BT-7A "Russian Artillery Tank"
Manufacturer: Ark Models Russia
128 parts, no photo etch or clear parts, 4 decals.
Price: about $10
The BT-7 was made in 1934 as a series of cavalry tanks
developed by the Soviet Union. These tanks had poor armor, (which became
painfully evident during world war 2) but reasonable arnament. The BT stands
for "high-speed tank" in Russian. One of the main features of the
BT-7 was the Christie suspension. The BT-7A was an artillery support tank that
was armed with a 7.6 cm howitzer. Otherwise there is no difference from the
BT-7.
I bought this kit when I was in Russia, this summer, and it
seems like it's from a new company. I saw Ark Models' kits in a lot of the
stores. The company seems to mostly make German and Russian World War 2 armor,
and World War 2 era Soviet aircraft. The box art was decent, but it shows the
tank with a chain, when none is provided, and a few of the parts in the
assembly are not shown.
Inside the box are 5 sprues of light gray plastic, but a lot
of the parts have nasty ejector pin marks that have to be dealt with. The
assembly begins with the lower hull The instructions show parts B7, B7, and B8
are sandwiched between parts A6 (A5) and A3(A4)... I assume, the instructions
are confusing throughout the build. Anyhow, the parts do not fit, so I left
them out. These are only the sides of the hull. The whole hull is made in 10
parts, something I find annoying, not to mention that when I attached D2 to the
hull there was a few large gaps.
I skipped around a bit and started assembling the turret
next. The main parts went together well, although there was a seam to be filled.
The part M4 does not fit onto the turret, so I had to sand off a part of it.
Sadly there is no interior whatsoever. The main reason I skipped around with
the instructions was because there are lots of parts that are attached at times
that do not make sense, for example towing hooks were attached after the
fenders, making it hard to glue them into place. I thought that the kit's
tracks would make the build easier, I was wrong. A lot of the track parts have
incorrect attachment points and require some surgery to correct. Luckily there
are extra parts left over, so you can always get another chance at them. When attaching the upper part of the tank to
the lower there are some nasty gaps to be dealt with.
I
painted my model with model master enamels and weathered it with a Tamiya
weathering stick (really good actually). It can truly be said that the kit's
decals are its highlight. Although only one of the four decals is shown in the
painting instructions it is the only part of the kit that had nothing wrong
with it. Overall this was not a
particularly pleasant build, and the many fit, quality, and other issues make
it a kit for experienced modelers. While it is completely inferior to Tamiya's
BT-7, this kit does provide an interesting subject to build.
ozzman