Calliope Sherman - Flames of War Review

My Flames of War addiction continues with the release of the new Battle of the Bulge army books. The Latest Book, Devil's Charge covers the initial German attack into the Ardennes that precipitated the largest battle the US undertook in WW2. While this isn't a review of Devil's Charge (Which is excellent) it is a review of one of the new models released to support the new Company lists in Devil's Charge.

One of the most exciting things about this period of WW2 is that the American forces start to use a wider range in interesting vehicles. One of the most interesting and iconic of those vehicles  is the Sherman Calliope. A Sherman tank fitted with a rack of 60 rocket tubes on the turret.

Interestingly enough the only reason I know how to pronounce Calliope at all is from the Manfred Mann song "Blinded by the Light"

The Model:  The Sherman Calliope comes in a box set of 2 tanks for 29.00 US (Can be found a little cheaper at some on-line venues) This is better than the recent Abrams box set in price but still not great. 

In the box for each tank you get a M4A3 hull, turret, plastic track frame, Calliope Launcher(metal and in 6 pieces) and two rare earth magnets.  The model really assembles in two parts, the tank itself and the metal Calliope launcher.

All the parts for a single Calliope

Hull detail

Shermans minus launchers

The Tank itself is pretty standard Battlefront fare. The detail on the hull is sharpe and crisp and I didn't have any resin filing to do.The Plastic tracks fit like a dream and only required a little trimming and sanding to remove some minor flashing. The Turret itself must be Calliope specific as it only has one hatch on the top as opposed to most other models of Sherman that sport two hatches.

The Calliope launcher itself is made of of six parts, three launch tube racks and three support braces. There is a lot of metal here and I can see why they would charge more than a standard tank.  It is a pain to assemble but no where near as annoying at the Russian Katyusha launchers.

Detail on launcher

Once assembled and placed on the turret it makes for an intimidating and tall model. With no metal tracks on this model it is significantly top heavy, as a result I am pinning the launcher to the turret to hopefully allow it to survive the occasional tip-over.

Tip of the Week: This kit also lends itself to double duty. If you are not fielding Calliopes in your list you can slap a turret from another M4 model (in my case I have over a dozen M4A1s) )on this baby and have yourself a platoon of vanilla almost M4A3 tanks(Yes, I know they are really M4s but they are close enough!).

Applying the Future wash

ready to repel the Germans!

Overall I am very pleased with these models, now I just need to build a list for them!  Let me know your experiences with the Calliope!