in the typical Dragon gray plastic, with DS tracks and a small decal sheet.
Building up the Panther hull is straightforward, but pay attention in the instructions to make sure all the optional bits are rendered correctly. The lower hull has all of its road wheels built up, while the rear plate needs some minor work for this one-off tank. The upper hull has all the usual bits and pieces, which Dragon provides as separate pieces, such as lights, shovel, and hatches.
The Panzer IV turret comes on a sprue that also includes the Pz IV side skirts, which will go into the spares box. The gun is stock, and is built up from eight pieces going back to the turret face. The side armor for the turret is added, and the instructions indicate that you have to remove the section that sits behind the turret. It's also important to remember that this is a fixed turret, so resist any desire of rotating the turret on the finished hull. The final step is to add the treads and the side skirts.
For painting, there is a single painting choice, and since there are very limited references on this tank, you'll have some flexibility with the interpretation here. The instructions show the tank in a three color camouflage consisting of green, brown, and yellow. The decals provide four crosses and three unit emblems.
Conclusion
This is a rather narrow subject for an injection molded kit, but since it doesn't require any new tooling on Dragon's part, I can see why they chose it. For those interested in having this unique one-off tank in their 1/72 armor collection, this is definitely cheaper than buying two kits and bashing them together. My thanks to Dragon USA for the review sample.