There has been a debate on the Internet regarding the pros and cons of model companies producing kits of the “paper panzers,” those German tanks that never made it from the drawing board to production in World War II. I, for one, like the idea of using my imagination in painting these kits of tanks that might have been produced if the war had lasted.
With its Leopard, HobbyBoss has joined the growing parade of paper panzers. The kit is molded in yellow plastic, with individual track links in light brown plastic. There are ejection-pin marks, but they’re easy to fill. The track links have a small amount of flash. All the hatches have inner-surface detail, and weld seams are well represented. The photoetched-metal details are well engineered and easy to use, even for beginners. A color sheet shows one paint scheme.
The directions include optional chassis-assembly instructions, with two options each at steps 2 and 3. Option 1 is for a suspension with three inner and outer road wheels and two middle road wheels. The second option is for two inner and outer road wheels and three middle road wheels. The rear idler is different for each option. I chose the second option and left the road wheels off the suspension to ease painting.
I also left small parts off the hull until it was completely assembled. I glued the rear hull plate (Part C15) to the lower hull after the upper and lower hulls were glued together. This allowed access to glue parts C30 and C31 to the upper and lower hull at the same time, instead of gluing these parts to the upper hull first as stated in Step 8. I left the front part of each fender (C18 and C19) off, allowing me to add the tracks after painting. The knockout marks on the underside of the hull, above the tracks and on the underside of the fenders, were filled with super glue and sanded smooth.
You have a choice of photoetched-metal or plastic wing nuts to simulate fasteners at the front of the fenders. I chose the plastic parts, which looked more three-dimensional to me. Drilling small holes in the fenders gave me more bonding surface for the little wing nuts.
The mufflers are assembled by adding the exhaust pipe to a solid piece of the armored housing. I gave the housing a cast texture by brushing on liquid styrene glue and stippling it with an old, stiff brush.
The track assembly takes more time to build than the rest of the model. Each track link has two guide horns that need to be glued together. The guide horns have detail only on one side, so make sure that side faces the outside of the track link. There is a knockout mark on the inner surface of each link that should be removed. I assembled each side in three subassemblies that I painted and added to the model after the rest of the kit was painted and weathered.
The fit between the upper and lower turret halves was poor and needed filler. The turret interior includes a gun breech, inner hatch detail, and vision blocks. I added cast texture to the gun mantlet.
The coaxial machine gun is molded with an open muzzle. You can choose plastic or photoetched metal for the smoke discharger bracket; the photoetched-metal brackets are fragile, so be careful when handling the turret. I broke these off too many times to count. The smoke-discharger tubes are very thick and would best be replaced by aftermarket items.
Since this is a paper panzer, you can paint it any way you choose. I followed the color scheme on the color insert: Tamiya dark yellow, red brown, and olive green (typical three-color German WWII camo colors) and painted the hull bottom and inside of the road wheels with Floquil red oxide. I used Tamiya’s clear blue on the periscopes. After I gave the model three coats of Mig Productions tan filter, pinwashes of Mig’s neutral wash, dry-brushing, and weathering powders finished it off.
The decals include three German crosses and a set of big, outlined numbers for the turret. The decals are thin and adhere to the model with no silvering.
Most of the information I found on the Internet and in books showed the Leopard in line drawings and sketches, so the scale accuracy of the kit is not measurable. However, HobbyBoss seems to have done a good job rendering in plastic what is shown in the few drawings of what this tank might have been.
It took me 29.5 hours to build the Leopard, mainly assembling the tracks. The easy assembly and good overall fit of the parts would make this a good kit to introduce beginners to photoetched-metal parts and individual track links while building a distinctive model. HobbyBoss’ kit of the German VK1602 Leopard will stand out in any collection.