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I recently picked up Dragon new 1/72 Panther Ausf.D kit and after looking at it for awhile wondered how difficult to make an Asuf.A variant?

Can any of ht emore knowledge armour members here confirm if all I have to do is the following:

  • add the frontal ball mg from a G kit
  • use the cupola from a G kit

TIA.

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  • 1 month later...

Sorry I didn't respond sooner, I just noticed this topic.

Which Dragon kit did you get? 7494?

If yes, then you would have to as you mentioned replace the drum cupola and add the ball mount MG to the front slope as well as eliminate the turret side vision port plugs and loading port. The majority of Ausf. A's only had the rear turret hatch and of course the cupola hatch. Some of the very first A's did have the vision port plugs on the turret side though. The A also had a different jack stowage on the rear hull plate, it was stowed vertically rather than horizontally as on the D. Probably not as noticeable on a 1/72 kit, but the A had a monocular gunners sight as opposed to the binocular on the D, so there was only one aperture in the mantlet as opposed to two. The exhaust varied greatly on the A's, but some did have the same exhaust arrangement as the D. There were five different exhaust arrangements on Panther Ausf. A's. If you're getting serial number specific you'd have to do some research into which specific vehicle you wanted to build.

German WWII armor can drive you crazy with the variety of details with each successive production batch of even the same model of any specific vehicle.

HTH.

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Thanks Jason. Yes, I did pick up the Dragon kit and then found the Revell offering of the A/D. Grabbed it to do some comparing. Dragon's definitely has the hands down on detail. But I think I can use the Revell kit as a guide of sorts. Thanks again

Cliff

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Thanks Jason. Yes, I did pick up the Dragon kit and then found the Revell offering of the A/D. Grabbed it to do some comparing. Dragon's definitely has the hands down on detail. But I think I can use the Revell kit as a guide of sorts. Thanks again

Cliff

Cliff, I'm not sure how in depth you reviewed the Revell D/A kit, but it has both cupolas. This gives you a spare for the D to A conversion of your Dragon kit. The Revell kit also has a couple of exhaust options which will give you more spare parts for your conversion. The Revell kit isn't that bad to be honest. I have several of their D/A and G kits and have been generally happy with the results of the couple I've put together. I like the Revell link and length track better than Dragon's DS rubber style. That said, Dragon's latest offerings for Panthers have been really good. Their Zimmerit coated Panther kits are especially nice.

I've got both the Spielberger and Jentz books on the Panther as well as a couple of other references so if you have any other Panther questions shoot me a PM and I'll try to help you out.

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  • 3 weeks later...

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