New Panther G Models

Despite not playing Germans, I was so excited by how great the new Panther G platoon box looked that I preordered one and then impatiently waited for it to arrive. When it did get here, it was like freakin christmas or something. I tore into the box and laid everything out and that is when the nightmare started. First, two of the tanks had their exhausts broken off. One of them was just the exhaust tips broken off and the pieces were not present in the box so now one of my tanks has no exhausts. I have filed at least 5 customer service claims with Battlefront since March and am leery of them thinking I am taking advantage of them so I did not file a claim on these models. The other tank's exhaust was completely broken off but it was a clean break and the piece was present in the box so it glued on nicely. Upon doing an inventory I then realized that every single piece of metal that was supposed to come with this kit did not get packed into my box. That was too much and I filed the customer service claim. They explained that all the metal parts come packed in a baggy which explained why I didn't receive any, magnets included. Shrugging off the initial disappointment, I set off on an adventure to get the tanks assembled. They go together extremely well and look absolutely fantastic! I am nearly blinded by the beauty of the tracks. What a great looking tank even if my home cast tarp from the previous post might be a bit big for the turret.

And that's when the real problems at least for me started. The tracks. Either they are simply way too wide or the part of the hull that hangs over them isn't wide enough. I didn't know that panther tanks tapered from the back to front either but they sure as hell do on these models.

Notice how at the rear of the tank you cannot see tracks but as you get to the front of the tank near the fenders you can see tracks? One might think this is not a big deal. Well that "one" also probably doesn't want to attach the skirts to their tank either. The skirts should be flush with the hull, not touch the tracks, and should be vertical or ever so slightly angled. The problem with this cast is that you cannot mount the skirts the way they were meant to be mounted without using a hell of a lot of filler putty (that I currently do not have available in my hobby supplies). The alternative is to mount the skirts at an extreme angle like the following.

Those are pics with the skirt sticky tacked on. I will NOT be building my lovely tank like this. How atrocious. Here are a couple of pics of how it should look but with the very obvious gap near the front fender.

I went to BF's website and looked at their web article. Sure enough they have the same tank with the taper in the hull and of course do NOT have the skirts attached because they CAN'T attach them without excessive modification.

I added the straight red lines so you can clearly see what straight is and that their hull tapers at the front leaving the gap. I then noticed on the assembly pictures that they did have one with the skirt attached and you can clearly see a gap at the front near the fender.

I then decided to look at some of their other pics and looked at the box and made what I think is a shocking discovery. They advertised their new panther g tanks right on the box art with their old metal panther parts. I couldn't freaking believe it. Just look at this picture for my evidence.

This is the picture provided on their website and the box. If you look closely where I have made the circles you can see several glaring inconsistencies with the models I have received. First look at the gun barrels. All of the black markings are holes but they are inconsistent with eachother. The new panther kit has plastic barrels so all of the holes should be identical. These are not, so that leads me to believe they are the old metal barrels with the holes individually drilled out. Next look at the hull MG on the bottom right vehicle. It looks nothing like the hull MG I received in my kit which you can see in my pics above. Why? Because it is the old metal hull MG. Next and most importantly look at the right fender area. What do you see? You see no huge gap between the hull and the skirts and that the skirts are mounted vertical the way they should be. Next you can also see that the fender light is thinner at the base and doesn't look like a glob of plastic like the over-simplified plastic fender lights do. What does that mean? It means that the fender is the old metal one and that either the hull is straight the way it should be or the track isn't too wide to interfere with the skirt. Lastly, I forgot to mark it but have a look at the tracks themselves. The details on them are nowhere near as good as the new plastic tracks have. They aren't even in the same book let alone the same page. They are obviously the old metal tracks which are thinner than the new plastic ones.

Based on this information I have deduced that the plastic parts included with the panther g box set must have been a last minute decision due to all the whining on the BF forums about how Zvezda or Plastic Soldier Company are so great and that BF should follow suit or those people will continue to buy from other manufacturers. This box has been my greatest disappointment yet. I cannot believe that a company with such excellent customer service would deliberately sell a misrepresented product to its consumers. I expect these shenanigans from other companies but not one like BF. I am deeply saddened by this. In closing I would like to share one last picture that sums up how I feel about the new panther g platoon box despite how wonderful the sculpts are and how easily they went together.

Coming Soon - Spetsnaz platoon (my first fully painted FoW models seen above the AR-15)