|
The A7V
began its life on November, 1916 when the German War Ministry gave the
Motor Vehicle Technical Testing Commission (VPK) a contract to develop
a tank; it was named A7V to keep it secret. It wasn’t named the
Sturmpanzer until September 22, 1918. The development and construction
went on painstakingly slow, because of problems finding the right kind
of armament (Belgian 5.7-cm casemate cannon was finally chosen) and
various problems with transmission and engines. The first tank was
completed at the end of October 1917. 100 tanks were ordered but only
20 were made by the end of the war.
Since several
companies were in charge of making parts for the A7V (mainly Krupp,
and Röchling) no two A7V’s were the same.
For instance the “Wotan” of the second production batch had shortened
mud guards. The tanks appeared very differently also, all the tanks
had some amount of crosses and their name, but apart from that the
tanks were designed individually. The tanks each
had a different style of paint until the end of the war (they were
repainted in September 1918) when all of them were to be painted into
bright colors and had the simplified Balkan cross. The first
production batch had horizontally mounted guns, while the second
production batch had socket mounted guns that could be labeled as
vertically mounted.
The first A7V action
took place on March 21, 1918 south of St. Quentin. The tanks did
fairly well, even though several broke down. The first tank vs. tank
battle occurred between two Mk.IV females and one Mk.IV male vs. three
A7V’s; the male tank managed to knock out one A7V, and the other A7V’s
fled. The tanks were grouped into 3 units. The tank “Mephisto” of the
first production batch is the only surviving tank and can be seen in
Queensland Museum in Brisbane, Australia. A form
of the A7V tank appeared in the 1919 Berlin riots named “Hedi” (“Hedi”
also had a companion, "Imperator".).
The A7V Sturmpanzer is one of
the most mystical tanks of the WWI era, many stories have been told of
them participating in the Russo-Polish war of 1920 (which is by all
accounts false). Also there have been many stories about the two
special MG A7V's that were used by Germans, to deal with the uprising
in 1919.
|
|
Click on the
pictures for the big versions!
|
The kit was made in
1980 so it’s truly the father of plastic 1/35 WWI modeling. The kit
has over 450 pieces and has a figure, detailed interior, moving
boogies, and tracks. Tauro planned to also make an Mk.I and a
CA1 Schneider, it’s a shame they dropped those projects since their
ingenuity would have been quite some competition to the Emhar
kits, that I find a bit plain.
The kit comes in
three sprues, one for the main body parts of the tank and the figure,
the second spruce is for the interior and the last is solely for the
bogie construction. There are also two bags, one with single link
tracks and the other with springs for the bogies and rods to connect
the tracks, this is a kit with some first rate innovation! The decals
are very simple just giving you two options the “Wotan” and “Hagen”
there are extra crosses and name tags (if you call them that) and
numerals giving you some slack if you mess up. The instructions are
quite brilliant; they fold and are much larger than say the Emhar
ones; they also give you about a paragraph for each action
explaining what you need to do! That is indeed handy. The Humbrol
paint numbers are dated and are not the ones they are now, so don’t
try to order with them. The soldier just needs you to glue his arms
and give him a pistol and a gasmask can. The instructions tell you how
to paint him and he comes out pretty good.
Hull/main body
parts/ interior
The construction of the tank is pretty
straightforward since the instructions tell you how to paint the parts
and how to glue them, in the first stage I don’t recommend to glue the
wheels just yet like they advise, since the track part of this kit is
tedious and those edged wheels might be a problem. The instructions
are well done and they tell you if you are making the Wotan to cut the
mud flap. A lot of people blast the interior of the tank, saying it is
bad and that it is inaccurate, I forgot what kind of interior do the
other 1/35 scale WWI tanks have? Oh yeah, nothing but a bunch of ugly
ejector marks, so don’t criticize the Tauro too much. The
interior does have a problem with the drivers level, it is too high so
you simply need to lower it a bit, and it stretches through out the
whole hull, all though it should be shorter so you would need to make
that change. The fit of the plates is perfect, but watch out, don’t
mix up the big side plates, a good way of making sure you got the
right one is by checking where is the exhaust hole is, it on the right
or the left. The top and the gun mount create some space that would
need to be filled by putty. The mg’s don’t have their shields so that
need to be added, check a photo of a A7V for reference, the MG’s are
very well detailed but are hard to put on and made to swivel, I failed
and had to glue them in place but that doesn’t mean you have to fail
too. The cannon can be made to move but I haven’t figured it out, it
fits poorly with the top, so that space needs to be filled. The top
cupola of the tank is assembled straightforward and the vents are easy
to make, they also send light down to the interior. The door can be
left in an open position or in a closed one it’s up to you, same with
the hatch on the cupola. The door knobs and chairs and hooks and what
not are glued right unto the big plates. The exhaust hole is too big
and it needs to be filled after you glue the exhaust pipe in. There
are a lot of spare parts in case you mess up, or they can go to your
spares box, like the spare cannon lever will go right into the
Emhar Feldkanone.
Bogies
This is one of the more innovative parts
of the kit. The bogie construction is very straightforward and there
is a whole spruce for them. The ingenuity and the headache come when
you assemble the bogies to the plate that will be glued to the tank.
The kit has metal springs to simulate real tank movement! I never
heard something like that to be done in any kit, not just WWI and it’s
truly a great idea, the problem is that in this particular kit it is
next to impossible to force those springs low enough to glue the bogie
into the plate. Since I got impatient I gave up and just glued them
without the springs but I should have tried harder, because if you
succeed you have something truly nice. It’s a shame that Tauro
dropped its innovative ideas and did not apply them to their other
kits that are more modern. So you should try to make them, even though
it is hard!
Tracks
This is by far the hardest and the most
rewarding part of the whole model. The tracks are single link and are
linked together by rods. The good thing is that if you do it correctly
the tank tracks change form and look very real and don’t resemble
rubber bands like the regular tracks do. The problem is that even
though you are attaching the tracks and it feels fine they are
actually breaking quite often, and then when you try to bend them or
attach them they get out of shape and bend; they also brake and are
very fragile. It says that they are not glueable on the instructions
but that’s not true, superglue easily glues them. The solution is that
either you have to make only half the tracks that are visible, or glue
them onto the boogies. This is when braking or not gluing the wheels
come into play, the wheels that have teeth easily brake the tracks so
it is best to glue them after the tracks have been done. The other
good way is by strengthening the track links with glue before you
connect them, this works great. Also be very careful and slow when
connecting them. If you do it right the tracks will look very good.
Unlike the rubber tracks these will behave and look like real track
links and not rubber bands, again this was a great idea by Tauro
and it’s a shame they didn’t perfect this technology. The instructions
tell you they can’t be glued but superglue works fine if you are
having troubles. I feel proud that I actually have the entire track
assembled I just had to glue it to the boogies in several places.
Finishing
As the model is complete you have to add
some hooks, door knobs and paint the tank. I found that airbrushing
the tank in field gray is the best for the Wotan. I used Andrea
acrylic paint. It works well it is non toxic, and it dries faster and
doesn’t shine like enamels. Since it is non toxic you can airbrush in
your house, and easily wash your hands with water. The decals since
they are over 25 years old broke up so I had to piece them together,
but there are several extra in case you mess up. I painted machine
guns gunmetal with a bit of steel, and I used steel for boogies and I
used rust/steel/light gun metal/ burnt steel for tracks. I used a bit
of rust to weather some rivets and such. I plan to cover the tank in
dust and put it in a diorama with some other German kits like, the
Emhar Feldkanone and ICM Storm troopers.
|
