AFV Content

nice Jagdpanther, good camo & weathering.

nice addons and snow camo.

After a modern MBT from British, I go back to WWII, painted a tank destroyer of German: Sd.Kfz.173 Jagdpanther with cool camo. 1/72 Sd.Kfz.173 Jagdpanther Product Photos: Working Photos:

thx Wulfman.

The hand and body stance makes the GPMG look a lot lighter than it really is.

While Vallejo do an extensive range of colours, overall I don't trust them to match a stated colour "with both hands and a map".... But, FWIW, there is list of Model Color here http://www.creativemodels.co.uk/paint_conversion.php/manufacturers_id/1/page/1 with approx matches, which maye give you an idea From the comments and photos above, you want a medium olive green. I'd have a look what's available in the shop, bear in mind they tend to dry a bit darker. For example, these are ones I'd look at, (they are colours i have) VAL888 Model Color - Olive Grey 888 VAL889 Model Color - US Olive Drab VAL924 Model Color - Russian Uniform WWII Note the WW" SCC15 Olive Drab is 15 (Olive Drab) 1pt 70888 Olive Grey [92] + 1pt 70924 Russian Uniform WWII [094] This gives a quite green drab, VAL887 Model Color - Brown Violet 887 RAL7013 Despite the name, it's an olive drab, browner than 889 above, 924 will fade it quite easily. Given the Vallejo I quote are ones I have used in mixes for US OD and SCC15,, these may get you into something that looks reasonable, It's worth getting some spare bottles, (i got some 10ml off ebay) and making up little batches of mixes you like for projects, so you have enough for touch ups. finally, most colour deck are expensive and FS595 deck is £250 or so... , but e-paint do a RAL fan deck for £17 https://www.e-paint.co.uk/RAL-colour-guides.asp Only 213 chips, but which at least gives you some kind of reference.. and means if you ask about a colour you can get a better idea of of what is being referred to. HTH

In our last episode it was revealed that chosen design would be Lt.Col. Leighton's 1915 futuristic design for the Westmorland and Cumberland Yeomanry. First order of business will working some way to make a set of nice wood spoked wheels while I am still digging around for some details on the noted Isotta-Fraschini 18-25hp chassis that the armoured car was based on. Wheels are simple right? Nothing but some roundy circular things attached to an axle? Not as simple as you might think. After a bit of searching I found a digital copy of an old easy to read book on Google books called The Wheel Wrights Shop by George Sturt dated 1923. Being a wheelwright was a very important trade, quite fascinating actually. For some light bed time reading: https://archive.org/details/wheelwrightsshop00stur/mode/2up You may have noticed that some wood spoke wheels have a shape that resembles a saucer or a dish and others that don't have this shape. The answer is in that book - hint, it's called dish and has to do with design of the cart or carriage the wheel was used on and that cart or carriage's motive source; whether it was animal drawn or motor powered. If you have ever looked closely at the spokes themselves you will have noticed that some have a drop like cross sectional shape and others are a flattened oval. The answer is in that book - hint: nothing to do with aesthetics or streamlining but rather about strength and reducing weight. Wheels with dish are commonly called ordinary carriage wheels. Wheels that are straight without dish are commonly referred to as artillery wheels due to their resembling wheels seen on artillery pieces. In the case of the Isotta-Fraschini wheels these look artillery style wheels, that is straight without dish but the spokes themselves appear to have a tear drop cross section. We now have some knowledge of these types of wheels and their shape. The model's wheels will be around an 25mm in diameter but that may change when I find some more details on the Isotta-Fraschini chassis and it's details. Why all this fuss over something like spoked wheels that will likely no larger that 25mm in diameter? Because it's interesting. It looks like that I will have to scratch build some wheels failing a search for some suitable off the shelve wheels. Doing so is a challenge in itself. I could use an O ring for the tyre and make some sort of rim and spokes out of styrene but I don't like the look of using an O ring for a tyre. There has been discussion in a number of other postings of @Model Mate and @Bandsaw Steve (of note) on scratch building wheels. One technique to make the tyre which works OK is to wrap thin strips of styrene into a circular shape, building up the thickness needed and then adding the middle bits to suit. It is fiddly and tedious but gets the job done. On Amazon I discovered silicone rubber molds targeted at the craft market with which you can cast resin finger rings. There are a number of different designs - one a roundish aircraft tyre shape, another which has a diamond like tread, and another which is a simple flat round shape. The rings vary in size from about 17mm outside diameter to 27 and there eight sizes on each mold. There are a few other sizes and shapes and additionally those large enough for bracelets. What a light bulb moment that discovery was. Using these molds it would be easy to cast tyres to an approximate size and then shape to required size. The diamond tread tyre would look interesting on a futuristic What If Sci Fi type vehicle. But wait, the design of the molds provided food another variation. I could make a mold of an O ring and could then cast however many tyres in whatever sizes I might want. All I needed to do was to tack glue a thin ring on one side wall of the O ring in order to hold it above the mold box bottom and then fill the mold box with silicon rubber. When set all I needed to do to free up and pop out the O ring. Using a syringe to over fill the mold provided the best results. The excess resin is then easily cleaned up and I now have a nice resin copy of the O ring I started with. Now I have an easy way to make some nice tyres. Making the rim and spokes are next. Easy? Difficult? We'll see. Stay tuned for the next episode. cheers, Graham

Hi All Those lumps on the top will be removed and replaced with bent scrap PE After some applied swearing I managed to get four similar ones. While they were bedding in, I cut a length of cotton bud stalk for the gun cleaner holder. I've seen pics of this tube quite battered with the end caps missing, so I painted the inner ends black and squashed it That will go on the side after I do something about those frameworks Comments and suggestions welcome Cheers Steve

Stunning, simply stunning. As for the figure standing next to the tank he has a facial expression that I don't think I have ever seen rendered in this scale. Technically brilliant and superb composition.

This is up to your usual high standard of Sherman builds John. Coming along very nicely indeed. Agree with everyone above, flatten off the face of the chevron and they will definitely look the part. You’re a brave man doing all that track work, especially on 48th scale!

The tank is looking brilliant but you sound so miserable about it. Are you in need of a break?

The programme Combat Dealers had on on rebuild. Maybe some of it will be useful to you. https://youtu.be/8EX79k-H5hM

Great work. Excellent models and I love the groundwork & telegraph poles

Great model. Love the colour and weathering

Such things were available before these kits. Certainly dry brushing and washes, although airbrushes were expensive and you had to be fairly dedicated to have one. However both Badger and Revell Sprite (De Vilbis) were certainly available at the same time as Matchbox kits, if a little later than the first aircraft. I remain unclear as to how a "filter" differs from the kind of wash that was used then. Can I suggest a bit of research into "Verlinden", who/which was a fairly obvious ancestor of what is now called "the Spanish School".

StuG III Ausf.G (36480 for MiniArt) 1:35 Eduard MiniArt’s new range of StuGs have become the de facto standard kit in 1:35 since their recent launch (only my humble opinion of course), and as is usually the case with their toolings, they have been crafted with multiple variants in mind. You can always improve on injection moulded styrene though, and this set intends to do just that, although because of the quality of the base kit, it’s not the largest of Eduard’s sets. As usual with Eduard's Photo-Etch (PE) and Mask sets, they arrive in a flat resealable package, with a white backing card protecting the contents and the instructions that are sandwiched between. Inside is a single fret of nickel-plated brass PE, with some parts pre-painted for realism, such as the jack block that is covered with a light wooden texturing, and a few belts that are red-brown colour. It includes a replacement bracket for the glacis, chains for the towing shackle pins at the rear, and a heat deflecting piece of tinwork under the overhang next to the rear shackles. This will need bending to shape using a D-shaped template on the long part, and an L-shaped template for the side parts. They replace some styrene parts from the kit, so you can use those as a guide on how to shape the new parts. At the rear of the casemate a long bracket is fixed across the width to carry a number of spare track links that double up as extra armour to the weaker rear, and are fixed in place on styrene brackets that are already moulded-in, and have PE wingnuts added to the ends. A suitcase-style stowage box on the exterior is cleaned of its moulded-in hinges and closures, after which a new set of parts are glued in place with improved detail and a padlock to complete it. Another padlock and two-part L-shaped eye is fitted to one of the hatches on the casemate, and after removing the styrene supports for the jack block on the fender, a replacement block is made from the pre-painted part, then it is wrapped in strengthening straps, has a pair of lifting handles fixed to the ends, and a bracket that secures it to the fender on opposite corners, with the painted strap holding it down. A small but effective set of parts. Highly recommended. Review sample courtesy of

@M3talpig @Pig of the Week Thanks gents. It was fiddly but, hopefully it'll be worth it.

Just reading through this thread and there is some absolutely fabulous work been done. It's made me realise just how much detail there is in this scale. I'll have to bear that in mind when I make a start on my 1/16th Stuart. Nice work. John.

Fantastic work stef! Great finish on this and love the mud caking at the back. I echo what Bertie say above, looks hefty mate!

That is splendid work, lovely paintwork... Ed

Yep, I received a similar excuse, hence why I gave him far to long to respond and lost my PayPal protection. Strangely he’s still managing to promote his latest creation, clearly his health doesn't seem to get in the way there….!

Vytautas

The seats make sense. I've left mine are folded - upside down maybe! Tom

Well, I've had a go with some freehand painting. At least it's better than I expected, it looks a bit like the suggested scheme, honest! Loads of overspray which I am blaming on my 0.4 tip airbrush rather than my limited airbrushing skills I can almost justify buying a new one based on it not being up to the job... Onwards and upwards!

Nice work!