When Did They Release This?

[stu22]

Trolling eBay I found an auction for a 1/16 M-51 Sherman, and then found the part number on tamiyausa.com. How new is this?

http://www.tamiyausa.com/product/item.php?product-id=56032

[Mouton]

It is very new. It was released during the Tokyo Hobby Show that was held mid October.

[tamiya monkey]

Im not normally a tank person, but that is a handsome looking piece of kit.

[BRELs]

A very poor rehash of the tamiya 1/16th 105mm sherman, too look better it needs the VVSS running gear to make it look right

[stu22]

A very poor rehash of the tamiya 1/16th 105mm sherman, too look better it needs the VVSS running gear to make it look right

You are correct in that this looks like they just put a new turret on the old 105 Sherman body and running gear.

If you really want to get into the details, the hull is completely wrong for an M-51, and the thing actually looks like an M-50 with an M-51 turret on it. The actual M-51 used the cast M4A1 hull which has round edges. The old 105mm Sherman kit is based on the welded M4A3 hull, which happens to be the same one used for the M-50.

The suspension however is correct. Both the M-50 and M-51 both had the HVSS suspension.