Dragon

1/72 M4A3 Sherman (105mm) w/Deep Wading Kit

Kit Number: 7330

Reviewed by  Jim Pearsall, IPMS# 2209

MSRP: $24.95 Website: www.dragonmodelsusa.com The Vehicle The "wading" Sherman was a watertight version, with the air intake and exhausts run through trunks to allow the vehicle to run on the bottom of streams and rivers which would have stopped most tanks when water got in the air intakes. The Deep Wading M-4A3 could just drive across creeks and rivers, on the bottom, as long as the water was less than 10 feet or so deep. As a side note, the Wehrmacht's Tauchpanzer III used a float and hose system, rather like a sub's snorkel, and could operate in water up to 45 feet deep! The Kit

The kit comes with 4 major part sprues, labeled A, a, B and C. Each sprue is packed in its own plastic bag, which prevents parts loss or damage. It still confused me that there are two A sprues, but I figured it out. There's also the upper and lower hull, which come in a separate package. Then a beautiful set of PE for the deep wading gear and a really nice metal piece for the tow cable. This is the fourth Dragon Sherman I've built for review. It's still a great kit. The fineness of the detail parts is amazing, as well as the fit. Building the Tank I followed the Dragon instructions and had no problems with figuring out where things went or how they fit. This is an achievement for the guys who did the instructions. I painted everything OD before I cut parts off the sprues, then did detail and touch up painting as I assembled parts.

The suspension is built first, with the rubber part of the road wheels painted black/rubber. These are attached to the lower hull along with the drive sprockets and return rollers. The detail parts on the upper hull follow. I had an interesting time getting the front lights and their protective "cages" in place and then not banging into them and knocking them off. I also found the fit and detail on the hatches to be great. The hull was followed by the turret, which also has a number of tiny parts for me to knock off, but again, everything just fits so nicely. The 105mm gun fits very cleanly, and the open muzzle is a nice detail touch. Early on, I was tempted to attach the tracks to the suspension before attaching the lower hull to the upper hull. I'm glad I didn't. For some reason the horizontal plates above the suspension, which fit into the upper hull, were about 1 mm too long. They had to be cut down. A pretty trivial matter, but I'm glad I didn't have to contend with the tracks while I did this.

I put the decals on before I added the wading kit. They're Cartograf, and they're just great. The Deep wading Kit I began the wading kit by attaching the intake and exhaust trunk connections to the top and rear of the tank. I started out using thick CA. The first joint failed. It just popped loose. The super glue didn't stick. OK, let's fix that. I cleaned the parts with soap and water to remove whatever coating was preventing the CA from sticking. That didn't work either. I wound up using Gator GlueŽ on all the brass parts for the wading kit. The pictures show the parts sitting in place to confirm that they would fit after painting. The upper trunks were the challenge in this entire build. The PE requires a somewhat difficult bend at the top of the trunks. The tops are curved, so it's necessary to form the tops to match the curve of the sides.

I wound up using a brass rod as a form to bend the tops. It worked pretty well, but I did run into another problem as I did this. The straight bends are slightly etched on the inside. This is really great, as the PE just follows these etched lines when you bend them, so there's no need for a special bending tool, just a good straight edge. The problem I ran into with the first trunk was that I formed the curve at the top, and then bent one of the sides over to check the match. Nope. Bend the side back, and do some more curve work. Then bend that side and check. No again. Bend the side back out of the way. It started to crack along the guide line. OK, get the top as close as its going to go, and that's it. I wound up having to use some Gator Glue as filler where the top didn't exactly match the sides. Close, not perfect, but fixable.

I didn't like the way the upper exhaust trunk mated to the lower trunk. I used a couple of pieces of sheet plastic to provide alignment and strength. Once the glue had set up on the trunks, I test fit them. Not bad at all.

I then airbrushed the trunks OD inside and out, and remounted them to the almost finished tank.

The only thing left to do was the tow cable. This was a really nice little piece of detail. It's real metal, and although it's a little stiff, it can be realistically draped over the top of the hull. I've envied the 1/35 AFV modelers their nicely done tow cables, now there's one available in Braille scale. Overall Evaluation Highly Recommended. Even if you only build it as a M4A3 105, it's a nice kit. The molding is finely crafted, fit is excellent (except for that one place where the lower hull is too long), and the detail is super. It would certainly be a conversation piece at any Chapter meeting. I usually have something negative to say about the instructions. OK, I did find one mistake. In the last step, it tells you to make the lower attachment for the intake trunk twice. There are only parts for one. Even I could figure that one out. Thanks to Dragon USA for an excellent model of an interesting AFV. And thanks to John Noack for allowing me to build it.