Tamiya's Super Pershing

Tamiya's Super Pershing is just like the misnamed Super Sherman....a joke.   All that is changed is the gun tube length....there were only 25 made and only one of the two in ETO saw any combat...neither of which is the configuration that Tamiya has put out.    No gun equliberator springs, no added armor on the bow or the mantlet and no stowage baskets on the rear as were on both Super Pershings in ETO and the front sits too high.  Why put out a pre production model when the only Super P's seen were the two in Germany in 1945 and a few who may have had a little training on them before they were all disassembled or placed down range as hard targets.

Looks as if Tamiya is out for only one thing...,making a profit on a semi modified existing tank. They have already stepped into deep doo-doo by putting out that shamefully inaccurate Israeli M-51 in 1;16 which they intentionally misnamed Super Sherman as a sales ploy.

Tammy,  shame all over you.

Confusion is going to abound about this release.  The original two T26E4 pilot models were built up in 1944. These had external recuperator springs atop the turret. One was sent to Europe for field trials and it rec'd a field up-armor job -- with the slabs on the nose and mantlet.  This is the one that saw combat, is the subject of the Hobby Boss kit and happens to be my avatar.

Meanwhile, the 500 T26E4s were ordered.  The production tank included modifications such as a reduced turret bustle counterweight and the removal of the recuperator springs from atop the turret.  As the war was ending, the large order was cancelled after only fifty were produced. All but one eventually ended up in scrap heaps or target ranges.  The single survivor is in
Catigny, Illinois.

From N'berg photos, it seems Tamiya  has chosen to add a sprue to their older M26/T26E3 Pershing kit in order to make it a production T26E4 -- one of the fifty made but which never saw any action.

Hope this makes sense.  I love Allied subjects but if initial impressions prove to be correct, will a let down, in my opinion.

It had additional armour on the glacis and upper hull, IIRC. Hobby Boss has had a kit that's been out for a while now.

Didn't it have additional armor plate across the glacis plate? I'm naive.

How long is it for pre-orders?  A year or less?  Thanks.

That would be one kit I'd preorder.

It looks like AFV Club is going to launch M-42 Duster this year.  Saw it in one of many pictures Don Busack took at Nuremberg Toy Fair.   Check it out...

/forums/t/135406.aspx 

It was just an upgunned Pershing, only two? were actually ever in Europe during the war.  Basically three companies (I think) have a kit, or one announced of either of the two ever produced.  Outstanding.  Where is my new M42?