The Nuts & Bolts series of books offer a detailed look at specific vehicles, and are strongly geared towards the modeller researching a build. This particular volume takes a look at the Sd.Kfz. 164 “Nashorn” 8.8cm SPG. This book is printed in both English and German with pages divided down the centre and one language on each side, or in the case of photo captions being in English first followed by the German translation.
The first twenty six pages deal with a brief history and development of the Nashorn. This is quite an in-depth history and includes the development and history, a look at camouflage schemes and markings, unit organisation, a brief listing of available scale model kits, a list of known surviving vehicles, and technical data. This section is completed with a photo index and a list of aknowlegements.
From there we move on to the photo sections with nineteen pages of black and white period photos, with three to four very good photos per page. These photos are all very clear and are all photos I’ve never seen anywhere alse. We then get four pages of 1/35 scale diagramatic line drawings, and three pages of 1/35 scale colour profiles of the Nashorn.
This is followed by thirty nine pages of reference photos of the two existing unrestored vehicles in Aberdeen and the Kubinka collection. These include a lot of good detail photos of all the smaller parts and fittings and despite the editors apologies for the difficulties in getting good photos due to the condition and storage of the photographed vehicles these are very, very good photos to have at hand when building a Nashorn. In total there are over 150 very nice, clear photos of every part of the vehicle.
There is then four pages devoted to a partially scratchbuilt model by Brian Wells using the old Dragon Nashorn kit as the base. This is an incredible masterpiece of modelling with a huge ammount of detail that serves as a very useful reference to building a 1/35 nashorn in itself.
The book concludes with eleven pages devoted to the towed PaK 43/41 which was the gun used in the Nashorn ( though obviously not in the towed state ). These are all reference photos of the preserved gun at Aberdeen and include a lot of very useful closeups of all aspects of the gun, plus a single page diagramatic drawing of the PaK 43/41.
From a modelling perspective this book is an invaluable reference tool that should be on the workbench of anyone building a Nashorn, especially if you want to detail it as accurately as you can.
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Author : Tony Greenland and Detlev Terlisten Publisher : Nuts & Bolts Pages : 108 containing B&W photos, line drawings and colour drawings Binding : Softcover Size : 211mm x 297mm.
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