Purchasing, thoughts, opinions & recommendations

[Nuc]

Evening all,

So its that time again when someone new asks that question around what tank to buy. ive been thinking about this for some time, ideally i would have liked a Tamiya Sherman kit due to my familiarity with their existing product. obviously that isn't going to happen now. Also im more pro allied armour than German.

So, my choices currently are
Forgerbear Taigen M4a3 - i do like this though i plan to paint it as a British firefly so im not keen on the hull machine gun. my painting skills also arent the best even after all these years of painting shells.

https://www.forgebeartanks.com/store/p1 ... inted.html

or this other Taigen pre painted Sherman, not overly keen on the paint but there seems to be limited options.

https://www.nitrotek.co.uk/rc-tank/1-16 ... parts.html

Any thoughts, opinions or recommendations from the seasoned pros would be greatly appreciated.
Cheers Nuc

p.s if anyone knows where i can find a decent Cromwell that would be even better!

[Kaczor]

Taigen Sherman is good choice for beginner. They are good runners, only problem is lack of track tensioner (which can be fixed using aftermarket parts).

Tamiya Sherman is great but discontiniued for over a decade. Only second hand are available on ebay (and also twice as expensive as Taigen

Chinese Hooben makes Cromwell but reputation of their products is not great. Can be found on Amazon.

PS. You can't paint M4A3(76) as Firefly - those are completly different machines. The best source of Sherman knowlege is Minutia Page:
http://the.shadock.free.fr/sherman_minutia/index.html

[RobW]

Work on the theory you're going to many (many) more than one. Of the basic models for Allied, you're looking at Sherman or T34, KV 1 & JS 2. Post war there are a couple more before you get to the modern stuff. Loads of German armour.
Hooben is something I'd avoid until you've had a play with other stuff. I've got their Sherman, and whilst it'll make a good basis for a cast hull IDF '76 it's going to be a mix of Hooben, Mato, Taigen and possibly some HL bits.

There's then whether to try and get as much metal as possible, or keep it cheap. The latter may be a good starting point if you want to add detail etc and tinker.

Forgebear is a vendor that's recommended, and I've bought stuff from. Haya is another good supplier, but can be a little more expensive https://www.hayaltd.co.uk/ . I'll say nothing about Nitrotek.

Not really answered any questions, but given you more to think about.

[Herr Dr. Professor]

I give my unreserved thumbs up to Forgebear, Taigen M4A3 that you are considering: https://www.forgebeartanks.com/store/p1 ... inted.html. I have had fine experience with Taigen tanks (also known as Torro when sold by Torro in Germany (FYI https://www.torro-shop.de/-Startseite). The version you are considering lets you do some assembly, thereby gaining useful experience with RC Tank innards. You can paint it as a Sherman, an easy paint job if you do it in all Olive Drab. And you can practice weathering. For starters, that choice would be hard to beat. Then, too, after you develop more and more skills, you will still have a decent Sherman tank.

For later, there are a number of rebuilds here on RCTW (just search under "Firefly), but that gets much more complicated.

[tomhugill]

Evening all,

So its that time again when someone new asks that question around what tank to buy. ive been thinking about this for some time, ideally i would have liked a Tamiya Sherman kit due to my familiarity with their existing product. obviously that isn't going to happen now. Also im more pro allied armour than German.

So, my choices currently are
Forgerbear Taigen M4a3 - i do like this though i plan to paint it as a British firefly so im not keen on the hull machine gun. my painting skills also arent the best even after all these years of painting shells.

https://www.forgebeartanks.com/store/p1 ... inted.html

or this other Taigen pre painted Sherman, not overly keen on the paint but there seems to be limited options.

https://www.nitrotek.co.uk/rc-tank/1-16 ... parts.html

Any thoughts, opinions or recommendations from the seasoned pros would be greatly appreciated.
Cheers Nuc

p.s if anyone knows where i can find a decent Cromwell that would be even better!

Hey Nuc, warprints do a stonking cromwell kit, if you don't mind some assembly

[jarndice]

Nuc,
Forgebear absolutely YES,
Nitrotek a Resounding NO,
They cannot be relied upon to deliver a quality product and the faff getting anything sorted out will take you to your pension.

[Herr Dr. Professor]

50Koruny here on RCTW (and other forums) has built a Cromwell: viewtopic.php?t=31651&hilit=50Koruny

[Herr Dr. Professor]

Nonetheless, I advise learning from the Taigen M4A3 first, as Mr. Koruny's skills are advanced, so he makes it all seem easy as he does it brilliantly.