Product Features and Details
Artitec 1870023 Highlights:
Model: Artitec's 1870023 1/87 scale Sd.Kfz. 7 is a resin kit and unpainted.
Prototype: The Sd.Kfz. 7 was a half-track prime mover that entered Wehrmacht service in 1938. It was intended as the off-road towing vehicle for the 88 mm Flak 18 gun and the 15 cm sFH 18 150 mm howitzer. It had seating for the gun crew (eleven plus the driver) and stowage for ammunition. It was designed by the Bavarian Krauss-Maffei firm and over 12,100 were manufactured during the war. Sd.Kfz. 7s were primarily assigned to Panzer divisions for towing artillery or transporting Panzergrenadier infantry. While better than trucks for towing artillery in rough terrain, the complex overlapping wheel arrangements of German half-tracks took considerably more construction time and required more maintenance than heavy trucks; thus the Wehrmacht never had enough towing vehicles and much of the artillery accompanying infantry units was horse-drawn, in stark contrast to the mechanized Blitzkrieg perception portrayed in propaganda newsreels. Later in the war, Sd.Kfz. 7s were converted to carry a quad 2 cm Flakvierling 38 L/65 or a single 3.7 cm FlaK 36 antiaircraft gun. In 1944-1945, some Sd.Kfz. 7s were converted into launch command vehicles for mobile V-2 rocket units.
