Got my Trumpeter SdKfz 7... pretty impressive

Ok its got some errors here and there, but I can't believe some people were saying its no better than the old Tamiya kit. Just OOTB is looks VERY impressive. People harp on some somewhat obscure or relatively insignificant errors. I haven't heard anyone mention the well done photo-etch rifle clips. Yes the drive sprocket rollers aren't angled, but then in one of Dragon's halftracks you didn't even get the rollers! Just empty brackets for them. Is it perfect, no, but it sure looks good.

As for the overly thick sides... The sides themselves are only about 1mm thick. Maybe 1.5mm. They are a practical thickness. The lip around the top is what is thick. This is pretty heavy, but I can see several solutions to this.

One is to cut the lip off the top of the sides, and make a new one from a strip of sheet styrene.

Second is to sand the lip down from the sides so its not as wide.

Third, would be if someone came out with two resin sides to replace the kit parts. It wouldn't be much resin and they would be drop fit replacements.

Fourth, make two sides yourself. They are, after all, flat.

The tracks look really nice. They are a bit different than other link halftrack tracks in that the rubber pad is seperate from the metal part of the track that it attaches to. So, each link is three parts... the track shoe, the base where the pads attach (that also holds the links together) and the rubbber pads.

Trumpeter's use of photo etch seems pretty good here too. Rifle racks, for example, along with clips that hold the canvas top in place, and other small details. The tubular centers of the drive sprockets are p-e as well.

Considering this is the only modern SdKfz. 7 on the market now, its pretty nice.

I will test fit the bodywork from Tamiya's 37mm FlaK version on the Trumpeter chassis when I get around to building the kit.