Matt182

Hi guys, I got to work with the pigments, starting on the engine bay and working forward through the fighting compartment. It's still a work in progress and the lighting in the photos don't really do it justice. I've tried to keep the weathering restrained but I had to make the engine bay rather dirty, seeing how easy it would of been for dirt to enter through the vents. The weathering has been concentrated around the crew positions, with the rest being more of dusting. Cheers Matt

That is an excellent looking Cromwell and the figure is just superb. I have this one in the stash and if it looks anything likes yours when I get round to building it, I will be very happy indeed!

Cracking job Phil, you got that one done quickly!

The muzzle also has an adapter to fit to the Trumpeter barrels if you want to go down that route. As for fitting the schumo barrel to the rest of the gun, god knows! I think you might have to be inventive there. Maybe build an adapter piece to slot into the the rest of the gun?

Cheers Pagey. As I mentioned earlier, I've been working on the main components for the drive train. Here are the parts in a basic coat of paint awaiting some washes. I dry fitted all these parts into the hull to get an idea of how it will all look. See what I mean about a lot of red oxide... It looks ok like this but once the upper hull is on it all gets a bit darker. And it gets darker still with the turret in place. It's going to need some weathering to break up the monotone apperance. I think once the lighter coloured components are in place it will break things up a bit and help draw the eye away from the masses of red oxide. Cheers Matt

There will be dirt and grime around the crew positions and engine bay with a dusting all over but any real wear will be kept to a minimum. I've been busy painting up the main components for the gearbox, transmission and drive shafts which again are mostly red oxide. I test fitted them and they look good but when the upper hull is fitted it all begins to look a little dark and bland. I'm hoping that a light pigment wash over all the parts will make the detail pop out again and give the interior a bit of life. If not it will look dark and dingy which is realistic but a little boring to look at!

Cheers guys Good luck with your build! Glad my build has been some form of inspriation but you might also want to check out this forum http://www.network54.com/Forum/637977/. You will find all the info you can ever need on the Tiger II there. I think your right Simon. As there is so many parts painted in just plain red oxide primer It might all look a little plain without weathing. Looking forward to seeing the first photos of your build Phil. For the barrel, Gunnar only ever made a couple of batches and they are long sold out. I managed to get one but that was 3 years ago and I was lucky to get it then! The only one I can think of is made by Schumo. It is actually for the Tamiya RC king tiger so it will require some modification to fit to the Trumpeter kit but others have used it and it looks very good. The only problem is Schumo parts are getting a little hard to find so you may have to do a little hunting. Add the Aber muzzle break to the Schumo barrel and you will have a first class L/71. Cheers Matt

Thanks everyone for your positive comments, I'm glad to finally be back working on this and your feed back really is great motivation Mike, very flattering but I think that even if I receive an offer for it, I would turn it down. I'm getting far too attached to it! I do have another update for you guys and it's quite a big one. I went a little mad over the last couple of days and pretty much completed the engine bay. There is only one small hose left to add bar the weathering. I worked too fast to take any in progress photos so here it is complete. Sorry for the rubbish photos, they don't quite capture the detail and tone of colour. I will post decent photos of all the interior before the upper hull is glued on, when I get there... This is what will be seen on the completed model I must say that all that endless work dry fitting everything over and over again has really paid off. It was a simple case of paint and fit, except some of the fiddly hoses which were a bit of a pain. Also, I just wanted to ask you guys for your opinion on weathering the engine bay. I quite like the way it looks all clean and tidy but I have the urge to get the pigments out and at least give it a light dusting. What to you guys think? Cheers Matt

Hi guys, After a little creative thinking, I managed to rearrange our spare room to create a small work space. It's not ideal but it's better than nothing! It's been a while since I have done any work on this and getting back into it reminded me why. I lost motivation trying to come up with an alternative for the two large radiator hoses which Trumpeter provided in rubber instead of styrene. When I painted them up they looked awful so I needed to replace them. This time around I came up with a solution quite quickly. All I did was chop the connection point off and replace it with a drilled out craft bead, then wrap the hose in strips of aluminium foil Then I painted them in black grey and steal colours, along with a wash of burnt umber oils. Here they are in the engine bay. The ends aren't attached to anything. Strictly speaking, this setup isn't accurate as there should be a large fan where the hoses are at the base of the engine. I haven't bother including this as I don't want to spend hours scratch building parts that will never be seen. As you can see in the below photo, it is almost impossible to see anything down there once the coolant & fuel tanks are in position. I finished off with priming the remaining components for the engine bay, hopefully I can get these all painted tonight Cheers Matt

Hi Eric, No further updates unfortunetly. I've just been getting over a loss of motivation and now home renovations are getting in the way Hopefully I will be back in the swing of things in a month or so. I may even be able to squeeze in some work in the mean time, if I'm lucky! Cheers Matt

I think you read my mind Phil! That's exactly the route I'm taking with my 1/16 builds. I am tempted with the Panzer IV but I think I will be holding off until all the aftermarket parts start coming out. How is your King Tiger build going by the way? Trumpeter have annouced there will be a couple of 1/16 T-72s coming out at some point in the next year or two. No idea if it will have an interior but it will certainly be one to keep an eye on.

Hi guys, Work has been a little slow on this one lately but I've made some good progress over the last couple of days. I got started on the Aber PE but I'm only using parts that are really worth the effort so I imagine there will be quite a few parts left over. The rear of the hull was finished first. Next I went to work on the turret. The spare track holders were pinched from another panther kit. Then I built the main gun. I replaced the main gun with an Aber barrel. It fits perfectly except for where it passes through the gun sleeve in the mantlet which is a very tight. The completed turret. I just have a little clean up / filling to do on the turret face. I also have a pair of spare road wheels which will be fitted after painting. And here is how it is looking now, really looking like a Panther now So mainly just all the tool holders on the sides left to go which will be mostly PE. I'm also thinking of moving the stowage tube to the rear deck as seen on some Panthers. I've also got a Mk III dingo on the way to go with the planned diorama so that will likely be built first before painting the Panther. Cheers Matt

Great work Daniel, the base looks excellent Looking forward to seeing more of the Tiger too

Thanks for the comments guys Just a little more progress for tonight. The engine deck is now complete. Perfect fit all round, sailed through no problems. I've been thinking about what I want to do with this model and I remembered I have a decent sized display case in the stash. I'm going to have a go at making a small diorama. The setting will be April 1945. The panther will be abandoned by a road side, say due to running out of fuel. Both MGs will have been taken, along with all the tools and tow cables but the rest of the tank will be intact. I will then have some British infantry going to inspect the tank. This is the ground area I have to work with. I have a basic idea of how I will use the available space but I would welcome some suggestions on layout. I will be using dragon's British infantry set 6212 as per below I'm not even sure these figures would be accurate for 1945 but the poses would be useful for the idea I have in my head! Cheers Matt

Fantastic all round, a real beauty.

Ah a white wash, Looking foward to seeing it. I've sent you a PM that you might find useful

Nice work Rob, very well built and I like the little extras on the fender. I can see what you mean about the minor splatter but it dosen't detract from a good camo job. It will look very nice once a few washes are applied. What paints / thinner are you using? You usually get a small amout of splatter like that because the paint is slightly too thick or the spraying pressure is off.

Hi guys, Lately I've been struggling for motivation on my King Tiger so I thought I would start something a little more manageable to get me going again. I picked this kit up from a forum member here a couple of weeks ago. I have been slowly working away on it. It's been a great kit so far, fit is very good and there are some very nice details included. First up was fitting all the torsion bars, workable suspension and cooling fans into the lower hull. They are nice details to have but as they won't be seen I didn't bother spending too much time cleaning them up. The hull extensions, final drive housings, rear plate and the sponson floors were also added at this point. A small amount of filler was required around the hull extensions to fill a small gap there. Here you can see all the swing arms which are fully workable if you only glue the torsion bar end. Also of note is that there are 3 different types of torsion bars and also an optional pair to fit steel road wheels at the rear stations. The instructions aren't particularly clear on which option is which but when you look for the parts the steel wheel label is moulded into the spur. I went for the standard rubber rimmed wheel setup. Then I fitted the upper hull Here are all the the wheels and drive sprockets And the Fruil tracks So, this is where I am now. The torture of the Fruil tracks is over, the bow mg is done along with the fender mounts, hull crew hatches, gun travel lock and some other fittings. The only thing extra that I did was fill the small gaps around the welds. I'm going to spruce things up a bit with some PE, metal barrel and some field modifications commonly seen on Panthers. I'm totally undecided on the camo scheme at the moment and as I'm not looking to depict a particular vehicle, I may just chose one I like the look of. Cheers Matt

looks good so far, nice camo.

Good idea IanC. I actually have those figures already so I'll give that a go, once my Stug arrives that is. Cheers Matt

Hi guys, Can anyone recommend some figures to fit a late stug III G? I'm just looking for the commander and loader in either resin or plastic, don't mind which. Cheers Matt

Top job, the weathering is spot on and great figures too

Top job, very nice indeed!

Hi Phil, If your going to be concentrating on the exterior then your work load should be greatly reduced. Trumpeter did a rather good job on the exterior so there isn't too much to do. I think how much work you have to do on the interior depends on how you will display it. If you go for a 'through the hatches' version you can get away without doing most of the changes I've made. The kit provides separate panels for the engine bay and driver's/ RO's compartment so leaving these removable will require more work. Keep in mind that unless you cut open the turret, you can only see through the hatches. You can save yourself a lot of work here too. As for priming before painting, it is a must when using acrylics on a multimedia kit, especially if you have done lots of scratch building. I find you just can't get the same level of coverage as you can with enamels. It's a pain to have to prime everything but it is worth it in the end. Cheers Matt

Just been reading through and what a fantastic build. Some truly superb scratch building on show here. I will be following this one