Plastic soldier company Allied M4A2 sherman tank reveiw

As mentioned in my previous post I picked up 2 boxes of these recently. I mostly picked them up as I wanted to see if the quality was there for the cost. I have built up the first box of 5 at this point and can honestly say I am happy with them thus far.

What you get in the box.
   Each box contains 5 sprues and a very basic instruction sheet. Each of the 5 sprues contains all the parts to make one tank, the box says "some assembly required" and they aren't kidding. Most of my experience with gaming models comes from Battlefront tanks which would be something like 7 parts for a tank like this, each sprue here contains 45 parts. going by the basic diagram on the instruction sheet your at about 22 parts per tank and depending on the variant you build it will be even more parts. I myself enjoy assembling a kit like this while watching a movie or some TV, so I don't mind this at all.

 
I am not kidding when I say a basic instruction sheet, on one side it shows a picture of a single sprue and 3 variants which can be made, on the other it shows the major parts to make one variant. This isn't too big a deal though as its not too hard to figure out what parts you need. If there is anything missing from the box its decals, though its not like I am used to getting decals with my gaming models anyway.

The tanks

 The detail on these is quite good, I think they may even have better cleaner detail than the best models Battlefront has put out. The biggest issue I have had with tanks has been the excess metal which destroys the detail on the one part of the tracks you can see, to a point this is replicated on these models though not nearly as bad as it is on a metal model. The tracks are made up of a top and a bottom half which connect at this same point. Very careful clean up of the tracks and careful assembly could make this 100% unnoticeable unlike the metal models where no matter what you do it will never come out right. each sprue has the parts to make a couple different variants, as well as one U.S. and one British Tank commander. There are also a couple of pieces of stowage and a few parts which I cant Identify for sure what they are. The first failing of this kit is in the turrets in my opinion. You have the option to model two different turrets one for the 75mm or 105mm gun and the later turret for the 76mm gun. There are only enough hatches however to do one or the other. One of the biggest things I kept hearing about the T-34 kit is the ability to have both turrets and thus field them as either tank as needed. I intend to scratch build some hatches so I have the option of either a 75mm or 76mm but it would have been nice to be able to do this out of the box.  there is one other failing of this kit and it will be the biggest issue for some. The hull of this tank is an M4A2 while the 76mm turret is for a M4A3. If your not going to use the 76mm turret then this kit seems to have no real issues, if you are and want your model to be accurate then your not going to be happy. I myself am going to try to ignore the inaccuracy, Though it may annoy me to no end in the long run.

 I gave one tank a basic paint job so you could better see the details on these. While there is still a lot to do before they are done you can see here what you get with these. The last picture here is a comparison with a Battlefront Firefly which is the only type of Sherman I have to compare it with. The Battlefront Firefly's always seemed like they weren't quite wide enough to me, well it seems that compared to these they are about the same width but the BF tank is a bit longer which would make it seem like it needed to be wider. I am no expert on the Sherman tank but the PSC tanks look like they are better scaled to me than this particular BF Sherman.

BF Firefly on the Right is a bit longer

All in all I like these models, I like the ease of assembly and the extra little bits of extra detail on the BF tanks better, but I think the PSC tanks are closer to being scaled properly (though other BF Shermans may be better in this respect).  I would not recommend this particular kit for 76mm tanks however as the hull is wrong but if you need 75mm or 105mm tanks this is a great set. Both BF and PSC tanks have flaws, depending on which flaws you find easier to tolerate will help determine which ones are right for you. For me cost wins the day as neither kit is perfect and PSC comes out on top.

I finaly give in

Anyone who has known me and my gaming preferences may well be surprised by what I am about to post. I have stood by many times and stated that my minis need to be metal and maybe resin, when Battlefront started using plastic parts I was not a happy gamer. I believed (and I still do) that going to plastic at the same time as giving me a price increase is a slap in the face. Now don't get me wrong I have nothing against plastic used in the right way. I have been building plastic models for 20+ years but these are display models (as in "DO NOT TOUCH"). I couldn't get past the idea that plastic was for display as the fine parts are fragile or for toys (for a minute lets pretend our miniatures are not toys) which are extremely over scaled to make them able to withstand handling without damage.

When I first started playing Flames of war a tank was about $7.00 They have now almost doubled in price. I kept hearing how great the new models from Plastic toy soldier company are and decided it was time to give them a look. My local hobby shop is stocking the new 15mm lines from this company and I saw they had the new M4A2 Sherman boxes in, I am a WW2 gamer that has no Sherman tanks (I know, whats wrong with me) I figure I can use them as lend lease tanks with my soviets so I bought 2 boxes. So I finally gave in and am now on the plastic is good train (as long as its cheaper anyway). I will post a complete review of these models with all of my unsolicited opinions on them soon.