LOL😝
Maybe if tank had been at the bottom of the sea for 50 years.
The texture is bad but I use surfacer on this type of thing and it’s a pretty easy fix.
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No, that hull texture is totally wrong. M4A1 hulls were sand cast and totally smoooth like a baby’s butt. If you could see a grain of sand in 1\35, you would see texture. Otherwise no. And that angled rear hull is wrong. That will require some major surgery. Frankly, I wouldn’t build these Border kits if you gave them to me for free. There’s just SO much wrong with them.
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I’d never seen anything like that 1 to 1 scale cantaloupe texture on a 1/35 scale AFV kit before.
Wow! That’s hysterically funny! Another Epic fail for Border.
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I agree with you that these are not great kits and they will require some work to make them look decent. Folks that don’t enjoy having to spend time fixing issues should absolutely avoid these kits. My POV is kind of messed up because my introduction to armor modeling was the 1/32 scale Monogram M4A1 with the tracks having the end connectors in the middle of the track pads,LOL! So over my lifetime I’ve become accustomed to fit issues, flash, omissions, molded on tools, major shape issues and inaccuracies, etc…
I also enjoy building more accurate kits like my RFM, Meng, Asuka, and Tamiya kits which have minimal issues compared to the old DML, Italeri, Academy, Dragon, Hobbyboss, Zvezda and Cyberhobby Shermans.
I can’t explain it but I’m actually really looking forward to building these new Border Models Shermans and doing the best I can to remedy most of their flaws. It’s ridiculous I know it is but enjoy doing stuff like that.
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The worst I’ve ever seen was the Academy M51.
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Well explained! 
RFM, Meng, Asuka, Tamiya plus Takom & newest Academy are the only kits I’ll buy these days.
The old DML, Italeri, Academy, Dragon, Hobbyboss, and Cyberhobby kits that are in the stash get donated to raffles.
Occasionally, an Italeri kit hits the work bench for the reasons you’ve mentioned.
As long as its fun for the builder that’s really all that matters.
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Gosh - I still have one of these on the shelf of pride, complete with calliope rocket launcher! It is what it is…
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I’d like to see pics of it, if you could be so kind. 
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I’ll have to dust it off first - probably tomorrow!
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I do enjoy the challenge of having to “fix” stuff sometimes. Other times I just like building something that goes together just right. But I did grow up in the hobby building a lot of stuff that required a lot of work just to make it acceptable let alone accurate. I also have this thing about seeing the kits for myself and building them myself.
I forgot to mention the Zvezda Sherman’s I bought and built the last couple of years. I know they’re very inexpensive but I’m not a fan. But even those Zvezda kits had some novel design concepts from a manufacturing POV that was interesting to see in hand. I don’t have my notes on them but I remember a couple of things that made me think that I’d never seen a manufacturer approach it quite that way before. I’m not sure if that was a good thing or bad thing now and I’d have to find my notes but to see something you’ve never seen before 50 years into a hobby is always kind of eye opening.
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And it’s not like we had a lot to choose from, right?
We still enjoyed them for what they were. I think it’s fantastic that these new manufacturers are still developing new Shermans. The further we get from WW2 it really surprises me that while less and less people in the US seem to have an interest in the war anymore and these companies are actually making more of these subjects than ever before, it’s wild. I think the last 20-25 years there’s been more Sherman tank kits released than in all the 55 years after the war.
I love it! Give me more😆
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I built their M4A2 (75 mm) kit a few years ago, and was not impressed. For the money it’s a fairly good kit, but I’d rather spend twice as much to get a kit without the many faults a serious Sherman modellers needs to correct to get a decent replica. Everything from minor stuff like the grouser compartment lids having too small a corner radius and the appliqué armour being a bit off in size, to the loader’s hatch having a clearly wrong orientation and the transmission housing being the wrong shape.
OTOH, if you’re in need of decent T49 tracks (and don’t mind them being on backwards, or care to do some work to correct that), this kit has them for a fairly reasonable price, and they’ve thrown in a complete tank to boot 
I did kind of want to try one of their 76 mm Shermans to see how it compares, but a special military operation intervened.
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I’m going to build the Border M4A1 75mm cos my wife bought one for me for my birthday, which around here is a VERY good reason. I do however reserve the right to use parts from my rather large parts stash, and fix the texturing too. 
I have peeked in the box and I have to say there’s a lot of good stuff in there. I don’t speak Sherman like a native but I am reasonably conversant, probably enough to recognize any big goofs.
It should be fun.
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Unfortunately none of my original Monogram builds survived my childhood.
I do have one that I built about 5-7 years ago on a nostalgia trip. It was when they re-released all the monogram stuff a few years back.
My son watched me build it and when I told him it had been my first tank model ever, he decided that he wanted to build one too.
I used the old oversized DS T-48 tracks that came with the orange box US M4A4 kit. The turret is from the “Hedgehog” Monogram kit. I did away with the calliope and painted it to look like a training tank in the US during WWII. The decals came from the stash they were originally from the Italeri kit.
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Nicely done model with an outstanding background story!
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My expectations were so low going into that one that I didn’t add as much detail as I should’ve, at least one crewman or something. I built and painted it over a single weekend so that I could get back to ongoing projects. It was a nice break from more detailed kits.
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Here’s the Monogram that my son built with some pointers from dad after he’d seen me working on the first one.
I think decals are from an old 6048 dml, it has the original bad tracks. He wanted a crew and I had the old Academy M51 crew which is enormous and not even a WW2 crew but he didn’t care. He also chose the camouflage colors and patterns because they were cool, LOL. He chose the IDF crew over the original crew for similar reasons. The “weenie one” decals he chose because he said it was funny😆. Needless to say this is one of my favorites in my collection for sentimental reasons. A couple of years ago he was going to throw it out to make room on his shelves for his new stuff and I asked him for it.
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I have the original Tasca release of that beauty in my stash. I don’t have the Asuka version but I think I read somewhere that they are almost the same. I have no idea how they are different, the box art is the same tho.
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