A7V "Sturmpanzer"

Manufacturer: Emhar (Kit #5003)

I have had this kit for many months now, but only just realized that I have never reviewed it. I am still not going to :) Seriously, I am not very educated on WW I tanks, and I have no references for this particular one either. There are many others who specialize in this era, and I highly recommend that you visit Peter Kempf's Landships website, where you will find several outstanding articles related to the A7V, and to this kit. I could never match the high-quality reviews on his site, so I won't even try.

What I will do here, is provide scans of the kit sprues, so that the viewer can see what this model looks like unbuilt.

Like Emhar's earlier Mark IV series, this is a very simple kit with only 30 parts. But once again, these parts are extremely well-detailed, with superb rivets, recessed panel lines, and very sharp molding. Some quick observations: I wish that the hatches would have been molded open, as well as the view ports. From what I recall reading the other reviews, this is a very accurate kit, with only a couple of very minor tweaks needed to correctly represent specific vehicles.

The decals are fairly comprehensive, with several marking options. I remember that the decals in the Mark IV kit were fairly decent, although they needed some heavy use of decal setting solution to properly snuggle around all the rivet detail. What I find very disappointing is the out-of-register printing of the cross markings. This is a serious problem throughout the small scale AFV industry, and it is really beginning to piss me off. Trying to get the larger scale modelers to take us small scale modelers serious is hard enough. Now when are the manufacturers going to start taking us seriously, and start paying attention to quality control issues such as this? If this was a WW II German tank, I wouldn't complain as loudly, since we now have several sources for replacement decals; but where are we going to find replacement WW I crosses?

Now, having finished my little tirade, I'll end this by saying this is an excellent kit, and I greatly look forward to Emhar's forthcoming Whippet, poorly-printed decals and all.