Italeri 1/35 Sd.Kfz.10 Demag D7 Kit First Look

By Michael Benolkin

First Look

The Sd.Kfz.10 was developed in the 1930s as a towing vehicle for light and medium artillery pieces. Its excellent on and off-road mobility allowed field artillery batteries to locate to virtually any position on the battlefield. Its robust design allowed it to serve in all theaters of operations from the North African deserts in the summer to the Russian steppes in the winter.

This vehicle became a popular chassis for mobile anti-aircraft artillery guns, in particular the 20mm (2cm) Flak 30 or Flak 38 cannons. The version of the Sd.Kfz.10 equipped with the Flak 30 was designated Sd.Kfz.10/4, while the Flak 38 version was designated Sd.Kfz.10/5. A total of around 1000 anti-aircraft examples were in the field by 1940.

This chassis was also modified for a variety of uses including an anti-tank gun platform armed with the 50mm (5cm) Pak 38.

Italeri has certainly made good use of the Sd.Kfz.10 molds. In this re-issue, we have a vanilla gun tractor/utility vehicle complete with a soft top. If you're looking for the Pak 38 or Flak versions, be patient, they'll be along.

This release is molded in desert yellow styrene and presented on three parts trees, plus a small tree with the clear windshield transparencies.

The interior of this Sd.Kfz.10 is nicely detailed and only needs some good shading and weathering to bring out the details. You can load the rear compartment up with supplies and really show off the details.

There is no engine under the hood, so you'll need to plan your build with the vehicle in service or do a little scrounging and scratch building to open up the hood.

One of the nice features of the kit is the track links and link sections. These link sections span the flat areas and use the individual links to connect up around the drive sprockets and return rollers.

The convertible top can be depicted up or stowed.

Markings are included for:

• 90th Panzer Grenadiers, Italy, 1943
• Elite Unit, France, May 1940
• Unknown Fallschirmjager, Rome, 1944
• 1st Gebirgsjager Division, Russia, Winter 1941/42

Since the vehicle was used throughout the war, it came into service with Panzer Gray, but was repainted according to the theater and time period giving this kit a great deal of camouflage options.

This is still a nice kit and it is great to see it reissued in its vanilla artillery tractor version. If you've been collecting the Tamiya FAMO and the variety of DML halftracks, this will fill another gap in the Wehrmacht halftrack family.

My sincere thanks to Testors for this review sample!