I thought I'd get the Panther properly kitted out, before giving it a trial run. The first thing was to press all the tools, and ancillary parts, into place. They're something of a tight (press) fit, with a coating of paint in the way, bit of relieving's needed here and there. The good thing is, it's not really necessary to use any cement with these fittings. Once they're in place, they're never likely to fall off..thumbup:
I didn't want to ruin the tank's surprisingly pleasing paint finish with HL decals, and opted to use Tamiya Panther water-slide decals. Down the road a bit, I'll probably use some light Tamiya weathering to give it more of a lived-in look. At the same time, the Commander will need fleshing out a tad.
I forgot to mention, that when the package first arrived, I noticed that a puzzling ticking sound was coming from it. If I were paranoid, I'd assumed that someone had inserted a Mission Impossible set of auto-destruct instructions in with the tank. In the event, it emerged that the transmitter was on, and had gone into intermittent red flash mode. So, I chose to accept the mission anyway.
Here's the smoker starting up:
and a clearer image:
It wouldn't work at first, and I realised I must have overtopped 't
he hole of filling' (you gotta love these Chinglish expressions). All you need to do, if you've oversoaked the smoke unit- with the Panther, anyway- is to turn it upside down, and drain the excess off.
Now, it works a treat. I'm also very impressed with the MFU; it did exactly what it should do.
In fact, everything works incredibly well, I'm delighted to say.
Who would have thought it a few years ago.
The four engine sounds are easy to select, and the proportional (engine speed) effect is especially good. The BB cannon really has quite a bit of venom in it, and the turret moves very smoothly (almost a full 360, no less).
I
really didn't want yet another tank, but, I am glad I bought this one. Even with hefty metal tracks it handled large chipping, my wooden ramp, wet grass on a steepish slope (the one I broke my ankle on), and can spin on carpet, grass, bird droppings (it happened
)and laminate flooring. In other words, although I'm too old for a full 'Wow!', this Heng Long product actually brought a smile to my face, replacing its default grimace
It really doesn't need any further expenditure. But.......
if I were to embellish it in any way, it might be with a set of these Wecohe Panther tools- from Dom at rctank.de:
Wecohe tank tools...round about 32 Euros.
"Get your facts first, and then you can distort them as much as you please"- Mark Twain.