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Dragon 1/350 Scharnhorst 1943

By Chris Banyai-Riepl

Overview

In the interests of expediting this review, I have chosen to forgo my usual in-depth examination of the subject, and instead provide you with the introduction from Wikipedia:

"Scharnhorst was a German Kriegsmarine capital ship during the Second World War. It was the lead of her class, referred to as either a battleship or a battlecruiser. The 31,500 t (31,000 long tons) ship was named after the Prussian General and army reformer Gerhard von Scharnhorst and to commemorate the First World War armored cruiser SMS Scharnhorst that was sunk in the Battle at the Falkland Islands in December 1914. Scharnhorst often sailed into battle accompanied by her sister ship, Gneisenau. Scharnhorst sailed on many naval operations in 1939—1941 with significant success. In December 1943, she took part in the German Operation Ostfront to engage Arctic Convoys sent by the Western Allies to the Soviet Union. Royal Navy—led Allied forces engaged Scharnhorst. In the subsequent Battle of North Cape, the ship was sunk."

The Kit

Dragon has been working on new ship kits for a while, but they have all tended to be smaller vessels such as the Benson Class and Gleaves Class destroyers. With this release of the Scharnhorst, Dragon has moved into the big capital ships, and they couldn't have done it better. The model comes with roughly a bazillion highly detailed parts, spread among twenty eight plastic sprues and five photoetch frets. There is also a small metal rod and a decal sheet providing the various deck markings. The large number of parts has actually been made less by Dragon's usage of slide molds, which allows for complex single-piece castings to be made while maintaining crisp detail. So instead of having a turret made up from four sides and a top, we get a single-piece turret, simplifying cleanup and reducing parts count.

Diving into the instructions, the kit begins with the assembly of the myriad of guns. This is good, get the complex fiddly stuff out of the way first. As near as I can tell, none of the guns in this kit are single pieces; they're all constructed from multiple parts, even the sidearms of the sailors (okay, I'm kidding about the last, but it is that level of detail that we're seeing here). The gun barrels have all been punched down the center, some deeper than others, but the result is that none of these guns need to have the barrels drilled out; it's already done. The smaller details are very petite and will be a challenge to remove from the sprues, but a quick glance shows that there won't be much cleanup needed here. Flash is non-existent.

The guns get a fair amount of photoetch detailing as well. A note should be made about the photoetch. Eagle-eyed readers will note that there is very little railing on the frets. Dragon has (wisely, I might add) chosen to provide vessel-specific details in their in-box photoetch, and left the more generic stuff like ship's railings to the many aftermarket general railing sets available. This is a good way to keep their costs down on a kit that is already well north of the $100 mark.

Back to the guns, the main turrets have another interesting Dragon feature. Developed for their armor kits to replace vinyl tracks, Dragon has a flexible plastic that can be adjusted to a specific shape, and it then holds that position. The canvas covers at the base of the guns are provided in this material, with nicely detailed folds and creases, and this will allow the modeler to position the main guns in any position and maintain that detail. I am not too familiar with this material, so I don't know the longevity of it, nor what kind of painting challenges might be involved, but it does provide an interesting alternative. The kit also includes regular barrels for those who do not wish to use this different material.

Cranes and boats are next, and the kit continues its high level of detail here. The cranes include both photoetch and plastic parts and lack only the cabling. I tried to count the number of parts in each crane and quit after twenty or so; the instructions are easy to follow for assembly, tough to follow for counting parts. Needless to say, these are complex, highly detailed, and will look outstanding when finished. The boats are a beautiful complement to the cranes, with separate decks and hulls, along with additional superstructure pieces. These are really little models in and of themselves, and the slide molded lower hulls have beautiful rudders molded in place.

Moving on to the superstructure, the majority of this is constructed from stacked solid pieces. This is where that slide mold technology really pays off, as these complex shapes can be done as one piece this way. Granted, there are going to be additional joint seams that need to be cleaned up, but that will be minimal and would be much less than if those seams were left up to the modeler joining two or three pieces together. The other benefit is the very petite detailing available on all sides. The decking on these parts is simply stunning and some of the best I've seen in this scale. Even with the parts simplification, though, there is still a large number of components, with lots of arrows in the instructions. Follow those closely, though, and there should be no problems in assembly.

With all the subassemblies together, it's time to turn to the main hull and deck. The hull is split into an upper and a lower piece. On many kits, this upper piece ends up being a fairly flimsy and flexible piece, making it challenging to fit both the deck and the lower hull. Dragon has taken that into consideration in this kit, though, and has molded this piece with solid bulkheads along the length of the hull, as well as using thick walls on the sides to limit flex. The lower hull is likewise strengthened, with the result being a very solid main hull assembly.

While the main hull is molded as full length pieces, the main deck is split into a forward and a rear piece. I believe the resultant seam is almost entirely covered by the superstructure, so this is not a problem, really. One very nice feature on this kit that you do not find on other kits out there (with the exception of the aforementioned Dragon destroyer kits) is that the deck is cambered. This is very slight, as it should be, but can be clearly seen when looking at the turret cutouts. This attention to detail is very commendable, and it is great to see Dragon going this extra step. While talking of deck details, the photoetch anchor chains are greatly preferred to the usual molded on ones. Another plus for Dragon.

But not all is rosy with this kit. Okay, yes, it is, but there are two little nits I'll pick. First up, you get a beautiful catapult amidships, but no Arado Ar 196 to go on it. Perhaps Dragon wasn't sure of how to do the delicate strutwork, or perhaps it simply got forgotten with all the other work being done. Either way, you have that impressive catapult that's just crying out for an aircraft to sit on it.

Second, Dragon includes figures in this kit, and these are, bar none, the absolute best 1/350 figures I have ever seen. The downside? Dragon gives you six figures. Yes, that's right, for a large German battleship, you get to crew it with a whopping six figures. No worries, you say, six is enough for in the box, Dragon is keeping costs down and releasing a larger crew separately, a wise choice for a model pushing up close to $150 in price. Unfortunately, Dragon is not releasing separate figure sets, which means that you are left with a rather difficult situation. You can use the six beautiful figures included in the kit, and then fill out the rest of your figure needs with the decidedly inferior alternatives out there, or you can buy yourself 10-20 Scharnhorst kits so you can get 50-100 figures. I'm sure we'll all choose the latter, right? Dragon, please release separate figure sets! These are too good to not be used extensively throughout a modeler's 1/350 navy.

Conclusion

The summary here is simple: buy it. Whether you have been wanting a Scharnhorst for decades, or are just looking for a good ship model to build over the winter, Dragon has delivered. The minor nits I touched upon in no way lessen the impressiveness of this model, and I am sure it will make many naval modelers quite happy, both in the box and on the bench.