The German answer to the British and French tanks on the Western Front, the A7V resembled a lumbering pillbox. Hampered by poor trench-crossing ability, the A7V was built in limited numbers but saw combat in the last nine months of World War I.
I've always liked the A7V — I'm a fan of early armor anyway — mostly because I grew up in Brisbane, Australia, home to the only surviving example. It sat outside the Queensland Museum and is the first tank I can remember seeing in the flesh.
Meng's new kit is a masterpiece with terrific detail on the tan plastic parts. The hull armor has rivets, bolts, and panel lines. Ejector-pin marks are inevitable but minimal on these parts, especially those where both sides will be visible.
The interior is complete: About the only things missing are the two Daimler engines, although the radiators and plumbing are present.
Construction starts with 30 road wheels in two styles. Fine sprue attachment points speed cleanup. The wheels are designed to be movable, but it takes careful work as the only things holding the bogie halves in place are the ends of the axles. A little more than half of mine ended up movable.
I had similar problems in Step 7 with the installation of the return rollers. Roller set A's brackets don't actually meet, although the instructions show them being assembled off the model. I glued one half to the support arms, then placed the wheels on the axles and rotated the other half of the bracket into position.
The rest of the wheels and suspension fit perfectly, but pay attention to part and assembly numbers. The trucks look similar, but they are different. If you mix them up, as I did, it takes a process of elimination to put them in the right places.
The tracks impressed me. Each link consists of two pieces — a tread and the guide teeth — which can be a recipe for weakness, especially when pushing the links together. In this case, the join between the teeth and the link is large and strong. Watch the alignment of the teeth pieces to ensure straight track runs.
The interior looks terrific, especially the main gun and attached gunner’s seat. Everything fits perfectly — even the photoetched-metal radiator screens drop into position without fuss. The machine gunners' seats are fiddly to build but sturdy when finished.
All of the hatches can be posed open. Photoetched-metal brackets for the driver’s cupola hatches are small and difficult to shape; I used an elbow bender to ensure even angles. (I got to the end and realized I had forgotten the photoetched-metal plates on the bottom of the doors.)
I painted the tank with the Ammo of Mig Jimenez World War I German armor set. Decals went on fine; with help from Mr. Hobby decal solutions they settled around the pronounced bolts and rivets.
The finished model looks just like the hulking behemoth I remember, and it matches drawings and dimensions in Mephisto — A7V Sturmpanzerwagen 506, by Mark Whitmore (Queensland Museum, ISBN 978-0-7242-3388-5).
I had a lot of fun building it. Despite the high number of parts, construction was made easy by good engineering and molding. This is a must-have for any modeler completing a collection of WWI armor.
Note: A version of this review appeared in the October 2015 FineScale Modeler.