Sd.Kfz. 251/21 Drilling

Preview by Rob Haelterman

I previously previewed and reviewed CMK's effort of this conversion and readers might have noticed that I was not entirely convinced, so I decided to try Kora's release. I have come to regret it.

This set contains a number of resin parts, two sirynge needles (that are viciously sharp) and a fret of PE.

Pictures of the parts taken, just as a pair of UFO's were flying over.

The resin parts

The resin parts are roughly molded with marred detail, an air bubble here and there and some warping. Even worse is the fact that the resin parts are extremely brittle and attached to rather prominent casting blocks at the same time. The central gun cradle, for instance, was reduced to nanoparticles while trying to remove it from the block. Not that it matters a lot as I believe it doesn't capture the real thing anyway. While I tried to scratchbuild this part, my efforts were stopped dead in their tracks when it became apparent that frustration was getting the better of me.

The metal parts

The needles are actually quite convincing (and far better than the CMK resin tubes) and come with a slanted muzzle, which is accurate for the outer guns. As there are only two needles, I guess that the center barrel needs to be cut from one of these syringes. They are long enough and the center barrel doesn't have a slanted muzzle, so this might work, but the instructions don't mention any of this.

The PE parts seem ok, but are rather tick.

The instructions

The instructions are minimalistic and rather confusing.

Accuracy

• The gun shield captures the look of the production version far better than CMK's shield as it has the tapered sides and the angled corners. I am not sure about the cut-out on the top, though, as I believe this should be a hole for the production vehicles. The arched support bar over the guns is provided (which CMK doesn't).
• A seat for the gunner is given (again something that CMK missed). Note that the gunner's seat was hinged so that it always hung down vertically when the gun was raised or lowered.
• Kora doesn't mention any alterations that need to be made to the interior. The vehicle had a crew of four. Panzer Tracts [1] shows three foldable seats in the fighting compartment and the rear benches of the Sd.Kfz.251/1 replaced with ammunition bins. As I assume that the driver's and co-driver's seat were still installed, this makes seating for five.
  Discussion on the Axis Discussion Group of Missing Lynx suggests that early versions might have kept the right bench seat and one jump seat on the right in front of the gun mount and possibly one more on the left, making seating for six.
• The middle of the three ammo boxes, attached to the pedestal, should be far bigger than the two on the sides. Kora gives three identical boxes. (CMK did so as well, but their three boxes were all bigger.)
• The extra armor for the top of the hull matches the original design better than CMK's.
• It seems the real vehicle had a travel lock for the guns. None is provided.
• I have no idea what part 20 represents, which (of course) doesn't mean it is not correct.

Conclusion

As it is, this could be a worthless set, but... given that

• the CMK Sd.Kfz.251/21 conversion isn't entirely correct either;
• CMK does offer a very nice stand-alone Drilling, which is far superior to that in the Sd.Kfz.251/21 conversion;
• the Kora PE parts look quite OK,

it seems that buying the CMK "stand-alone Drilling" together with this Kora set will get you the parts that go a very long way towards obtaining all that is needed for an accurate Sd.Kfz.251/21.