A friend of mine gave me this kit yesterday. It’s the Italeri kit # 290
Is this a good kit or not in terms of accuracy, molding and so on? Is it worth spending time building and extra $$ on PE, indy tracks and other stuff?
Opinions appreciated…
Thanx…
It is a decent semi older kit. Certainly a step upward from the OLDER Tamiya Panther A. For awhile it was the only D kit in town but Dragon has taken care of that. Moldings are typical Italeri, not bad, but not top of the line. I do not know of any accuracy issues. My feeling is that Italeri kits are certainly worth building and if you want to fancy it up with AfterMarket, go for it. If you want all that stuff in one package, go get the later Dragon kits. But I think just a straight OOB kit with maybe some replacement tracks will make a build you can be happy with.
I agree with stikpusher, the tracks will be awful, two piece rubber bandies so there is no hiding the joint at the top and they are very stiff, the tracks are the worst thing about Italeri’s kits other than that they are pretty decent.
Save the money, get Dragon, and be happy!
Steve
I would echo the sentiment. While it was a decent kit, by the time you add tracks, PE or barrel, you would be at more money than a brand new high tech Dragon kit.
With that in mind, I would just build it out of box and use it to hone your modeling skills.
Excellent advice. Try new things out that you might have been timid to try before. No loss. You may even surprise yourself.
Go to Missing Links and go to the articles section.There is a good article on correcting the Italeri Panther.As I remember it is for the A,but most of the corrections are appicable to the D also.The most difficult thing(and it is rather easy)is to extend the hull behind the turret so the turret sits right.If I can do it,anyone can.Some Tamiya road wheel won’t hurt either.If you want a challenge,then go for it and money be dammed.