Group Build “Made in the USSR”
How do normal people participate in Group Build?
They see an ad for a new company and say to themselves: “Hmm, I have a couple of suitable models and I can participate in this.”
What will I do when I want to take part in a new company. Like everyone else, I look at my reserves, 3/4 or even 4/5 of which fit the company’s conditions.
The photo shows a little more than half of all my boxes.
And then I say to myself: “I didn’t buy all this to glue it together in some company! I bought it to glue it together for myself!”
And I start to think about which model I should take part with. I take into account that I really don’t like gluing together identical models. Taking this into account and the fact that I recently assembled one KV-1 tank,
a decision is made to buy another KV-1 tank, just from a different year of manufacture.
But this doesn’t seem to be enough. Simply gluing a tank together is not interesting. And even using the well-known aftermarket is also not interesting. This is all commonplace, it has already happened a hundred times, etc. Therefore, a decision is made to assemble a KV-1 tank from an installation (experimental) batch under the designation U-7. It is better known under the name “KV tank No. U-7” or “KV-1 with aircraft-type fenders”. The letter “U” comes from the word “Установочный” (“Installation”).
In addition to the fenders themselves, it has a bunch of differences from the production model.
- Different road wheels.
- Different support rollers.
- Armored shields over the air intake openings.
- The headlight is not the same and not there.
- Cable thimbles.
- A different overlay on the front armor plate junction.
In principle, there are so many differences that you could apply to the company “The Tank That Never Was”.
A bit of history of the prototype:
The tank of the installation series with the factory number U-7, manufactured in April 1940, was left at the Kirov Plant for experimental work. In the summer of the same year, tests were carried out on it for warranty mileage. And in September – October 1940, a lowered large turret for the KV-2 tank was tested on it.
Then this tower was removed and a small tower was installed, but it is not clear which one.
At the end of October 1941, the tank was transferred to the front. On December 25, 1941, during a counterattack on a village in the Leningrad region, this tank was irretrievably lost.
Luckily for me, we have all the necessary aftermarket items for sale, and from one manufacturer with the strange name «Khmuryy modelist» (“Gloomy Modelist”). I bought everything from him.
There would be no need to buy exhaust pipes and thimbles. The ones from the kit could have been useful there.
Likewise, these were purchased with other purchases due to reduced postage costs.
I know what kind of tracks Trumpeter’s KV models have and I don’t like them. I didn’t buy any tracks, I have a normal supply.
But when should I collect all this? There are 3 months until summer, and I already have 6 trips scheduled for that time, each one a week long!