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M1A2 Abrams Tusk II


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21 hours ago, BlackMax12 said:

Go for it, you only live once and there's never ever too many Tiger IIs or Abrams.

 

I'm a little browned off about that Trumpeter 1/16 M1A1 I have ordered, should have read some reviews before dropping the dough.

 

 

Lloyd

 

Oops that doesn't sound too good. I have had a look at some of the other Trumpy 1/16th kits of the Kind Tiger and Panzer IV, been tempted, and then seen what some of the experts here have gone through to correct a catalogue of simple inaccuracies. I'm not in their league. Good luck with it.

 

Cheers John.

Edited by Reilly
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Just the three machine guns of the secondary armament to add, or so I thought. The commander's .50 cal wasn't too bad although I made some adjustments to fit the shield. The coaxial .50 cal required some adjustment of the mount to make it fit and line up properly. The loader's 7.62mm is no fun at all and is shown below. The 2 part counterweight was awful so I remade it so that it would fit and not look like two random pieces of plastic. Its not as neat as the other parts but at least it fits. Next the shields have to be fitted. The only thing supporting the weight of the shield is a 1.4mm thin finger of plastic which is supposed to be glued behind the aperture shown about 2 mm above the lower pivot point. There's no way it can support the weight. I've tried a couple of different adhesives but as yet nothing works. I think I'll just glue the whole lot together and forget about any possibility of movement. 

 

sIMG_0409

 

Edited by Reilly
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  • 3 weeks later...

Right, I'm calling this finished. This hasn't been as much fun to build as I hoped it would have been mainly due to having to rebuild parts that should have, given the price of the kit, fitted in the first place. I finally got the loader's 240 completed by simply glueing everything together rather than having the machine gun move freely. As a result the loader's hatch will remain closed as will the commanders due to the unintended spring loaded hatch construction. I've added a tow cable to the rear turret bin. Normally the Tusk II version doesn't have a tow cable mounted on the side of the turret as it would be inaccessible or difficult to get to at best. I haven't filled the bins up with the usual coolers, boxes, water bottles, bergens etc as all the ones I've seen in the streets were only out for the day and were generally clean. I could maybe have gone further with some of the chipping but didn't want to overdo it. When I was assembling the Meng tracks I spent quite a while weathering track pads and wheels and basically its invisible,probably could have saved myself a bit of effort there. 

 

  

s_D4R8064

 

 

s_D4R8060

 

There are more higher resolution pictures on my Flickr site at Meng Abrams M1A2

 

Here's a comparison between the Meng and Tamiya models 

 

s_D4R8074

 

I used Vallejo paints for the Tamiya model and the Meng/AK Interactive set for the Meng kit. Is one better than the other? Not sure but I have pictures where both would resemble the colours shown. The antislip later that is already embossed on the Meng kit is far better then my own attempt on the hull of the Tamiya where I used an antislip layer manufactured by Mig which would have been more suitable to a Russian WW2 panzer. Using Mr Surfacer for the Tamiya turret gave a result closer to the Meng version. 

Edited by Reilly
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In view of the problems you encountered during the build it turned looking extremely nice Reilly. The color of the Meng offering seems a bit brighter but that is always difficult to tell from photos on a 'puter.

I just bought the Rye Field 3 in 1 Abrams, rather curious how that offering will come together (might even finish the tracks in a couple of years :think:)

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Sure looks like an Abrams Reilly.  The LHS has the Meng kit and I was looking at it, but briefly after reading of your trials and tribulations.

The two Rye Field Abrams I've done were good except for the tedious track assembly.

 

If that's the Tamiya kit in the foreground I sort of prefer the color, seems more natural and the other looks like it should be sitting on a showroom floor somewhere.

Mind you if they weren't side by side then the Meng would look fine and I see that it has various tones which look great while the Tamiya seems more monotone.

Of course that could be my monitor or even my old man eyes for that matter.  How about some closer close-ups for us old squinty guys?

 

Take care,

 

Lloyd

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5 hours ago, Gremlin56 said:

In view of the problems you encountered during the build it turned looking extremely nice Reilly. The color of the Meng offering seems a bit brighter but that is always difficult to tell from photos on a 'puter.

I just bought the Rye Field 3 in 1 Abrams, rather curious how that offering will come together (might even finish the tracks in a couple of years :think:)

Hi Gremlin,

 

The colour of both kits is maybe a little lighter than they are in reality due to the photo lights. At higher resolution the colour is a little better. I've been following your Bradley build. I have the same kit in the stash and have been playing with the tracks for a couple of evenings. I think I might give them a go but will bin them if they give me too much trouble. Those were good looking tracks you had acquired. Interestingly I have a photo of a Bradley and a Abrams parked next to each other. The Bradley has the darker colour of my Tamiya Abrams and the Abrams is closer to the Meng paints. I'd put it up but it isn't one of my pictures and I don't know who to credit it to. I also suspect that the sun bleaches the paint over the course of time. I've seen panzers with varying shades of sand colour, probably also dependent upon where they were operating. A good many looked that they had been properly sand blasted. 

 

Your Bradley is coming along nicely and from what you've posted it doesn't seem to have the issues that the Abrams had. If it does then its down to my poor skills rather than the kit. Good luck with the Rye Field Abrams. I considered it due to the interior but for the time being I've had enough of the Abrams.

 

Cheers

John.

Edited by Reilly
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4 hours ago, BlackMax12 said:

Sure looks like an Abrams Reilly.  The LHS has the Meng kit and I was looking at it, but briefly after reading of your trials and tribulations.

The two Rye Field Abrams I've done were good except for the tedious track assembly.

 

If that's the Tamiya kit in the foreground I sort of prefer the color, seems more natural and the other looks like it should be sitting on a showroom floor somewhere.

Mind you if they weren't side by side then the Meng would look fine and I see that it has various tones which look great while the Tamiya seems more monotone.

Of course that could be my monitor or even my old man eyes for that matter.  How about some closer close-ups for us old squinty guys?

 

Take care,

 

Lloyd

 

Hi Lloyd,

 

Thanks, re colours, see my comments above to Gremlin. I still have the models on the photo table so I'll see if I can come up with some close up shots and maybe do something about the colour in the conversion process to jpg from the Nikon format. Track assembly is for those days when your fed up and just want to have the brain cruising in neutral, bit of music, beer and some track bashing. The Meng track had quite a few pieces but it was one of the few parts that went together without too many issues and at the end of the day I think looks just as effective as aftermarket would. 

 

Cheers

John.

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The only other thing I hate about the Abrams tracks is after all of that work over half of them are hidden behind the skirts.

In some case you just don't need workable tracks, not Tamiya rubber bands mind you but somewhere in between.

 

BTW won't your Nikon take .jpg photos without any conversions?  I used to use RAW but then said way too much effort to convert to something usable and

since I never edit anything RAW went away.

 

Lloyd

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On 9/12/2017 at 11:04 PM, BlackMax12 said:

The only other thing I hate about the Abrams tracks is after all of that work over half of them are hidden behind the skirts.

In some case you just don't need workable tracks, not Tamiya rubber bands mind you but somewhere in between.

 

BTW won't your Nikon take .jpg photos without any conversions?  I used to use RAW but then said way too much effort to convert to something usable and

since I never edit anything RAW went away.

 

Lloyd

 

I used the Tamiya rubbers on the Tamiya model, partly because half of them are hidden from sight and because the definition of them was pretty reasonable. I was prepared to ditch them but I was happy with the paint job and the end result. 

 

True enough I could use the jpg function on the camera but I'm so used to RAW now that I just live with it. I use the iPad camera for the construction shots, its surprising the quality it can produce given the size of the lens and sensor. 

 

Cheers

John.

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6 hours ago, FrancisGL said:

In spite of everything, your efforts have been worth it. I have to do one of these Abrams a day, although I like the older versions more.

Cheers Reilly :yes:

Thanks Francis. The M1A2 had indications for hole drilling marked M1A1 so it looks like Meng are also planning earlier versions based on the same basic kit.

 

Cheers

John.

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  • 4 weeks later...
On 9/12/2017 at 6:30 PM, BlackMax12 said:

Sure looks like an Abrams Reilly.  The LHS has the Meng kit and I was looking at it, but briefly after reading of your trials and tribulations.

The two Rye Field Abrams I've done were good except for the tedious track assembly.

 

If that's the Tamiya kit in the foreground I sort of prefer the color, seems more natural and the other looks like it should be sitting on a showroom floor somewhere.

Mind you if they weren't side by side then the Meng would look fine and I see that it has various tones which look great while the Tamiya seems more monotone.

Of course that could be my monitor or even my old man eyes for that matter.  How about some closer close-ups for us old squinty guys?

 

Take care,

 

Lloyd

 

It took me longer then expected but I've added a few more extra detail shots to my Flickr page for those who need the gregory's. Here's an example. Now its time for work on the Meng Bradley. 

 

s_D4R8363

 

Linky: https://www.flickr.com/photos/113106574@N02/albums/72157686453590304/with/37507017596/

 

Cheers

John.

 

Edited by Reilly
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