Recently, Corgi talked up the release of their 1:50 scale military vehicle series on Facebook, showing photos of the packaging as well as other pertinent material from their marketing department. One forum goer responded that the Tiger shown in the promotional material did not properly represent the vehicle in question. According to the sales literature, the tank being offered is an initial production Tiger I Ausf. H, one of 100 vehicles that comprised the first batch of tanks to reach the battlefield in late 1942.
We took a closer look at the image and, lo and behold, the critic was right. Not only does the tank shown sport steel road wheels, a feature commonplace among some of the late model Tigers and designed to prevent mud from building up between the wheels. But it didn’t end there. The initial production Tiger did not come with armored side skirts as shown on the Corgi tank. Furthermore, the initial production Tiger came with side-mounted storage boxes attached to the turret, which is clearly absent on the Corgi replica.
Corgi’s Tiger is slated to come out in December so they still have a few months to correct these issues by either building an initial production Tiger — not likely to happen this late in the game — or going with a late model vehicle that perhaps saw action towards the latter stages of the war. This would require different packaging, an altogether different camouflage scheme, and, of course, different markings and insignia. While its great to see Corgi make a return to the diecast battlefield, we hope they’re doing their due diligence by matching up historical records with the right vehicle being portrayed.