Well, I had always believed that metal gun barrels, by and large, represented the "lazy modeler's approach to armour building."  You know - why fill a seam when you can spend a few bucks to avoid it entirely?  Besides, they look pretty cool before the model is painted.  But then I come across a few products that buck this trend.  One is the Eduard T-72 barrel, with its intricate photoetched representations of details on the 125mm gun's thermal sleeve.  And then there is this.

For most armour modelers, the Polish company ABER is synonymous with complicated.  Their massive photoetched sets sometimes defy the imagination with the sheer number of parts, and things like their working tool clasps for German AFVs are legendary (both for their appearance and the unbelievable difficulty to assemble them so that you actually can remove the tools from your 1/35 scale tanks!).  So I suppose that I should not be surprised that ABER took something relatively simple, like the Panther's 75mm KwK 42 main gun barrel, and gave it the "ABER treatment."  Whereas other companies, such as Eduard and Jordio Rubio, make this barrel out of one or two pieces of metal (barrel and cast muzzle brake), ABER gives you no less than 11 pieces, in three different media, to make the most accurate and complex Panther gun you could imagine.

Why is it so complicated?  Almost every kit and aftermarket barrel (of any gun) on the market cuts corners on its representation of the internal structure of the gun's muzzle brake.  If you ever get a chance to look at a real one close up, you will notice that it is actually quite a sophisticated piece of engineering, designed to channel the powerful backblast of the gun so as to minimize recoil and dust being kicked up when the gun fires.  From a modeling perspective, these details are not easy to reproduce.  In plastic, you will inevitably get a seam running down the centre of the inside of the muzzle brake, a seam which is virtually impossible to remove, while turned metal barrels simply cannot reproduce these internal contours.

Hence, ABER took the multimedia approach.  Using photoetched and machined brass, they have faithfully reproduced the internal workings of the 75mm KwK 42's muzzle brake.  I have to admit that I was somewhat skeptical of their approach until I test-fitted the brass components of the muzzle brake.  It fits very precisely, has no unsightly seams, and looks great.  The photoetched is only going ot make it look better.

The kit instructions recommend soldering the pieces together.  I have never soldered before, but attaching photoetched brass to machined brass seems to dictate that it's time for me to learn.  The machined and turned aluminum parts fit together so tightly that glue might not be necessary, but the photoetched is another matter entirely.

I have not measured a Panther barrel, so I cannot comment on accuracy with regards to length.  From an appearance standpoint, however, I give ABER top marks.  This barrel and muzzle brake look amazingly like the one on the Panther Ausf. A at CFB Borden (see the photo below).  About the only thing missed was the rifling in the barrel itself, but that it only visible because of the camera flash.  It would be an extraordinarily detail-minded judge who would look for rifling in a Panther barrel at a model contest!

If you want the ultimate Panther, then you should get this barrel.  It's so ... ABER - very complicated, but very accurate.  As such, it is not for every modeler (this barrel is NOT a shortcut for those looking to build a model quicker!).  It certainly is one impressive piece of engineering, though.  I have no doubt that, once I am finished it, this muzzle brake will look closer to the original than any other on the market.  Recommended to all Panther lovers who are not afraid of working with metal and dare judges to look down their gun.  I'm looking forward to putting it on my DML Panther Ausf. D (which is starting to look like an aftermarket junkpile - 3 PART photoetched sets, WWII Productions tracks, and now this!  How long before I end up with a Tiger Model Productions cupola?).

Here are the contents of the ABER Panther gun barrel set.  One nice piece of turned aluminum (with subtle machining grooves which very much remind me of the texture on the barrel of the Panther Ausf. A at CFB Borden), four pieces of machined brass (with a bit of work, they fit together very well indeed), and a small photoetched fret with a total of six pieces.  At the bottom (not to scale) is the barrel built up (sans photoetched); the apparent ridges running along the sides of the barrel are reflections from the scanner and not any imperfections in the metal.