Hetzer 2cm gun

 

Historical background:

To the best of my knowledge this was only a design on the drawing board and few, if any, reconnaisance Hetzers with a 2cm gun were ever produced. The manufacturer of the conversion kit, "New Connection Models", could only supply one sketch for this tank as a guide for its parts. Therefore some things remain pure speculation e.g. the modified exhaust system.

This fictitious variant is a "what if" version of the design. An quickly produced hull, still in its fresh from the factory anti rust primer, is modified with a 2cm gun turret of the type that was already in use with other German armoured vehicles. As this is a fusion between two different types of vehicles the turret is already painted in dark yellow. Also, as this is a straight off the production line version, everything is given a fresh and new appearance.
 

Basic model and conversion:

I had to use the Italerie kit, which was provided by the client, for whom I had to build this model - even if it does have the wrong road wheels. Rather than using the inacurate Italeri rubber tracks as I did, the newer ones found in Dragon kits should be selected. The Dragon kits come in 3 variants:

• Early version (May-June 1944)
• Command Vehicle version (same as the early version but with many parts for the conversion to the late variant, the road wheels and the 5 figures are improved.)
• Flame thrower version (from late October 1944 on)

For the conversion the choice is rather insignificant as the entire upper hull is composed of "New Connection" Resin parts anyway. If you are looking for the exact road wheels and tracks, you can find them in on the ever increasing kit accessory market. However it must be said that all of the Dragon tracks represent the version in use until October 1944 so therefore it may not have been used with this particular version of the vehicle.
 

Assembly

If God wants to punish somebody, then he makes a crazy modeller out of him. I wanted to once more try out my abilities to manufacture my own parts, because I had a PE-set of the SdKfz 234/1 turret in my spare parts box. As the ABER set provides only the turret armor and some super details for the gun, but lacks the gun and its mounting, I wanted to copy these parts with the help of the "New Connection" conversion kit.

Fortunately Mr. Ian Howes, whom I met at the Modelling Exhibition in 2002 in Ried/I (Upper Austria), supplied me with some very unique construction material. It consists of a somewhat porous but nevertheless hard material which can be worked with easily. It can also be glued using super glue or a 2 part adhesive. This material is also used in the automobile industry for the production of 1:1 scale wind tunnel models of new auto-Designs. Therefore I could manufacture many parts of the carriage myself. (Maybe you can ask BMW more about this material?)

The gun was constructed by using a proven method of a standard medical syringe needle. Also a metal hole punch from Historex was found to be invaluable in detailing the gun barrel. Plastic, brass and aluminum tubing and also more parts of the syringe needle supplied the remainder of the construction. Corrosives from the conversion kit for the super-detailing of the gun itself were also widely. The gunsight and its tiny details can be even folded down!

The gun elevation and traverse wheels were made from a thick wire, which was bent around a round wooden stick. Other details were made with thin plastic and copper wire. The metal lattice work on the turret was soldered together.

After the turret was finally done I could finish the hull relatively fast. Only the joining of the side skirts to the resin upper hull contained some problems: One must shorten the two front armour-plates slightly so that they fit into the mounting holes.
The exhaust is not included with the conversion kit but it can be seen in the structural drawings in a slightly difference to the Italeri kit. Therefore it had to be scratch built partly using plastic tubing. Finally only the small details remained such as the hand grips for the access hatches, made from brass- and the antenna from steel wire.
 

Painting

As I have previously mentioned I wanted to represent a factory fresh version which shows the usual improvisations used towards the end of war. This example shows such improvisation whereby the hull has just been finished and it has been used to mount a previously constructed turret from another vehicle.

The anti rust primer colour comes from Humbrol and was sprayed on Tamiya acrylic colour primer of "Panzer Grey". The inscriptions and markings were hand painted using Humbrol white. Next it was given a sealing coat of Future flor wax and given a "Burnt Sienna" and "Umbra" wash. Some streaks, those that were left from the dirt of the assembly workshop on the brand new tank, were created with diluted colour pigments. Oil colours were applied with a thick brush. In principle also the turret was similarly painted, only that it was somewhat more dirty.
 

Results:

Thank God I didnīt have to buy this conversion kit on my own budget, because the price of approx. 60 EURO would have been a little too expensive for me, especially considering the raising costs if one uses an individual link track rather than the one supplied from Italeri. Nevertheless it was well worth it for me as now I have a second 2cm gun with turret in my spare parts box. Maybe I will use it when it comes time to build my Italeri Puma converted into a SdKfz 234/1.

© April 2003 Schachinger