Wespe, 1944
After building the Nashorn I was desparate to build another open AFV. Tamiya's 35358 Wespe kit is praised by everone and looks to be a very good kit for an affordable price. This kit offers four high quality personnel, although I am not good with figure painting, so I leave it for later. Sooner or later I need to try that again.
However, this kit looks really good, indeed.
The build is smooth as usual and reliable tamiya fit.
You need to carefully follow the instructions and make sure you don't miss any small detail. For example, cutting the edge off the part A31.
The main gun requires a bit of attention as certain parts don't need to be glued together so the barrel can be set in any position.
The kit comes with length and link tracks. Before fixing the tracks in the final position I have painted the lower hull and the wheels with Tamiya 'Dark yellow' and also painted the rubber on the wheels. I have applied a bit of Vallejo's Thick mud gently to the lower hull behind the wheels to create a rough surface. When it dries I would overpaint it and apply pigments to finish the weathiring off. The tracks got the first layer of Tamiya's 'Dark iron' colour. All this is just a foundation to avoid any plastic left unpainted. Nevertheless, I am planning to build a pretty worn vehicle, so this part will get much more weathering later on.
After some paint, dark wash and pigment applied it looks much better.
Between the stages of weathering the hull I could work on the fighting compartment and other details of the kit.
Main colour is the above-mentioned dark yellow after a bit of gentle pre-shading. Chipping applied with a small piece of sponge, then came the enamel washes: 'dark wash' and 'streaking grime' have proven to be the best colours. Plus gentle touches of 'light rust'.
For the external appearance of the Wespe I started with the same colours pre-shading covered by dark yellow. However, as I wanted a rather worn piece of arillery, I have oversprayed it with a mix of white and dark yellow. I have used 'dark green' for the camo, again with patches of a lighter shade of the same green.
After sealing everything with flat clear I started to work on the weathering of the external parts. Chipping and washes primarilly. The details (e.g. the tools) also got their final colours.
I was working slowly, step by step so as the weathering comes together and finally the complete vehicle started to gain a homogenious look.
When preparing for the build, I found the photo below on the internet. I quite liked the idea of hanging some jerrycans on the side of the vehicle, so from the frame of some old PE parts I have bended the hooks and glued them to their final place.
What do I think of this kit? I definitely recommend it:
-Easy build, standard tamiya quality
-Nice details, but not too many parts
-Easy to assemble link and length tracks
-High quality figures
Here are some photos of the final build, but you can find more in the gallery.
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