After quite some time I now finished another tank hunter, the Nashorn. Featuring the long-barreled 88mm Pak43, this was also one of the mounted anti-tank guns, but now built on a tailored base (the Geschützwagen III/IV).

There are numerous pictures of the original vehicle available, and I got inspired by one showing a dispatch rider handing some message to a Nashorn commander. There is actually a figure set available from the Russian manufacturer Stalingrad, featuring six resin figures plus a very nicely crafted horse. As kit I chose the AFV offering, adding a PE set from Voyager models. The idea then was to depict a Nashorn of schwere Panzerjaegerabteilung 519 in winter withewash, located near Vitebsk (Belarus) in January 1944.

The build itself took some time, with many thoughts going into what should be build and painted when. To me, open-roof combat vehicles are both a blessing and a curse, as you can depict many many details, but the assembly just takes a lot of time.

Especially the gun shield took some time, as I ended up using the kit plastic part, with the PE part having the wrong shape.

The whitewash was executed using hairspray, painting and weathering went on quite fine.

The figures have nice poses and are a really good addition to the vehicle. The only downside of Stalingrad figures is that they don’t have the quality of e.g. Alpine offerings, so some cleanup using Magic Sculpt was required. There is one guy wearing a hood over his head, and the face was so badly moulded that I cut of the head, replaced it with an Hornet offering and resculpted the hood.

The finished vehicle

I placed the vehicle on a self made base, depicting a muddy road with remnants of snow.

Details

The figures