The development of this Russian heavy machine gun started in 1944 and by 1949 it had entered service as an infantry weapon. By the 60's it was withdrawn as it was too heavy to be useful. However, it was also mounted on tanks, BTR's, BRDM-2 and other armor vehicles, even boats. It has heavy fire power and a very long range of 2-3,000m and up to 2,000m vertically as an AA weapon. This version, KPVT (tankovyi) was modified from the infantry version by shortening the receiver, providing a heavier barrel jacket and using a 50-round belt instead of the original 40-round belt. To us Americans, if you convert the 14.5mm it turns out to be .57 caliber. More than half way between the .50 caliber M2 MG and the 20mm round. With the larger bullet and case it provided approximately twice the energy of the .50 caliber round, making it a very formidable weapon.

I asked to do this review as I was building a Meng's T-10M tank and I wanted to swap out the plastic MG barrel with this brass barrel. You get a lot of things in a very small package: three turned brass parts, two resin parts and a small PE sheet. You get one PKT barrel tip, that I would not be using so it went into the spare part box for now. One barrel with a finely turned flash suppressor and one barrel jacket with elongated cooling holes. I don't know how they make these elongated holes but it is truly a work of art in this scale and a wonder to behold. I wonder if Santa is missing any elves?

Okay, moving along to the fabrication. Slip the barrel jacket over the barrel from the rear forward and apply a very small amount of thin CA glue just behind the flash suppressor. Then cut out PE1, which is the handle and use small tweezers to make the bends as shown in the instruction sheet. Take the resin piece and sand the excess off the bottom till you have the two parts for the handle grips. Use some thin CA glue and attach the resin parts to the top and bottom of the brass handle.

Next cut out the two PE2 parts. Using the instruction sheet as a guide, bend and fold then to make the handle brackets. It will take some time, but go slowly and carefully and with some luck you may make them without dropping them. Finally, cut out one of the PE3 parts, which is the latch that holds the barrel jacket to the barrel. At least here they give you two parts and these are really tiny, but only need to make one. Use the instruction sheet as it gives you a side view and an overview of what shape this part needs to be bent into and where it attaches to the barrel jacket.

One thing I did before I glued the barrel to the barrel jacket is that I dipped both parts into some Blackening fluid as I don't believe any paint would really be able to cover the barrel or the insides of the barrel jacket. At least the blackening fluid made these parts dark When all the parts were assembled I spray painted the unit with some Testor's Model-Master gunmetal paint. Then painted by brush the handle grips a dark brown. All one then has to do is attach the barrel assembly to the model's maching gun receiver

I would highly recommend to any armor modeler this brass barrel set. No matter how fine the plastic injected 14.5mm barrel may be it can not match the look of that brass barrel jacket with the elongated cooling holes. It would be well worth the money, in fact I bought another Master-Model set to replace the kit's 14.5mm manlet machine gun. I want to thank Master-Model and IPMS/USA for the opportunity to try this fine product.