German Tank IB (Pz. Kpfw. I Ausf. B)

ESCI tooled the three kits derived of the Pz. Kpfw. I Ausf. B the same year, in 1976. By code number this is the first release and the base for both ESCI – 8370 – 8041 – Sd. Kfz. 265 Command version (Kl. Pz. Bef. Wg. I b) and ESCI – 8370 – 8041 – Sd. Kfz. 265 Command version (Kl. Pz. Bef. Wg. I b).

Any of the ESCI Pz. Kpfw. I Ausf. B kits has a good consideration between hobbyists, looks like ESCI made some mistake of measurements or decisions between A o B variant and this ended up with a too short engine deck and wrong shaped upper hull parts that all the kits share despite they use different upper hull parts, since they all had to “fix” the too short engine deck. Also the sprocket wheel is not correct in all the series.

The initial ESCI releases had the common single piece tracks without inner detail and hard to manage and glue. The later ESCI-Ertl releases introduced link-and-length tracks which are quite thick.

The history of the kit is quite common in the ESCI line, Hasegawa, Revell-ESCI, Polistil and Aurora released all the three kits in the 70s. Lastly Italeri reissued this kit as Italeri – 7042 – Pz. I Ausf. B keeping the link-and-length tracks.

From ESCI to ESCI-Ertl, the kit included a decal sheet with four markings.

Nowadays S-Model or First to Fight releases can built a nicer Panzer IB model.