Roco Panzer III

The Roco Minitanks Panzer III is an old model, it is probably thirty five years old. With a little work, this model can be cleaned up and made into a decent kit.















The first thing to do is to clean up the model by removing all the flash. I disassemble the kit and remove the little wheels underneath. This allows the vehicle to sit flat on the tabletop and it looks better than having the tracks float along above the floor. Get a bead about three millimeters wide, and cut it in half. You can get all kinds of beads at craft stores. You just want a plain sphere with a hole in the middle where the string will go through if you were making a necklace. Once the bead is cut in half, you glue it where the hull machine gun is located. Then take a Roco machine gun, or even a bit of wire, and glue it into the hole. This greatly improves the front of the tank.

















Rummage through the spares box and get out a variety of bits, boxes, and any small spare tracks you have. I use the tracks from 1/76th scale German vehicles. It is easy to pick up damaged ones from flea markets or from friends that use that scale. Cut those tracks up and place them on the front hull. I drill a hole in the track and in the model and then use a pin of plastic rod to hold the spare tracks in place.

















On many of my Panzer IIIs, I have taken the horseshoe turret armor from the old Roco Panzer IV and glue them almost without change on the Panzer III turret. I then cut the ends off the Panzer IV side skirts and glue them on the Panzer III hull. I cut them just outside the tiny clip that holds the skirts to the tank hull. The new Roco Panzer IVH has outdated the old Roco Panzer IV and so those are now surplus. That has allowed me to steal their skirts. The old hulls can be given away to kids to encourage them to play with models.

These few modifications make a rather plain, and outdated model into a very nice model that can soldier on for another 35 years in my armies.