COBI Panzerkampfwagen II Ausf. F Set 2597

COBI's Panzerkampfwagen II Ausf. F is a 1:28 model built from 813 blocks, 17.5 cm long, with a turret that rotates through 360 degrees, an elevating 2 cm gun with coaxial machine gun, an opening hatch sized for a figure, working tracks and a removable brick engine. A tank crewman in a beret with a P08 pistol is included, plus a nameplate.

The training tank that went to war

The Panzer II was never meant to fight. Germany was rearming faster than its factories could build the Panzer III and IV it actually wanted, and the II was ordered as a stopgap — something to give crews and units to practise with while the real tanks were finished.

The real tanks were not finished in time. When Germany invaded Poland in 1939 the Panzer II was the most numerous tank in the army, and it was still the most numerous in France in 1940. The campaigns that established the reputation of German armour were fought largely with a light reconnaissance vehicle carrying a 2 cm cannon that could not penetrate most of what it met.

What it could do was move, and the doctrine the Germans had worked out mattered more than the armour did. By 1942 the type was obsolete beyond argument and was withdrawn to training, scouting and — as its chassis proved more useful than its turret — conversion into self-propelled guns.

In the COBI range

Set 2598 is the Wespe, a self-propelled howitzer built on this same chassis.

Specifications

Pieces: 813 · Figures: 1 · Scale: 1:28 · Removable engine
Model dimensions: 17.5 × 9 × 8.5 cm (6.9 × 3.5 × 3.3 in)