Hasegawa’s Kettenkrad in 1/72
November 17, 2009
The Hasegawa Kettenkrad included in the “Schwimmwagen + Kettenkrad” 1/72 scale Minibox kit turns out pretty well, as you can see from the pictures above. You can also see three ESCI telegraph poles from their Diorama Accessories kit. Those telegraph poles are certainly better than the Fujimi ones! Much more detailed and realistic.
The Hasegawa Kettenkrad is only problematic when it comes to including the figures that are meant to be used with it. Two problems here: 1) You cannot get two blokes sitting on the back – realistically, they should be able to. I decided to go with just one passenger. Mine is packing an MG-34. 2) The fully assembled driver cannot be placed properly. I cut off much of his lower legs, trimmed & filed the stumps and his thighs and then he fitted on his seat and his posture looked mostly normal. Otherwise, it’s quick to assemble and looks pretty good.
You can read about what On the Way! has to say about Hasegawa here. In particular, Stephen Brezinski provides a comparison of Hasegawa’s Kettenkrad versus Academy’s Kettenkrad here.
Eastern Funker's 'Panzerfaust: Armoured Fist' blog 
Some more nice work mate. I have always thought Hasegawa’s scale is a bit off. What do you think with this kit?
That’s a hard question for me to answer – looking at the finished kit and then comparing it to photos of a real one…it probably should be a touch longer.
Stephen Brezinski says it’s OK – he’s probably more of an expert at scale than I – so I’ll accept his judgement.
I didn’t NEED the kattenkrad for my army…just wanted to clear out the hobby room a little to make way for 7 Panthers…Peter and I may have to engineer a scenario so I can game with it…