Wade's World Reviews - Various AFV’s

Ryefield Model’s #5069 Stug III ausf G Early Production

rfm-stug-iii-ausf-g-build

5 Price ~$47 now (paid ~$29 on sale)

3 Instructions - There’s a couple of misnumbered parts and a part called for that wasn’t included. I had to remove this to fit the hull together but don’t recall that being mentioned in the instructions.

5 Molding Quality - State of the art 2020’s

5 Plastic Quality - Goldie Lock’s Perfection! Soft enough to be easy to clean up parts and stood up to liquid cement well.

5 Parts Clean Up - well designed for easy clean up and that’s good because a lot of parts clean up is needed. Given how the lower and superstructure assembly meticulous part clean up is mandatory.

2 Ease of Build - Painful to write that because it’s a marvelous kit but there are compelling reasons for that score:

A) Track assembly is a little fiddly. A thicker liquid cement like Testor’s Liquid Cement is your friend as low viscosity liquid cements like Tamiya Extra Thin make assembly of the working track, track pins more difficult. I’ve talked with multiple people (5+) that had difficulty assembling these track links.

B) Assembly of the superstructure goes well if one studies the sequence and test fits and all of the parts are cleaned up and burr free. This is easy enough for experienced builders. However, its more demanding than typical due to the build up sequences for the superstructure.

C) see comments on instructions and picture.

D) The kits a little more complex due to other versions havng an interior.

5 Accuracy Looks like a Stug III G to me. Tracks, suspension dimensions looked right to my eye. I’ll leave the hairsplitting to the the detail ninja’s :ninja:

5 Fit - Oh and it is sweet! Very rewarding when it all goes together!

5 Doesn’t Require Aftermarket - maybe a few wing nuts and two Aber antennas. Some will dislike the tracks and decide to replace. If tracks are assembled meticulously, they are very good. This kit sold me half a dozen RFM Pz III/IV track link sets!

5 Details Built Out of the Box - Very formidable kit for model contests.

** 45 points out of 50 **

45/50 => 90%

Very Highly Recommended, especially if caught on sale :grinning: :+1:

So how good is this kit?

The numbers fail to fully communicate the favorable impact this kit had on me as a model builder. I learned to trust RFM generally knows what they are doing and achieve excellent fit with this kit. The kit peaked my interest in Stug III’s.

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