Fresh out of the box

[Mackem]

Firstly, congratulations. You have bought one of HL's best offerings to date. The Pz III is a great little runner, pretty well put together, and there are lots of after market mods available.

Out of the box you will need to do two little jobs to correct the most glaring discrepencies:-

1: The tracks will be on the wrong way round. Remove the drive sprockets and swap the tracks round, or pop one of the pins that hold the tracks together and swap them round. ( Detailed info on how to do this can be found in the FAQ section. )

2: The TC's cupola is nearly always out of alignment. If you are lucky it wont be glued in place and you can simply twist it so that the vision port that is in line with the centre of the hatches faces directly forwards.

That's the most basic fixes for the PzIII.

Cheers
John

[philipat]

Got any pictures of how the tracks should look?

Any pictures of what you did to fix the TC cupola? My vision ports don't seem to line up with the centerline of the hatch. Turning it just removes the entire cupola from the turret.

[Dietrich]

A bit late of me on the track direction.....but here goes....
The tracks can be fitted either way around....the choice was down to the crew. I seem to recall reading that ' Technically' the first two pictures are the 'correct' way around going by the book ....BUT....the other way around shown in photos 3 and 4 seems to provide better grip although it is meant to lead to a slightly higher track wear rate.

PzIII-07 upgraded ausf.F.jpg (60.48 KiB) Viewed 1932 times

PzIII-08. upgraded ausf.Fjpg.jpg (43.85 KiB) Viewed 1932 times

.
The track has a triangular section to each link....the technical book says triangle pointy end facing forward....Better Grip says flat bottom of the triangle facing forward...
.

PzIII-04.jpg (64.05 KiB) Viewed 1932 times

PzIII-05.jpg (63.02 KiB) Viewed 1932 times

[jarndice]

Thank you for that Alb, up to now I had always gone by the few close up photographs I had seen and fitted my Panzer4 with the tracks pointy end first, it is so good to know that there is an alternative, most unlike the German Army to be flexible! shaun