SleeperService

It's good to Welcome you to the horde of GB non-finishers Jean. It would be nice to have such stunning distractions, round here it's drunken brawls in the streets, idiots trying to drive over a broken rail crossing, and worse.

I still see a load of guys at prayer there. Excellent! Nice work and, as you say, these old Airfix kits can assemble OK. If the Airfix Gods smile on us then next year should be a truly excellent year.

More happy memories from YoungSleeper days. When I built this SleeperDad had me fill the inside with polystyrene. What a result it floated in the bath The Sherman didn't for long though.... I hope you enjoy it as much as I am mine. Oh err Missus..

I now have a KV-107 for this. Thanks for the head's up In process of arranging collection, when my mate is around, and when our favorite chippy is open..... Great link to that Japanese site. Thanks mm. Maybe she won't be Swedish after all.......

Thank You most kind Sir. Bit late to the party but I've got the chassis assembled this evening which is firmly jigged up to make sure all the wheels touch the ground. Out of the box they didn't. Just as a thought I went back to 1969 or thereabouts as soon as i started this. Football results on the radio and fish and chips for tea. In the background the faint smell of tube glue. After tea I had to walk the dog and the table was allocated to my sisters. Sunday morning was a year away... Anybody else get these flashbacks as well? Obviously not of my house and family

I'm part French, part Lancashire and part Suffolk. None of those are known for wasting money (or much else) so the Scammell will be appearing but not in Tank Transporter guise. The main issue is that I can't remember which wheels from the Scammell need to go on the Matador......

With a bit of 'encouragement' from @JOCKNEY I'm coming in as a very late starter with my £2.50 Charity Shop bargain. After a bit of stash mining I've found the Scammell Tank Transporter to donate proper truck type wheels to this old warrior. I won't be bothering with the gun because life is too short..... Here's the starting picture, still bagged with decent decals and a flying hour I'm going to give it a little love but in keeping with the GB ethos I'm not going insane with it. Had a minor meltdown when Scalemates put the release at 2008 but that was a fib. My boxing is 2005 and the original release was 1966 I'd just started school!!!! Time to get started.

It will if I can lay hands on the Scammell tank transporter that's stashed away somewhere. I've got several builds all at the slash and burn stage so a 'small works' I can drop onto while waiting for glue, filler and primer to dry will be good

The 'wagon wheel' was attached to the gun as the linked photo indicates. SleeperDad (or one of his buddies) tells me that it was held up by a catch while traveling. Once at the gun point the catch was released and the wheel landed on the ground. Then the gun was pulled onto the plate ready for action. By using a hand spike at the trail two men could lift it and turn the gun around. The raised inner lip kept the wheels on the mount and it was important to level the area before dropping the plate. Apparently all this hassle was worth it as the mount was so good only tiny corrections were needed on a shoot. Later on the turntable could be carried on the later tractors. Apparently a 'Damn fool idea' The ESCI 1/72 offering is very nice too but it represents the later version with a muzzle break and associated counterbalance just ahead of the breech. This was to allow the gun to use supercharge ammunition in an anti-tank role. For conventional shoots super charge could be used without the muzzle break but it was a 'bit lively'. H&S would have kittens A very nice and very fast build. I picked up a Matador and 5.5" gun at a charity shop yesterday £2.50. I thought I'd done well....

Nice work there! That picture looks scarily like an AutoCad generated thing.

Wrong address sorry. BT or Yahoo killed that one. nicholasDOTperry198ATbtinternetDOTcom should work.

Standard aerial is 2M long. Diameter? Well it tapers along it's length. Base diameter about 1.0mm in 1/35

Another cracking thread! Good to see British armour getting some love. I have all the answers you need. Send me your e-mail addresses @Bullbasket and @Redcoat2966 and I'll send you a file to unzip and marvel at. I'm nicholasDOTperry198ATbtinternetDOTcom

Whoa! If your Centaur is an engined one in Normandy then they were almost certainly SCC.15. Why you ask? Well the instruction was for all vehicles for the assault units to be replaced by new vehicles waterproofed and fully serviced just before D-Day. Once delivered running was kept to an absolute minimum. At the same time it was ordered that 'A' vehicles were to be SCC.15, even the BARVs in some cases got a new paint coat over the nearly new blue or grey they were built in. The original plan was for the RMASG to be carried in and fire from landing craft. The vehicles had the engines and transmissions removed to carry extra ammunition. At some stage quite late in the day it was decided (apparently by Montgomery after a demonstration) to land them to 'thicken up' the tank support but they were restricted to how far inland they could go. That meant the vehicles either got a major rebuild or bits were swopped with stock tanks, in either case they were overhauled and waterproofed before issue. Parallel to this the Crusader SP AA guns both 40mm and triple 20mm were going through a rush development programme, with the BARVs and these Centaurs. There's a lot of evidence to show that all were SCC.15 when issued. Look at the pristine state of the markings for one thing. The clincher for me is that the Preston Isaac's Centaur has brown SCC.2 underneath the Green even on the artillery sight which was unique to the RMASG. But it's your model and your choice. I offer the information so you have a reply to the inevitable 'anorak' out there who'll challenge it. It's a very nice build as well. I've come to the same conclusion with Voyager photo-etch as you. Silly errors, obvious bits missed but lots of little bits that make a tiny difference....then we paint it and the difference nearly vanishes

Now you can go hunting for the kit the orphan sprue comes from. Model-Making the hobby that keeps on giving..... @Seahawk My bench is rather full at the moment but an Aifrix Matador and Scammell are only about five feet away. So who knows? I haven't a clue how long..... Thank You for the article again. A long time ago I drove a Pioneer which showed me how HGVs had progressed, slow with an appalling turning circle but 'interesting' when they got any speed up on those huge tyres.