BPM 15mm Hetzers

 While I do have some 6mm Hetzers, I've never had any in larger scales. Earlier this year I picked up a scenario book covering the Seelowe Heights which features a lot of Hetzers, so I thought it worth adding to my ever growing heap of German tank destroyers. A couple of thousand were built from late 1943, so rather more numerous than King Tigers, of which I have four. Ahem. 

These two are resin models from Butlers Printed Models (BPM). I went for resin as I was concerned about striations on the sloping hulls on cheaper filament types, and these came out very well indeed. Single piece models, but I went for the earlier version with the remote MG turret, which was supplied seperately (along with a spare, thanks BPM).

Lovely little models which capture the feel of the real thing very well. No assembly required apart from the MGs and sizewise they fit well with my Zvezda Pz 38ts, possibly a little longer, but the Zvezda models are notoriously undersize. The tracks are a bit crude, but they aren't very visible.

Lovely fine detail on them, the exhaust is very crisp as are the various raised bits. The panel lines around the hatches are so fine you can  hardly seem though, especially under the camo paint. I did a pinwash around most of the raised and sunken parts which helps pick them out. 

I looked at various colour schemes but in the end went with a dark sand base for both (rather then late war Czech dark green), one of them got standard 1944 green/brown disruptive and the other got the later war 'ambush' pattern. It isn't a scheme I do very often as it is so time specific, but it seemed appropriate for at least one of the these. Otherwise it was mud all over the running gear and wheels and light drybrush to pick out the highlights. I put basic balkan crosses on and some plain 'turret' numbers on one of them as like most late war vehicles, they weren't covered in heraldry.