1/72th scale plastic scale model kit by Revell

Historical background Sd.Kfz. 9 or Sonderkraftfahrzeug 9 (exceptional self propelled vehicle) was a heavy tractor, the heavies used by German forces at the beginning of WWII. It was the only unit capable of towing a broken down tank up to the appearance of the Panther and Tiger tanks. After the introduction of the "Bergepanzer" wrecker vehicle in 1944, the Sd.Kfz. 9 lost its primary use, and was later mostly utilized as a transport. The vehicle was built by the FaMo (Fahrzeug und Motoren Werke) Factory in Breslau. It was produced in about 2500 units from 1938 till 1944.
The kit The kit comes in the typical Revell floppy box, with five sprues, a small decal sheet and a strip of clear foil for the wind screen. The quality is very good. Clean cast parts, no flash, and good design of the components allow for a quick and simple build.
Assembly The parts went together with absolutely no putty, and minimal sanding. The wheels have to be painted before assembly. To make my life easier, I prepared a metal washer with my hand grinder to have an opening fitting the wheel rims for quick masking. The concept of the tracks is good. The slack span can be represented without having to apply every link separately. I finalized the three separate subcomponents: the passenger component, the chassis and the cargo area, before the final assembly.
Painting Painting was done straight, no priming. The paint used was a mix of Gunze and Tamiya acrylics, to get more or less the desired tone. The coating was sealed with Future clear coat, then weathered with thinned artist oils. Then Futurized again, then dry brushed with a lighter gray. A light post-shading was applied with Tamiya smoke. Finally, a coat of Xtracolor flat was used, with a few drips of MIG mug pigments applied in the still wet lacquer.
Finishing The Model was beefed up by a crew of Preiser figures. These are nicely detailed, and just the driver needed a light arm operation to hold the steering wheel. The painting went through basically the same process as the vehicle. As payload, two sets of bombs were added: two rocket propelled PC500RS and two SC250. These came from the Italeri resin offering, which are far from being worth the 20Euro I've spent for them. The bombs have poor details, and the stabilizers are really thick. Much better would be to realize them from photo etched components.
Summary Since I'm generally interested in airplanes, this vehicle just came across, as a little diversion between other projects. It took at most four weeks to build, and was a lot of fun. The Sd.Kfz.9 was mostly used by the army units for towing heavy equipment. But it also fits well a Luft'46 environment, and will round off a small diorama for the BV P194.