Review: Plastic Soldier Company Churchills

Hello All, Adam here,

It’s been ages it feels since I did a proper review of a product, but with plastic Churchills I thought now was a good time.

So where to start, well firstly the box is what I've come to expect from PSC artwork on the front and a simple painting scheme on the back, it’s to the point and easy.

The content of the box is 5 plastic sprues to build a Churchill tank and the instructions, now this is where the first bit of joy comes and 2 little bits of disappointment. 

 The joy is the sheer number of options available to build! You can do a Churchill Mk 3, 4, 75mm, Mk V 95mm CS and Mk3 AVRE. The two little bits of disappointment are that there is no option to make the beastly Mk7 with it’s FA 13! And secondly I think they could have rearranged the diagram of the marks a little so the Mk 3 AVRE was next to the normal Mk 3 so I wouldn't spend 5 minutes trying to decide what turret a AVRE should have!

The build instructions are also very easy, though I do wonder how they can make a Mk 4 turret from 2 pieces of plastic but the Mark 3 from 6 pieces – though this does lead onto one of the exciting parts – you have enough parts to make 2 separate turrets! With the exception of one square hatch you can make two interchangeable turrets for the tank. I fudged opening the turret with some butchered plastic from elsewhere, - but big thumbs up on the value for money front!

The Mk 4 turret is easy to fit together, it almost snaps into place. I’m of course special and glued the box on the back on wrong – so the instructions are not completely idiot proof it seems! The Hull is three parts and again fits together nicely with minimum of fuss, I would advise anyone building this tank though, that this is the stage to add the hull machine gun, as when I built this one I had to use tweezers to get it into place. On subsequent builds I went straight for the MG on at this point for ease.

The tracks are 4 pieces, the main body is 2 pieces and the very front on all 5 had a little bit of extra plastic flash. Ben told me how hard the Battlefront Churchills were to put together, these are a dream in comparis The covering for the end of the tracks is a little fiddle, but fits very well. The tracks slide nicely onto the main body with no fuss.

Here is the mark 3 turret next to the mark 4. As you can see I’ve added a closed circular hatch from an open fire Sherman, it’s a perfect match. As mentioned these are more of a fiddle to put together, but do line up well, - though I would say getting the petard mortar though the front late is a wee bit of an effort. The turrets don’t need magnets as the pop in pretty well.

The details on the model are what I’ve come to expect from PSC stuff in the past, it’s not super detailed but has enough for what I want in a WW2 gaming model, it’s also pretty robust having dropped it and it not broken. You get some extra bits of track to add onto the hull, though I would have preferred maybe some jerry cans or other stowage, thankfully I have some bits lying around I can add.

I painted it quite quickly, with just some PSC british armour spray, before picking out some details and dipping. Then decals (from Dom’s decals and some spare battlefront ones) and testors Dullcoat. I have to say that I really think PSC should consider adding decals as they add so much to the tanks.

Model Quality – 5/5 details are crisp, minimal flash, and with the option 5 variants they’re pretty damn good. A spare small square hatch is all I ask! Oh and I still don’t like their tank commanders!

Instruction Quality 4/5 – couple of place I think they could have improved slightly e.g when to attach the MG and maybe a rear shot of the turret in assembly but otherwise great. Also they do assemble very easily like the PSC stuarts, even with trimming etc 4 of them took me an hour of so to build.

Value for money – 5/5 again, first off compare the price vs Battlefronts BBX23 that’s 5 costing £19.50 vs 3 costing £22. that plus the options for 2 turrets is just great!

What is it missing – options for crocs and Mk 7’s – yes I know that’s a big ask, but that would have been so nice, maybe an upgrade box like for the Halftracks? Also Decals would be lovely!

Anyway I hope you enjoyed this review

Adam