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Kfz.70 6x4 Personnel Carrier
(Krupp Protze)
Kit # 7377 Preview by Rob Haelterman

The Protze

A preview of the kit can be found here. As the kit builds easily, there is actually very little to add:

  • The manual teaches us that this will most likely be a quick-build affair and that there are no parts to augment our spares box.
  • Detail and some parts are somewhat thicker than the ICM kit of the same vehicle, but much easier to build and a lot sturdier.
  • The cargo bed is somewhat overengineered and some parts don't fit too well in this area. Dry fitting is the order of the day as minor modifications to the parts are all that are needed to make them fit perfectly.
  • You can see through the hood from the sides, which can be easily solved by gluing some plasticard to the interior of the hood.
  • The locating holes for the axe on the rear of the cargo compartment go all the way through the rear wall, which is not necessary for the small locating pegs on the axe itself. These should be plugged from the rear.
  • A clear windscreen is given. It lacks the splitter frame on the driver's side and has bolt detail on the inside, where it will be hidden by the dashboard. It only has a frame on the outside, making painting on the inside difficult. It's actually rather easy to fit the windshield backwards, as I discovered.
  • The pennant holder is rather "sturdy" for this scale.
  • For a vehicle that saw widespread use, research into the color schemes is rather, well, minimalistic: two identical vehicles from unidentified units, both in gray, but with different licence plates and another one from an unidentified unit with a whitewash. The latter requires the formation of your own licence plates. This allows you to make any WH or SS licence plate (in case you are building an exact replica of a picture), but is a very fiddly affair, even more so as the SS runes come in halves...
  • Decals for the instruments are given, but not mentioned in the instructions.
  • The shovels seem a bit too large, but shortening them is an easy affair.
  • One of the headlights has a blackout cover with a pronounced slant. While possible in my opinion, it looks somewhat strange.
  • To my eye the front fenders leave too much space for the wheels. As the wheels do not look underscale to me, the cause is more likely the positioning of the fenders, which sit too high with respect to the hood.
  • Only basic measurements were performed as I was lacking both in decent references and motivation to measure every little bolt.

 

  1/72 according to [1] Kit
Total length (excluding towing pintle)

69.75mm

 69.54mm
Distance between rear axle 11.94mm 12.20mm
Distance between front axle and middle of rear axles 40.28mm 40.15mm

 

 

 

 

The Pak

Years later, I decided to build the Pak 36. I mostly followed Al's advice for his Dragon Pak 36 and replaced the spades of the outriggers and added handlebars. Whereas Al scratchbuilt his spades, I could use the reaonably well detailed spades of the Pak that comes with S-Models 3.7cm PaK 36 auf Renault UE(f), which gives you two spare gun carriages (if you build the kit according to the instructions.)

Note that the instructions of this Dragon kit allow you to build the gun in the towed configuration, but don't tell you te remove (or, at least, fold the bottom) of the lower shield (part G6).

 

References

[1] Krupp-Kraftwagen im Kriege. Die legendäre Krupp-Protze und andere. Waffen Arsenal Band 107

[2] Krupp at War. The legendary Krupp Protze & Other Vehicles. Schiffer Military History 53. (Basically the same book as the above.)

[3] Military Models Website:

 

Sample kit bought by author.

Dragon kits can be purchased from Tracks & Troops

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Article Last Updated:
21 January 2015
18 November 2018

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