Part 1: First Look

MSRP: $16.00 When Germany invaded Russia they soon found that their Pak 36's and Pak 38's were not having a great effect on the T-34's and KV's. The idea arose to take captured French Model 1897 cannon in 75mm and modify a new muzzle brake and strap them to a new carriage. The guns worked better than anything they had at the time but were not a total success. When the Pak 40 entered service the Pak 97 was slowly pulled from front line duty and relegated to static defense positions, especially in and around Normandy. Italeri's new 1/35 Pak 97/38 consists of 71 parts for the assembly of the gun, with another 40 parts making up the gun crew. Although this is a new release from Italeri it is not really a new kit at all, it seems to be a mix of several different kits combined to make this kit up. There is no decal sheet provided and the painting instructions for the SS smocks is a pattern I have never seen in reference books so I would recommend some research to find accurate references. The crew pictured on the box art is not the same crew in the kit. The uniforms and poses are different. Of the four figures, one is firing and one is aiming but they can't fit where their firing positions should be without modifications to their poses, so think about how you assemble them before gluing. I made this mistake and have to figure something out about posing them with the gun as they have already been painted. The German helmets with the camo cover are a little misshapen and don't look exactly right. Although the carriage and gun do fit together nicely, they seem to be molded somewhat differently from each other, possibly because it may be the carriage from another kit. The detail is decent and the kit is a relatively a quick build, about one day. You'll spend double the time painting SS camouflage on the four figures. The muzzle has tiny baffles that are molded solid but look much better drilled out. From what I've seen in some museum photos the operators could tow this gun two different ways. One is with the pivot wheel attached to the end of the carriage rails and the muzzle attached to the tow clevis on the tow vehicle, the second way is to store the pivot wheel on top of the rails and attached to the tow clevis facing backwards. You have that option to do either one, which I think is kind of neat. All in all this is an okay kit for the price, plus you get a crew even though they need minor work. There is a build review coming soon.

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