Getting Back in the Groove/ A Review of Some Tiny Tanks

Well it has been a while since I have gotten into some proper hobby on this blog.  I have to apologise.  Life has gotten well and truly out of hand in just about every way.  Outside of hitting the gym I have very little to help my state of mind.  This in mind I sat down to have a little hobby fun the other night.

Now this is a bit of a departure from my usual GW focus on this blog BUT my good friend Dave has been talking up Plastic Soldier Company’s kits for quite some time.  I thought that if they were half as good as the man said… well, it would make for a good diversion (and maybe get me motivated to get cracking on something bigger).  Plastic Soldier Company is mainly known for hard plastic, multiple part kits that they scale up and down depending on what they are selling.  That is to say that their 28mil Russians are the same models in the same poses only bigger than their 15mil Russians.  Same sprues.  Same everything, only in different sizes.  I have looked closely at the 28mil Russians and I have to say that they detail is pretty horrible compared to standard GW kits.  I have a Flames of War (mostly painted) German SS force that was missing tanks so I picked up the PSC Panzer IV box.  At $33 AUS for five tanks I was not expecting much (it is well cheaper than Battlefront). 

I was shocked when I opened the box.  Clearly I had not read the box other than to make sure I had gotten the scale right because I missed the fact that it contained the components to make 3 different variants to a Panzer IV (very different ones too).  Each tank and all of its bitz fit on one sprue. Seen here with the variants in question:

There were tons of parts!  I actually had to read the instructions.  Since there were no words I was initially nervous but I did not have any reason to be.  The kits were a joy to put together.

 I opted to make all 5 panzers the IV Ausf H variant.  Not only does they best match what I am trying to do with my infantry but they also look pretty cool with the extra armour.

The plastic is cut cleanly and crisply with good detail and very little flash to shave off.

I was able to build most of the 5 tanks in the time it took me to watch the original Tron.  Which is surprising given how many parts you have to stick together to make each tank.  The pieces fit almost seamlessly with almost no effort. 

Putting these tanks together was exactly what my hobby needed with the impending Necron Bomb being dropped in retailers everywhere tomorrow.  If you are into the 15mil love… run (do not walk) to your closest shop to get some of these.  They are cheap and amazingly fun to put together with none of the hassle of resin.   Here is a Panzer IV with a few other models thrown in for scale: