"1/144 desert war vehicles?" Topic

The 1/144 tank models are seriously attractive, but I'm new to the market for them. It seems like all of the models I've seen are late war European versions (some of which could be 1943ish, but still…).

Is it possible to build a Desert War collection from manufactured models, or is this scale pretty much a DIY 3D-printer oeuvre?

- Ix

Arrowhead might have what you need. 20% sale till the 5th too.
arrowheadminiatures.co.uk

For 'to assemble' metals… as said above, Arrowhead, plus Pendraken have redone several vehicles closer to 1/144… PzIII to come soon.

Plastic prepaints… if you can find them, Takara did a nice PzII and a PzIII which could be repainted. 6pdr and 88mm ATG also. I have not tried Panzer Depot but they have several in a 'Desert' scheme.

Ready done prints… Butlers Printed models have many vehicles suitable for W Desert. Note: 1/144 prints not quite so detailed as pics of 15mm but definitely OK and usually possible to hide any print lines with stowage, flag, etc.

Figures… Pendraken or Miniature Figurines.

You can get the Panzer 2 and 3 from Dragon here as kits. They have 48 boxes in stock.
link

I have a bunch of these from 21st Century Toys in this color or Panzer Grey. Let me know if you want a few. With a little work they can be made into something acceptable.

Size wise they are pretty good. L to r F-toys, WTM and 21st.
‌Picture+27444 by machinehead1956, on Flickr

machinehead… I think I've read that there were no 37mm gun PzIIIs in W Desert… could be wrong, though!

There are these from F-toys too.
link
link

Heedless Horseman from Wikipedia,
Aside from use in Europe, the Panzer III also saw service in North Africa with Erwin Rommel's renowned Afrika Korps. Most of the Panzer IIIs with the Afrika Korps were equipped with the KwK 38 L/42 50mm (short-barrelled) tank gun, with a small number possessing the older 37mm main gun of earlier variants.
The 2nd F-toys link is armed with the 50mm and is painted in Dak colors with 5 in stock.

There are even some pre-painted in desert camo though they are getting harder to find and price is usually out there.

Dragon CanDo has a nice Pz-III and Pz-IVD. Example of the IV
auction

WTM has a Pz-II, Tiger I and an 88mm gun

The new Dragon kits also have a Panzer IVD too.
link

machinehead. 21C PzIII. Afraid I cannot recollect sources, but were very reliable tank 'buffs' with shipping lists / Orbats, etc.. I was surprised and disappointed… liked the idea of a mix of 37mm / 50mm!
Will be somewhere on TMP!
Although marks prior to F were shipped, they had been up-gunned to short 50mm… (with a full mantlet?)…. or may have been 'Dummy Gun' Command.
The 21C model appears to be an E. Not a fantastic model… but ok if someone wants to use it…. why not?
Could be wrong! :)

TMP link… follow links or refs. 'Jentz' ? Anyway…
TMP link

Heedless Horseman, After looking around I will have to agree, I couldn't find anything to back up that DAK had any 37mm armed Panzer IIIEs.

Neat little models !

with a small number possessing the older 37mm main gun of earlier variants.

I have heard/read this before as well, in the past, can't remember any sources.

Well, I may be wrong! Tanks Encyclopedia says they were there!
link

Cannot find the source which said none…. but again, tmp link:
TMP link

Adding to my comments in the second link of Heedless' message Jentz doubles down in his book "Tank Combat in North Africa" with the following on page 29: "Only Pz.Kpfw.III Ausf.F, G, and H with 5 cm Kw.k L/42 guns were shipped to Libya in March and April 1941."

Guys on Pendraken Forum concur… 50mm only… or 'Dummy' 37s on 'spotter' arty command…. but with different placement of dummy gun and a big 'bed frame' aerial.

One year later:

Nobody in this thread mentioned Kamiya resin 3D prints, so I'm doing it now. The scuttlebutt on TMP is that these are really nice prints (few or no print lines), and they certainly look nice in photos. The range has quite a few of the desert war British and Italian tanks that have been missing from the 1/144 market, and appears to be growing. I put together a small test order of Soviet TDs; if I like it, I'll put together an order of desert tanks next.

It looks like the main Pz II, Pz III and Pz IV variants are or have been available from Dragon and Takara, so shouldn't be too hard to put together in numbers. I plan to collect a lot of Pz III and Pz IV variants in plain Dunkelgelb to serve in both Russia and Libya; that might make some people wince, but I think most scale interpretations of Dunkelgelb are close enough for Afrika Korps service.

Somehow I hadn't noticed until today that the Pz IVF1 was available from Victrix. For some reason the photos of that model are not very good. A box of those should provide all the short-barrel 75mm Pz IV models I want to own.

It looks like there are pre-painted Grants on eBay, and resin M3 Stuarts too.

I think for infantry and artillery, I'll just have to turn to Pendraken. They don't need to be perfectly in scale with the vehicles anyway – no gaming scale is.

- Ix

Arrowhead Miniatures has a few British tanks that were used in the desert including Grants.

link

link

Ed, a friend asked me if you still have Pz3's to sell on as he's looking for DAK

Thanks

Marc, how many does he need? Sand color or grey? Also I don't want money, they're on the house as I have a few hundred of them.

Six of the DAK if available please. And that's a very generous offer but he is more than happy to pay for them. Thanks. Marc

Ok, need an address. E-mail me at goelwin@msn.com I probably won't get them out till after Xmas.

A few good, new suppliers with some North Africa models, that are reasonably priced -

link

Anschluss Publishing models are mostly one-piece made of resin (they could be 3D prints, or from resin molds of 3D printed vehicles and weapons, because they sometimes exhibit slightly perceptible printing lines). Good price, especially at the current US dollar to British pound exchange rate.

Anschluss is just now previewing some armor pertinent to North Africa on their Facebook page (link at bottom of their webpage above….the variants shown on FB can be incorrect sometimes, but the pictures are clear as to what they are).

Another UK supplier -

scalefiend.com/about

Scalefiend are resin kits (a little cleaning and assembly required). They also have a few Western Desert models too.

Sorry about the late posting here Yellow Admiral (I never look on this WW2 board, and been wondering where all the cool WW2 guys have been handing out).