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OOB Tamiya 1/25 Centurion MkIII


Scuff

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This build is being posted on other forums, so please accept my apologies if you have seen it before.

This will be my first attempt at an AFV since coming back to the hobby. I'll be looking for suggestions etc. from those more experienced AFV builders on here, if they are willing ;)

Anyway, I picked this kit up from ebay for £30, which i though wasn't bad. The box is a bit battered and a few pieces had come off of the sprues in thier bags. The decals are yellow but its all there. I am going to attempt an Israerli version in Dark Yellow. I Know that their current vehicles are painted Yellow-Grey, but I don't think that the early Centurions were done in that colour. I'm happy to be corrected by those more knowledgable.:)

These first few shots are from the internal turret detail. The light grey is just Vajello grey primer sprayed liberally and dry brushed with tamiya metallic grey XF56. The chipping was applied by hand with a very fine brush, dabbing on MC214 Dark Iron from Mr.MetalColor. A Mix of Dark And Rust wash was applied.

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The light grey primer sprayed over the Mid Grey-Blue Plastic showing the contrast.

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The shell cases were sprayed with MC217 Mr.MetalColor Gold.

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Images showing the bits before they are all hidden:(

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The Ammo Boxes were Sprayed with Mr.MetalColor Stainless Steel.

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Turret Base with seat, the cushion was coloured dark green and gently weathered with Tamiya weathering powder/paste 'Sand'.

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Box edges chipped with Dark Iron.

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The Main Gun Breach component

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Turret Gearbox and commanders seat.

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Here is an update on the turret internals. Most of the 'innards' have been welded to the turret ring. Feel free to comment if you wish.

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The interior of the turret is now complete. The main issue was poorly fitting turret halves which necessitated a bit of filling with Vallejo white filler and some sanding.:rolleyes:

A couple of points of interest - The radio pack face was sprayed with buffable Dark Iron and when dry, I rubbed my finger over it to shine the protrusions. The white dials and small needles were painted and and then a drop of Krystal Clear added, which when dry gave me a nice glass face effect.:)

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The completed the turret.

It was airbrushed with a base coat of Vallejo grey primer. A graded coat of dark brown was added to the shadow areas underneath with a gradual fade to the grey undercoat at the top highlight areas.

A preshade of matt black was then applied around all of the edges and join lines. Heavily thinned dark yellow was then sprayed in 4 applications to build up the effect that I wanted. Once dried I brush washed the whole thing with a 'grime' clay wash and removed it in such a way to allow it to sit in the recesses and leave some dirt streaking. Chipping was then applied by hand using a teeny weeny (technical term) brush and some dark iron paint.

The track pieces were airbrushed with buffable dark iron and when dry, the high spots were buffed. Rust pigment was brushed into the crevises (Ooo-err Missus):eek:

The cable on the cable drum is just weathered fuse wire wrapped around.

The whole lot was then dry brushed with Tamiya weathering light sand to highlight the edges.

Coats of matt varnish were applied in different amounts to different areas to give a variation in 'Mattness' (I'm sure that's not a real word) :D

I made some camo netting to scale and coloured it in desert shades. The retaining straps were made of lead wire which I rolled flat with a bottle of tamiya XF-1 and then shaped the straps around the netting and barrel. They were glued at the bottom with Gator Glue and painted in Dark Yellow. I think this adds a touch more realisms to the stark barrel.

Comments welcome.....:cool:

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Edited by Scuff
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I am liking this very much - you've achieved a classic finish

You might want to look at the lower left smoke discharger bracket and some filler as the brackets were surface mounted and not recessed. The pic below is an old type from the ranges in Germany - you can see the Smoke discharger bracket clearly along with the armoured cable to initiate the launchers. Hope this helps?

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Right side

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Edited by Shermaniac
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I am liking this very much - you've achieved a classic finish

You might want to look at the lower left smoke discharger bracket and some filler as the brackets were surface mounted and not recessed. The pic below is an old type from the ranges in Germany - you can see the Smoke discharger bracket clearly along with the armoured cable to initiate the launchers. Hope this helps?

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Right side

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Thanks very much for taking the time to comment. I wasn't sure about the fitting of the kit parts, and I'm pretty sure that the kit isn't totally accurate (which ones are!)

Thanks again for your observations.

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This brings back a lot of memories for me as crew-member on a Centurion in the late 60s. The loader/Radio operator was also the general tea maker. I cannot for the life of me, looking at the pictures inside the turret, wonder how I managed to stand alongside that gun whilst on exercises in Germany. There is no room at all. As for the drop down seat to sit on for the operator, forget it, a shell prevents that from happening.

Problems used to happen to the browning alongside the gun when there was a runaway belt(or blockage) of bullets, depends how fast you could think under pressure, you either pulled a round from the belt before it reached the chamber/firing pin, or you twisted the belt. As for firing the main gun, ever tried lifting a 3 foot 105mm round into the breech; in a confined space? Beneath the gun was a net to catch the spent case when it was ejected. When time permitted the various shell cases were thrown out the side of the turret through the pistol port. I do not recollect there ever being 4 rounds alongside the turret walls. Plenty of shells alongside the driver and under the floor

When not on live firing, but still traveling cross country it was the radio operators job to brew up on the move with the electric saucepan which plugged into the rear of the turret which had to filled up from a jerry can inside the turret. That was the hardiest part of the job, basically it was an electric saucepan Once boiled you used the compo ration tea bags to make tea..........all the time the tank is going through hill and dale and down ditches, knocking trees over etc, etc, In my years on cents I was lucky to ever get one cup of tea from the kettle. Inside the turret its all steel and the kettle just slides every where, it even falls off its perch and onto the floor and has to be refilled, so much spills out the kettle whilst on the move it was a challenge, nay, a skill to get 4 cups of tea from that kettle.

The Radio Operator is the only man capable of making the tea, as the commander is in the hatch, Gunner stationary sitting in one position until the tank stops and he can get out, and the driver, well, he is busy driving

Whilst the kettle is boiling, my other job besides looking after the Browning and loading the main gun was to operate the radios, these were C42 and B17s. All messages, sent and received had to be logged in a proper log book............I remember it wasn't fun at the time, but looking back now it was an experience

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i have to say thats a neat kit - BUT its the photos that really caught my eye... very nicely composed and lit - my in progress photos are just snaps ;-) what setup are you using for them

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i have to say thats a neat kit - BUT its the photos that really caught my eye... very nicely composed and lit - my in progress photos are just snaps ;-) what setup are you using for them

Hi Rob, thanks for your comments

With a lot of my commercial work, I will use studio flash units fitted with large overhead softboxes tilted towards the camera and another to fill the front. I use either a Canon 1Ds3 or 1Dx SLR camera. BUT......

I have to admit, for a lot of my model build shots I'm a little lazy. I use a grad black/white vinyl roll. I use 2 Canon 600ex-rt radio triggered flash guns which are pointed at the ceiling for a good soft bounced light. I use a Canon G12 compact camera with a Canon ST-E3 flash trigger, as the small sensor gives a large depth of field, and the quality is fine for the small web pics. The images are colour corrected and edited with Adobe Lightroom 5.2

I hope that all gives you an insight

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I have managed to get the hull painted and weathered this week. The wheels are mostly finished, I'm just working through them progressively so that I dont get too fed up with them :D

Most of the fully working suspension is screwed on to the hull, and held in place with the covers. The usual Vallejo grey primer was laid down, and pre-shading was airbrushed with a combination of flat black and dark brown. This was followed by layered Tamiya dark yellow. A coat of Gloss sealed it all in.

A grime wash dirtied it up followed by subtle highlighting on some of the edges with tamiya weathering master light sand. The lot was then airbrushed with a matt varnish.

I finished off with some chipping applied by hand using MrMetalColor Dark Iron.

The last image shows the hull next to that of a Tamiya 1/35th scale Panther, just to give you an idea of the size of this 1/25th Centurion.

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Hi Guys
Another quick update before I dash off to work.
The wheels were assembled and the rubber 'tyres' were flattened as they all had an annoying dip in the middle all of the way around. I was quite aggressive with a very rough sanding stick, which also gave a nice worn feel to the rubber faces. A few nicks were cut into the odd rubber tyre. They were all airbrushed with primer and then dark yellow before a grime wash was applied. This encouraged the bolts to stand out. A light sand dry brushing sorted out some subtle highlights.
The tyres were hand painted with Tamiya Rubber Black and when dry, given a good dose of sandy pigment to show some perceived use. A final application of some paint wear and chipping was painted on by hand with a fine brush and Dark Iron paint. SOme of the dark Iron was buffed to give some variation.
The track pieces were assembled a few evening ago whilst watching Stargate Atlantis on t' telly. They were airbrushed with Dark Iron and the high and touching faces buffed to leave shiny faces where they rubbed the wheels, sprockets and ground. Rust pigment was brushed with a stiff brush into the joints and then over brushed with a mixture of sand and green earth pigments. The whole lot was airbrushed with Alcohol to help keep the dust in place.
The track skirts were painted and weathered with the same techniques used on the turret. I shaded from light to dark to give some weight. The streaking was done with Tamiya weathering master. The original decals were very worn and faded, so I redesigned the characters on CAD software and cut out some masks with a laser cutter. I lifted the mask slightly from the surface when airbrushing the white characters, as I wanted a 'roughly sprayed at the front with a stencil' look.
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Hi Rob, thanks for your comments

With a lot of my commercial work, I will use studio flash units fitted with large overhead softboxes tilted towards the camera and another to fill the front. I use either a Canon 1Ds3 or 1Dx SLR camera. BUT......

I have to admit, for a lot of my model build shots I'm a little lazy. I use a grad black/white vinyl roll. I use 2 Canon 600ex-rt radio triggered flash guns which are pointed at the ceiling for a good soft bounced light. I use a Canon G12 compact camera with a Canon ST-E3 flash trigger, as the small sensor gives a large depth of field, and the quality is fine for the small web pics. The images are colour corrected and edited with Adobe Lightroom 5.2

I hope that all gives you an insight

oohhh comercial - am jealous... ;-) not just of your modelling skills but photography too..I usually do my final shots with 1 or 2 off camera flashes - only have a Canon 600D but have 2 off camera flash guns and soft box (try to kid myself i can take photos).....

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This is the reasonably detailed engine and sub-engine.

I decided to paint a base colour of Tamiya XF-21 Sky. For the fuel tank I used Stainless steel, a hint of leakage was applied using Tamiya Smoke and an application of burnt blue from thier Weathering Master powder. The hoses were Tamiya Rubber Black and were finished off with the hose clips in chrome silver.

A Dark Dirt wash was applied over a coat of gloss, and when dry, removed as required to give some definition to the details. Chipping was hand brushed with Dark Iron. The dusty and sandy areas were completed with Tamiya weathering master Sand and Light Sand.

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WOW you are a really skilled modeller mate. That is outstanding, can't wait to see more. That mark of cent is it?

Thanks Crossy, I enjoy the hobby and take inspiration from those who post and share their ideas on the forums.

It is a Centurion mk3.

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