Tuesday, March 19

35th scale Sd.Kfz. 234/2 "Puma" Schwerer Panzerspähwagen full interior kit from MiniArt.

Is 2024 year of the Puma? MiniArt certainly think so, with their all-new Sd.Kfz. 234/2 "Puma" Schwerer Panzerspähwagen in 1/35th scale. The full interior kit is shown inside & out in detail in our preview today... 




35th scale Sd.Kfz. 234/2 "Puma" Schwerer Panzerspähwagen full interior kit from MiniArt.

Sd.Kfz. 234/2 "Puma" full interior kit.
From MiniArt
1/35th scale
Kit No#35414
Full interior included.
The Subject: Sd.Kfz. 234/2 "Puma" Schwerer Panzerspähwagen
The Sd.Kfz. 234 was a family of armored vehicles developed and built in Germany during World War II. The first and most famous version, the Sd.Kfz. 234/2, was equipped with a turret featuring a 5-cm KwK 39/1 tank gun and a coaxial MG 42.
This armament was originally intended for the VK 1602 Leopard, a planned tank in the Panzer II class. The switch to this armament was documented on July 1, 1942, and on November 2, 1943, the production of 100 vehicles with this equipment was announced. A total of 101 vehicles were manufactured between December 1943 and June 1944. The designation Sd.Kfz. 234/2 was used from March 1944.
A trio of German reconnaissance armored cars. In the foreground is this subject, the Sd. Kfz. 234/2 8-Rad "Puma", midground is an Sd. Kfz. 234/3 8-Rad and an unrecognized armored car in the background.
This version of the Sd.Kfz. 234, with its relatively strong armament for a reconnaissance vehicle, often tempted crews to engage in combat instead of just performing reconnaissance tasks.

The Kit:
We have some nice CADs of this kit providing some details of the makeup of the model. A walk around of the whole armoured car, with the golden parts representing the photo-etch and the blue items shown below showing the options like openable hatches etc.
Take a look at all the options you can access with this kit, the blue shaded panes show everything that can be opened or closed on the kit.
Vision ports, stowage compartments are all just begging to be shown opened up and under inspection by the German owners or the new custodians in a post battle - or WWII scene.
A view from above with the turret removed showing the full engine compartment opened up , with engine inside.
You can also show the engine fully removed of course, but with heaps of internals fully formed such as the fuel tanks and radiator etc.
The top of the hull removed showing the real interior of this kit, every compartment is filled out neatly, radios & crew compartment add to the full engine.
The engine in...
...and out.
A view of the lower hull and suspension, showing the complex drives of this vehicle and the independent, turntable axles.
From underneath you see the internal hill roof.
The internal turret parts are shown in this illustration.
The mount and the insides of the gun, radio & cans for the commander are shown in this simple drawing.
The Puma's 5 cm L/60 main gun is moulded in full, showing the whole mechanism here.
The 14,825 cc (905 in3) Tatra 103 V12 diesel with 157 kW (211 hp) is a big engine, and with a lot of ignition and wiring harnesses, you can see that MiniArt has supplied all of this inside the box.
Shaded to show the colours of the engine, the blue parts of course, were not blue in real life!
The radios are an important part of the scout / recon vehicles, and the full sweet of communications including aerials (& cans) are included in the kit.
The open and closed grilles for the rear engine deck are shown...
The "Jerry" cans on this kit are attached with photo-etch.
Some do not like this, but with just the right amount of glue, these sandwich together tyres give you a full tread with no sanding seams involved...
Another feature of this vehicle and correctly of this kit are the independent suspension and tunable wheels & tyres.

This kit from MiniArt will soon be available - Until then, keep an eye on the MiniArt's website or just look in here for more info on MiniArt’s new stuff.