Anyway, we'll see over the next few weeks.Ordered the kit late on Monday from eModels and it arrived this morning so a big shout out to them for lightning fast service.
The T70 was designed by Nicholas Astrov's team as an improvement to the T60, which lacked firepower and armour protection in the face of increasingly powerful Nazi machinery. It was intended to replace both the T60 and T50 for use in the reconnaissance and infantry support roles.
The original design replaced the 20mm main gun of the T60 with a 45mm piece and increased the thickness of the armour giving a weight of 9.2 tonnes. To drive this heavier machine Astrov's team fitted two Gaz 202 petrol engines side by side each driving one track through separate transmissions, an arrangement which was rapidly exposed as being totally unsatisfactory so the layout was redesigned with the power plants fitted in line along the right side of the tank and delivering power to both tracks through one transmission and differential. The turret was also replaced at this time with one that could be welded from plate armour making manufacture much easier.
The T70 was operated by a crew of two. One driver and one commander, who also doubled up as his own gunner and aimer. This made operation of the tank in it's infantry support role very difficult for all but the most skilled of commanders.
Despite it's shortcomings the T70 was suitable for manufacture in smaller facilities than the T34 and consequently a total of over 8200 were built during 1942 and 1943.
T70's proved themselves to be capable but not exceptional and saw action in many of the great Russian campaigns of the war, including Kursk.
Specifications:
Weight 9.2 Tonnes
Length 4.29m
Width 2.32m
Height 2.04m
Max speed 28mph
Powerplant 2x Gaz202 petrol engines
Armament 45mm model 38 gun and 7.62mm machine gun
Armour 10mm - 60mm plate.
I'll start with a quick in box review and sprue shots.........
The kit comes in a nice big box with a good piece of box art on the front and on the sides there are photo's of the unpainted kit showing the PE parts attached. This is the "Special Edition" version and comes complete with a small amount of PE and some crew members, so that will be another foray into the relative unknown for me since I've only ever painted one figure before and that was in 1/48 scale.
The instructions look nice and clear and this is the first kit I've bought that has painting schemes in "Glorious Technicolor". so I'm delighted with that, in fact the only improvement on it would be if the crew figures were in " Supermarionation!!"
One neat little touch is the inclusion of a printed miniature map to go with one crew figure. I don't know if the traditionalists would approve or not but I think it's a nice little touch that shows thought for the builder, even if I choose not to use it.
The plastic is nice and crisp and the detailing looks sharp, although I can't really comment on the accuracy of it. My knowledge doesn't extend that far. On first look around it there are no obvious EPM's that would cause a problem.
I have watched an In box review of this kit on Youtube and they claimed no flash. This is not entirely accurate but what flash is present is minimal and will be easily cleaned away.
Now we come to the big negative point.... With the exception of the tracks, all the sprues were bunched into one plastic bag, including the few clear parts and the decals, neither of which were offered any protection from being jostled about by a jaunty postman happy in his work. Surely the industry standard should be better than this in the 21st century? Even the much criticised Airfix manage to put the clear parts into a separate bag from the rest of the plastic.
I'm really looking forward to this build. I have a definite idea in mind about how I wish to present the kit but firstly I need to get the thing built.
This might result in my investing in some Friul tracks, we'll see how it goes first.
