Everyone is well aware of this German armored fighting vehicle so I am going to pass on providing a history of its development and usage.

 I have been waiting for some manufacturer to do this kit for a while. I am glad that Dragon has taken the initiative and continued to develop and add on to their Panther series. I assume that Dragon will be expanding upon the mold and offering other, A variants and the D model at a later date. Upon opening the box the instruction sheet was what attracted my attention first. I really like the fact that they have replaced the line drawings of past instructions and used photographs of the actual kit parts instead. Unlike some manufacturers instructions these instructions will leave nothing to your imagination.

I especially like the weathered tank model used for the Marking and Painting reference. I hope that Dragon will continue this practice with their future releases.

The Panther model is a typical Dragon tank mold. The tracks links are all individually molded, which limits Dragons over all appeal to the modeling world. I think that with the advances that have been made in track belt design (Tamiya) Dragon should offer both options.

I expect that the links will assemble together with no problems. There is a little sanding required on the surface of each link but it is minor and should not consume a great deal of time.

The molding of all the parts is crisp, and they come individually wrapped. I am disappointed that Dragon did not include photo etch with this kit.

The model surfaces are smooth and the modeler will have to get out the Dremel bits to get a textured hull/turret/mantlet if they do not want to model the zimmerit coating.

The box art shows the tank as having zimmerit applied while the markings and camouflage instruction tank does not. The Armor at War Series Panther book stated that “virtually all Panther A’s received zimmerit”.  The zimmerit version will be interesting to do because of the zimmerit pattern applied to the Panther A. The side skirts are stamped styrene (thin) and are a big improvement over what would have been molded for modelers before.

This model will present a lot of fun to any modeler wishing to do a factory fresh or a weathered and battle damaged Panther A. This looks to be another great tank kit from Dragon and I am looking forward to building it. Thumbs up to Dragon on this one. 

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