Retired Bob

A bit more accomplished today, the gun barrels are now dunkelgelb, as are the engine deck grills and the other bits of grey plastic that were showing. I'm now assembling the "magic tracks" to wrap around the running gear, I'll post some pictures asap.

Glad it's not just me then, I vote we go back to the 1970s, the weather was better and I needed a comb.

Looking good Darryl, I'm just catching up after my King Tiger builds, I have to ration my time on this site or before I know it, the day has gone and I have b.... all done, I have the AFV Club Achilles and Wolverine in the stash, one of those mad moments when I wanted to recreate D-Day in 1/35th scale. I know what you mean about losing your ability to brush paint, I did all my painting with a hairy stick, now when I try it's rubbish, must be the paint these days.

Managed to get some paint sprayed on today despite the weather, yet more high winds and rain for the weekend. The aluminium barrels have been primed, the hulls and turrets have been given a quick coat of Tamiya dunklegelb. The left one has the front and rear of the turret in white as I will mask off the number 11, I will also paint the German cross onto the hull. The right one will be painted up as s.Pz.Abt.503, also from the Normandy front 1944, you can see it had only the single gun sight hole and the armoured ring removed the side shot trap, but with the rounded front the turret was still a poor design. A KT from s.Pz.Abt.503. There were a couple of different camouflage schemes, but I like this one. A photo of the 2 KTs from above, the large mesh is still in black primer, they are not the kit supplied ones, these are from a photo-etched set from ET Models that I had in the stash. I will use the extractor fan cover from this set on the right hand KT, a job for later as it's made up of lots of small parts. Thanks for looking.

Very impressive paint finish Simon, looks really good. Mmm... stuff for the roof rack, boxes of medical supplies, perhaps a spare stretcher or two, just no weapons or camo nets.

I did get to the Halifax show on Sunday and while there I decided to obtain another Porsche turreted King Tiger and build it to a later build standard, the 30th tank off the production line in May 1944 was completed with the following changes being implemented; fitted with the Leitz T.Z.F.9.d monocular gun sight fitted, the outer sight aperture was welded over, an armoured ring was bolted onto the hull to remove the shot trap of the gap between the hull and the turret, a mesh frame fills in the gap between the forward engine deck and the turret overhang (to prevent explosive charges being placed under the turret overhang to initiate the ammunition stored in the rear of the turret) and no snorkel cover was fitted. The kit supplied exhausts and tracks are used and the indentation in front of the hull machine gunner is left in place. I'm just finishing off the turret, as with the previous build I have removed the weld around the cupola and enhanced the shallow welds of the turret roof plates. Tomorrow I will get some paint on and then take some comparison photos of the two tanks together. Thanks for looking.

Agreed Simon, and some things never change, making equipment for our military by the lowest bidder is guaranteed to get the best stuff, NOT, and by the time it's put right it costs a lot more. Just glad that our WW2 tankers had to face such unreliable equipment, just imagine if the King Tigers had been really reliable and built in the numbers that had been planned. Anyhow getting back my model, here is how it looks now, black primer on the tracks and metal components, dunkelgelb flashed over the hull to check for imperfections. Depends if I get to the Halifax show on Sunday whether I get any more done before Monday. Thanks for looking.

That is just superb, very impressive build and painting. In fact gobsmackingly good.

Took this photo before I attached the snorkel cover, it shows the running gear cleaned up and painted with dunkelgelb.

I have finished adding all the bits and pieces to to the engine deck, I used some Lion Roar grills on the intakes as they looked better than the Dragon supplied parts, the resin exhausts have been cleaned up, mesh cover added to the snorkel cover and it's been glued to the hull. Bending the exhaust covers into shape has caused the most problems, I can imagine trying to get them to stay put on those skinny blocks will be ....interesting. I have replaced the kit gun barrel with an amorscale one, the detailed brass muzzle brake clinched it's replacement and it comes with a nicely moulded resin gun mount. The Dragon turret comes with the twin gun sight holes to the right of the main gun, these were for the Leitz T.Z.F.9b/1 binocular gun sight. Only these early KTs had this type of binocular gun sight, it was soon replaced on the assembly lines with a monocular gun sight and the outer sight hole was welded over. Thanks for looking.

Let's just call it a labour of love, not much blood spilt, and it's over and done now. Storm Dennis, I did have a busy weekend planned, model club on Saturday and Halifax model show on Sunday. Have to see how it goes, there are roads still closed by flooding near me, I could stay in and do some modelling.

It looks like they are hooked onto something, track hanger or similar? and then secured with some rope. I agree with you, the resin can be a let down, especially for the price. When I replace hatch handles I have several materials that I use, from model railway suppliers I get brass rod in various thickness's from 0.2 mm to 0.5 mm, it bends easily and to get the handles the same width and 90 degree angles I have a pair of tapered nose pliers that I fold the wire round, works for me. Good work with the Comet, I have one in the stash waiting patiently.

Well it's Valentines day, the wind has stopped howling and it's stopped snowing so I stayed up late and finished my tracks, 46 pairs for each side. With the improvement in the weather I hope to get some paint on the running gear and prime these tracks. Hopefully some more photos by the end of day.

Hi Pete, I have some Fujimi Intruders in my stash, for about the same price and age I know I have this Black Bunny aircraft, not sure what else, so I will be taking an interest in your build, have fun.

Hi Steve, glad to provide some informative entertainment. When I was looking to build one of these early production King Tigers I looked at an online video on building the Takom kit, the chap was making it as one of these five early machines but had done no research at all and made numerous mistakes. I decided to use the Dragon kit but obtained all the necessary AM parts to build it correctly which cost as much as the kit itself, but that's the fun in this hobby, doing the research and making it to the best of your ability. Hi Darryl, I was interested in building one of these first five tanks as they had some differences to the later ones, which I will build as my next project. If you want to build an accurate King Tiger it is very helpful, I bought mine back in 2008, I'm not sure if it's still available. There are some interesting profiles, but I always like to use photos where I can. Here is one from Flickr, it shows the rear of an early Porsche turreted KT with the exhaust pipes and shields missing, the mounting blocks for the shields come as photo etch on the Voyager conversion set, but rather than faff about trying to fold 8 small blocks I will use some plastic strip cut to size. Thanks for the posts, it's good to know I'm not talking to myself.