1/32 Revell Lee Tank M3

sunray · May 14, 2017

A last year I did Airfix's 1/32 Crusader Mk.III tank.

http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/234998810-132-airfix-crusader-mkiii/

Loved the build so I thought I would see if I could get hold of an Airfix 1/32 Grant but I couldn't find one but I did manage to get hold of Revell 1/32 Lee so here is how I am getting on.

As you can see from the last photo this isn't a young kit but for a 42 year old kit it hides its years rather well. Though the figures are not the best nor are the decals and the vinyl tracks are a bit long but the rest of the kit passes muster. The plastic quality isn't bad, the ejector pins are not in any places to give too much trouble and the detail looks right to me. My first job was to make the six bogie's. The parts needed a bit of tiding up but not too much. To get read of the seam lines on the wheels. This was done using my Dremel, a cocktail stick and piece of wet and dry stuck on a flat piece of wood.

The cocktail stick are cheap but I found the chuck of my drill wasn't too keen on them as every now and then one tried to escape. So looking around my bench I spied a mandrel from my Dremel which has a thin screw which easily fitted the wheel.

This worked perfectly and made the job of sanding the road wheels a faster. I had a piece of wire grill which I got from my spares box and I decided to replace the grill between the filler caps.

So using small drill bits I got to work.

Using a file and skinny sticks I smoothed down the sides. I cut the grill to size and I used plastic rod to make the inner frame for the grill to sit on.

I had a look at the vision slots and I decided to drill them out and used scrap plastic as backing. I did this to give them a bit of depth and used the backing as I wanted the hull light tight.

I did this for the turret as well. Regarding the turret I drill out the main gun barrel and the coaxial machine gun adding cooling vent holes to the as well.

As you can see from the previous photo, the side door has a grab handle above it. As a rule I always replace plastic handles with metal ones if I can just because I don't want them to snap off later on and I think the look better. So using a bit of copper wire roughly the same thickness as the kit part I cut it to a usable size.

I used a metal ruler to straighten the wire by rolling it under the ruler.

Now using a flat pair of pliers I put the first bend in.

At this point I was going to use a nice piece of kit made by RP Tools for making handles.

But just my luck, the size of handle I wanted was where the pin is, so on to plan "B" and I made them the old way.

So I first fitted the wire into one of the handle holes.

Then I roughly placed the flat pliers where I wanted the second bend to be. Keeping the pliers in place I removed the wire from the hull and then I put the second bend in. If I wasn't happy with the bend, as I am using copper I just straightened the wire with the steel ruler and tried again. Anyway when I was happy I trimmed the wire ends to make it easier to fit.

I then fixed them in place with CA glue.

For the upper machine gun I used a syringe needles which was the same diameter as the kit part and I cut to size using my Dremel and a cutting disc. Then I glued in place with CA glue.

I filled the tool locating holes on the rear deck as I was going to add my own tow cable made from twist thin copper wire. The reason for filling all of the holes as it allows to slightly move the location of each tool if I have to.

I used plastic rod glued in the holes and I sanded when the glue has cured. Here is the kit tow cable.

And here is the homemade one.

These are easy and cheap to make. All you need in a hand drill.

A vice and a screw. You put the screw in the vice with the head of the screw and about an inch of the screw shaft sticking out of the top of the vice and tighten the vice. For this cable I used two pieces of thin wire bent in half. The loose ends of the wire are placed in the drill chuck and tightened. The two loops at the other end are placed over the head of the screw in the vice. Now pull back slightly on the drill to straighten the wire and just turn the handle of the drill and watch it braid the wire. Stop when you are happy and cut to size. For the loop I bent the end of the wire then I used a small strip of soft aluminium then I used a drop of CA glue to keep it in place. I use aluminium sheet but you could use the aluminium off the top of wine bottles.

Next I tidied up the shovel by removing the mounting strips, etc and the plastic that filled in the gap in the handle.

Then I started to add the tools, cable, tarps, etc.

The tarpaulins where made by just rolling a piece of soft aluminium and the shovel and cable strips where made from the same using CA glue to attach.

Even with all the homemade additions for me this is a fast build. There has been a bit of filling but not as much as I first though.

For me the kit antenna was a touch too thick and I knew would snap off in the future so I again used thin copper wire rolled and straightened as before.

So I just cut off the kit antenna from its mount and I drilled a hole in the mount to take the wire. I then attached the antenna mount to the tank hull.

I am not going to attach the antenna to the mount until I have finished painting the M3.

AgentG · May 14, 2017

You are making this old girl sing!

G

Trenne · May 14, 2017

Nice work. Looking forward too seeing some paint on her.

Bullbasket · May 14, 2017

Modelling the old fashioned way. It's just a shame that Revell left the backs of the road wheels and idlers hollow. Nice work so far. Looking at the Crusader, this should turn out well. British or US?

John.

sunray · May 14, 2017

Thanks guys.

2 hours ago, Bullbasket said:

Modelling the old fashioned way. It's just a shame that Revell left the backs of the road wheels and idlers hollow. Nice work so far. Looking at the Crusader, this should turn out well. British or US?

John.

Thanks John,I have just sprayed with primer and I have just got a few gaps to sort out that I missed. I will be doing an American livery mainly because the decal set has a bit of damage due to its age and the best decals are the US ones out of the set.

Bullbasket · May 14, 2017

2 hours ago, sunray said:

I will be doing an American livery mainly because the decal set has a bit of damage due to its age and the best decals are the US ones out of the set.

You could try spraying a thin coat of gloss varnish over the decal sheet. That would help to hold them together.

John.

clive_t · May 14, 2017

Excellent modelling

clive_t · May 15, 2017

I am intrigued by the fact that you actually removed the moulded grille at the back before fitting your own, maybe I should have done the same on my Grant before fitting the PE grille...

sunray · May 15, 2017

On 2017-5-14 at 2:27 PM, Bullbasket said:

You could try spraying a thin coat of gloss varnish over the decal sheet. That would help to hold them together.

John.

Thanks for the advice John. What I am thinking of doing is incorporating the damaged decals in the weathering if you know what I mean.

5 hours ago, clive_t said:

I am intrigued by the fact that you actually removed the moulded grille at the back before fitting your own, maybe I should have done the same on my Grant before fitting the PE grille...

Thanks Clive. As you have seen its not hard to do and its cheap. The hardiest bit is getting the right size of grill but luckily I had a piece of grill from a T62 Tamiya kit. I find a good place to get small gauge grill is from an old dish washer filter, just in case you know someone who is throwing one away.

Cromwell · May 15, 2017

Nice build. It's amazing that a few home made additions improves the look so much

keep up the good work

sunray · May 21, 2017

On 2017-5-15 at 7:31 PM, Cromwell said:

Nice build. It's amazing that a few home made additions improves the look so much

keep up the good work

Cromwell you are right there. I think I get more fun adding scratch made bits than I do making the rest of the kit. Anyway I have started the paintwork by applying the the primer coat and then I added a bit of pre-shading.

Kris B · May 21, 2017

I am interested how the Base colour will be looks like. Preshiding well done.

sunray · May 21, 2017

20 minutes ago, Kris B said:

I am interested how the Base colour will be looks like. Preshiding well done.

Thanks Kris. The primer was a bit too dark for me so after I sprayed the black I sprayed the centre of the panels with thinned white to lighten it up and hopefully make the paint more sun bleached. Anyway thats the plan.

clive_t · May 21, 2017

That's looking rather fantastic! It never even occurred to me to consider pre-shading an AFV

Cromwell · May 24, 2017

It's a shame they weren't used in Europe. What you've done would make an interesting winter camo

Bullbasket · May 24, 2017

What about Soviet use?

John.

Cromwell · May 25, 2017

Ahhh!!!! Mr Basket

sunray · August 29, 2017

Thanks chaps. I haven't done much to the Lee as I have been busy. But now it's up and running again and I sprayed on the base coat of Olive Drab. Once dry I gave it a coat of Klear to seal the paint.

clive_t · August 29, 2017

Looking good!

sunray · October 10, 2017

Thanks Clive I have been busy doing other things but I have managed to do some work on the Lee. I decided to add some bags which are 1/32 I found in my spares box. They needed tiding up but that didn't take long.

Once painted they didn't look too bad.

Now I have come to the part of the build that requires the decals, so I proceeded to apply the kit decals. I used Micro Set and Sol without any issues but after the first application of Micro Sol I noticed the decals didn't crinkle up as normal. I have had this happen before so I waited over night. The following day I noticed a few bubbles and loads of silvering. So I popped the bubbles with a pin a gently tapped the silvering also with the pin and then I reapplied the Micro Sol but I had the same result. I even applied a coat of Tamiya X20 Thinner to the decals and again with the same result. Then when I had a closer look and you could see that decals had not adhered to the surface plus they were brittle. So I put this down to the age of the decals and I came to the conclusion they were unusable. So I decided to remove the decals and I will make my own, I have made them before on a RC 1/16 Walker Bulldog upgrade I did a few years ago and its not hard.

First you have to get the special paper and that depends on what printer you are going to use. I have tried making the decals on an inkjet and a colour laser. Out of the two I find the colour laser the best and quickest to use. The reason being if you decide to use an inkjet printer, once you have printed the decal sheet you have to give it a coat of varnish to seal in the ink before you can use the decal sheet. With a laser you don't and you can use it almost straight from the printer. The other reason is that because the laser doesn't require a coat of varnish the decal itself is a lot thinner. In the photo below "Predator Sam" & "Uncle Sam" were printed using a inkjet printer and they were given coat of varnish before being cut to size and applied.

As you can see the decals are quite thick so I removed them and printed new ones using a laser printer instead. The photo's below are the laser printed ones.

So I am going to use a colour laser printer. For a laser printer (as the same for an inkjet printer) there are two types of paper, clear or transparent and white. The reason for this is that your printer doesn't print white so if your new decal has white in it, you can either paint the area where the decal is going to be placed white and use the clear paper or use the white paper. The problem with using the white paper is that you have to be really good with a modelling knife if your decal is say white lettering, etc. This is the only real draw back as I can see. The "white stars" were printed on white paper and what I did was to draw the stars with a very thin black hairline as a cutting guide in the software I was using (an old version of CorelDraw). So as I cut out the star it destroyed the thin black line.

You can buy your paper on Ebay but I got mine from

http://www.homecrafts.co.uk/laser-water-slide-decal-paper-a4-white

http://www.homecrafts.co.uk/laser-water-slide-decal-paper-clear

They also sell the inkjet version. It costs £8.99 for ten A4 sheets but on your first order you get 20% discount with a code. What I do is cut the A4 in half and then you have twenty sheets of A5.

For the software I use CorelDraw but there are loads of free drawing apps available on the web or just use Windows Paint. The other thing you might require is the correct font which again can found in most cases free on the web.

Now I am ready to go. What I need for my tank is the serial number which isn't a problem because the one I am after is in black and I also need a stars & stripes. So for the serial number I will use a clear sheet of decal paper and for the stars & stripes I will need the white paper. I also measured up the original decals so to get the correct size. What I also do is to print off a test sheet on normal white paper to check the decal size, etc before I use the decal paper.

All you have to do now is print off the sheet.

As to not waste the paper I have added one or two badges, etc that I might need on future builds and to practise on. At the minute I am not ready to apply the new decals as I have one or two things to do to my tank so I got my "Buster" out to give you a demo. I am going to use one of the "Killer" decals, so I cut it out as normal and placed it in the water. The water doesn't need to be warm as I used cold and it took less than 30 sec to slide off the backing sheet. I used some Micro Set and then applied the decal. The surface of my Buster isn't glossy at all and is more a matt finish.

Then I removed the excess water and pushed out any bubbles with a soft brush and cotton bud. Then I applied the Micro Sol. As you can see from the photo below I added a bit too much Sol but it doesn't matter.

The decal started crinkling almost straight away.

And after ten minutes here is the result.

Just to see what would happen I gave it another go with the Micro Sol.

There is no silvering at all and thats on an uneven surface. So as I have said earlier I removed the old ones from the tank. It was only the transparent kit decals that needed replacing. The others were ok.

I then resprayed the area again and made my decals on clear decal paper. I applied the home made decals using Microsol and Set.

For the Stars & Stripes flag on the front of the hull I used white decal paper. As the sheet was A4 I added a few other things that I might use in future builds as with the transparent decal sheet.

I cut out the flag with a knife.

Then I applied as normal.

The decals adhere extremely well. The film is very thin but for decals they are quite robust.

The decals on the turret, the "L 3's" are from the kit and the rest are homemade.

Then I gave everything a coat of Klear to seal.

AgentG · October 11, 2017

Good job!

She's really coming together.

Those kit decals are actually new. They are a new set included with this re issue of the kit. I didn't use them as I am aware of Revell decals and the problems they present.

G

sunray · October 11, 2017

5 hours ago, AgentG said:

Good job!

She's really coming together.

Those kit decals are actually new. They are a new set included with this re issue of the kit. I didn't use them as I am aware of Revell decals and the problems they present.

G

Thanks mate. I didn't know this was a re-issue and as for the decals you made the right decision. Apart from that I am enjoying the build.

sunray · October 13, 2017

I have given the tank a few extra coats of Klear, then the next little job is the weathering. The look I am after is a tank that has been worked hard and worn, so a bit of chipping, rust. I gave the tank a quick going over of dry brushing using Vallejo Model Air Steel to pick up edges, bolts, etc, and then on to the washes. The washes I have used so far are Vallejo, Humbrol and AK.

The first wash I used was Vallejo which was applied basically all over the tank and then I used Vallejo Airbrush Thinner and water to push the wash around. Using the thinner you have to be careful not to work it in too much in case its starts eating into the base coat. Thats why I gave the tank a few extra coats of Klear to protect the base coat, but if this happens I just stop and add a bit of water to dilute the thinner. The paint turns a pale grey colour as it sometimes picks up a bit of the primer coat but once dry the area it changes to a paler shade of the base coat adding to the effect. I find this wash gives a dirty, grimy and worn look.

With that done I moved on to the decals and I added a touch of chipping. All I used was a fine brush and the base colour Olive Drab.

As the eye is drawn to the decals due to their shape or colour I think the chipping of the decal adds to the worn effect plus its a good way of hiding damage. In this case the Stars & Stripes had a very thin white line on the outside edge of the top and bottom red stripe when I cut the flag from the homemade decal sheet but now it just looks worn.

When doing chipping I try to keep it as nonuniform as possible.

The next wash I used was the Humbrol for the Rust. As the Vallejo was an acrylic wash the Humbrol is an enamel wash and I find it easier to control. So using a find brush I add a drop on a hinge or bolt and let capillary action do the work. If I have added too much I use a larger brush to draw the wash down as I have ran out of thinner.

After the rust I used the AK Kerosene wash to an oil feel on wheel hubs, fuel spills, etc.