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1/35 Tamiya Chieftain MK5


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Hello Chaps, this is my first WIP so be gentle ;)

Yesterday i started Tamiya's 1/35th Chieftain 'MK5'. I got this kit fully aware of all its faults and the fact that what i would get in the end is more of a Chieftain MK2/MK3 hybrid with a smattering of MK5 parts. However i like the Chieftain and wanted to build one and after building and being impressed with two of Tamiya's other tank kits i decided on getting there Chieftain. I was for a period after getting the kit seriously considering getting one of Accurate Armour's conversion kits or another conversion, possibly from Castoff, but they were too expensive and having never worked with resin before, i decided not to buy one.

Without further ado here are the pictures of the first night.

The obligatory box shot

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The contents of the box

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What i was left with after a couple of hours, i forgot how monotonous building road wheels is

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Now i did come across a problem with the kit at this point. The poly caps for holding the return rollers are too small and the piece of the return roller that is meant to go through it pushes it out the back instead. I have tried gluing the poly cap into its housing in the suspension and gluing the return rollers together, let them dry and tried again but to no avail. So here's were I'm at with it, any help would be appreciated.

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This is the rear of the opposite suspension set with the poly cap glued in place (the top hole)

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Thanks for looking,

George

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Right chaps.

Today's update, I have cracked on with the Chieftain, ignoring the return rollers, and got the lower hull almost built. I finished the remaining suspension bogies and attached them to there corresponding positions on the hull and attached the towing equipment to the front. DSCN0573_zps3a1a82b0.jpg

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Following that i built up the rear panel and attached it to the lower hull.

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Any feedback is gratefully received

George

Edited by slifer44
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Hi George

She's coming along nicely, keeping soldiering on :-)

I went the OOB route too, but that was more due to first model in an age, than anything else, but I know what you mean about resin add-ons etc.

On the return rollers, I didn't experience exactly what you described, but I did notice that the axle wasn't easy to locate in the poly insert so I slightly rounded the edge. This seemed to make inserting a lot easier. I didn't have to glue the poly insert, but after checking fit I didn't mount the return rollers until after fixing the road wheel assembly to the hull. So the poly insert was trapped when it came to inserting the axle.

Also, I found that I had to press home the axle to full depth with pair of tweezers, fingers had too much give to press home the axle.

Hope to see more, Ian

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Hi Ian,

Thanks for the kind words :). On the return rollers turns out it was more a problem of my own making because i was pushing the axle in with my fingers and not tweezers as it became hard to keep the poly cap in place and to make matters worse the glue prevented the axle being installed without considerable force and a bit of clearing.

I have made some progress with the Chieftain today. I've managed to get the upper hull sorted, although the rear storage boxes were a pain to put together as the lid wouldn't fit, but other than that went together nicely.

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and the two hull section together

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Finally, the return rollers are on!! :). Two of them put up a fight (you'll never guess which ones :whistle: ) but the rest went on a treat :)

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The two that put up a fight did get damaged a bit but nothing serious.

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Regards, George

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Small update today chaps.

First off, after reviewing the last pictures i realized i had left the front shield off :whistle:, so that went on first. Following this i made a start on the turret. I spent the best part of around 30 minutes putting the gun together (sanding and trying to line it all up) before spending a few minutes trying to figure out how to install two pieces to the rear of the the lower turret before deciding just to put the thing together. So after about 1 hour and 30 minutes of building all i had done was put the turret together put on the search light and a storage box, so not much done today. Anyway here are a few pictures.

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George

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Hi again George.

Still looking good, some of the parts are easy to miss, I wouldn't worry. I missed the turret coaxial mg when building the turret, so had to trim the part and fit to barrel assembly with tweezers and patience while the glue set. :-)

Whilst disassembling my chieftain for priming I snapped the axle for the front idlers. I've fixed it and strengthened it which should stop the front idlers bending the axle, which you've probably noticed already. I'll be posting pics on my thread tomorrow.

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Hi Ian,

I'm glad i only missed the shield and not something as small as the coax mg, your Chieftain's coming on well as well keep it up :)

On to the update, started by building up the commanders cupola, with the hatch fully traversable.

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I then attached it to the top of turret and almost fully built up the left side.

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I then made a start on the right

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and attached the rear panel to the turret

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However i have not attached two pieces as i don't know if they were on the Chieftain or not so if anyone can tell me that would be appreciated. The piece on the left is meant to fit over the periscope in front of the commanders cupola, any pictures of it would be great, and the piece on the right is meant to attach to the turret next to the gun.

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George

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Update on the Chieftain.

Thanks to Dan the .50 and armoured cover were attached to the turret. Following this i started attaching the remaining parts to the right of the turret. The only issue i found was attaching the rear stowage rack, but this was my own fault as i decided i would build it up straight on the turret instead of as a sub-assembly like the other one which made putting it together tricky, but it did finally go together. With that the tank is pretty much done, construction wise, only the gun travel lock and towing cables left and they'll probably stay off. Next job is disassembling the tank ready for painting.

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and finally i wanted to see what it looked like with a track on

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George

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Looking good George, just the easy bit to do. Painting. :-)

Look coward to seeing another update in the near future.

I'll be posting an update tomorrow, as I've spent the evening laying the base green coat with the new airbrush.

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Right, i intend to start painting the Chieftain very soon, but i am an airbrush novice and would like some advice. i have painted one kit with an airbrush and it worked great but it was a 1/76 kit so i just painted the whole thing black to start then painted the main color straight on top. I was wondering weather i should use this method on the Chieftain or pre-shade the panel lines first then paint on the green and finally the black to complete the camo. Any advice would be great. Finally i have a rattle can of Humbrol matt cote and bottle of Humbrol clear gloss varnish, i have used the matt varnish twice to finish and seal a kit, the first time i got a bit of silvering on two small decals (i also blew one off,woops :blush: ) but it worked, however on the second i painted it then applied the gloss varnish, applied the decals and weathered it (first attempt at weathering), everything was going great, i let the weathering dry and went and applied the matt varnish to finish it, and disaster, the paint on the bottom peeled straight off, some of the powder hadn't stuck and was blown off and large areas of white, snow looking, 'dust' spots appeared so the tank was stuck on the shelf as i slowly removed the matt varnish with cotton wool and enamel thinner. So does anyone have any tips of avoiding this happening again. Thanks.

George

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Personally. Can I just say that again, personally. I would pre shade, undercoat, maybe touch up pre shade, spray your two colours, maybe using blu tac or similiar to mask, leaving hours of drying time between each step. Gloss varnish, decals, gloss varnish, weathering and my final coat would be the Winsor and Newton artists matt.

Just me though.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hi guys, i am finally getting around to ordering the paint for the Chieftain (i know i took my time :blush: ). Currently I'm contemplating getting Humbrol 33 matt black, either humbrol 30 or 78 and 26 for the termal sleeve, there not perfect matches but they look the closest from the Humbrol acrylic catalog. The aulternative being Tamiya XF-67 NATO Green and XF-69 NATO Black, but the problem is i don't know if they'll work with my varnishes (Humbrol Matt varnish(rattle can) and Humbrol clear gloss varnish) and it says they have to be thinned using Tamiya's thinners. Which would you guys recommend i get if i want a Chieftain that looks as real and accurate as possible, also what color for the thermal sleeve. Any other suggestions are appreciated but try and suggest paints that are acrylic and will work with the varnishes (I've had too many unwanted reactions between the acrylic varnishes and Humbrol enamel, probably shouldn't of tried combining the two :blush: )

Cheers,

George

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Personally I would use Tamiya paints but then that depends on if you are using

An airbrush . Tamiya paints do not brush well at all. If you are brush painting then it's

Vallejo all the way.

I also would not use the Humbrol Matt varnishes , they have not worked for me at all and some builds have suffered a frosting?. I

Like the acrylic paints as the weathering products i use are oil based and Tamiya / Vallejo are

A good bombproof base upon which to start with.

HTH

Dan

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Thanks for the info Dan, I am airbrushing the Chieftain so I'm going to order the Tamiya paints. But what would you guys recommend i get for a gloss and matt varnish as I'm probably going to replace the Humbrol varnishes once there empty, as they cause too much silvering and peeling on the paint.

Thanks

George

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Hi George,

I prefer to use the Vallejo satin and matt varnishes but only use Vallejo's thinner

I've had a few issues when thinning using water but their own thinners work very well.

they also do not react with Tamiya Acrylic range of paints, don't be tempted to thin them

with Tamiya thinner as this turns them to a gloopy mess.

HTH

Dan

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  • 3 weeks later...

Right, sorry for the lack of updates on the Chieftain, other commitments have kept me away from it for quite awhile. I did try and get going again 2 weeks ago and tried to get the pre-shading done. However every time i tried, the paint blocked up the airbrush and required a complete clean before i could try again. I tried three times at varying pressure and paint to thinner ratio to no avail. Last weekend I was out on an expedition and so couldn't paint. So i tried again today. I got my other airbrush out (for the first time) and equipped the 0.4 nozzle and needle. I put the paint in the hopper and thinned and it clogged almost immediately so it was cleaned and i tried again. This time it worked and i could finally start pre-shading, but the paint wasn't particullarly black, more grey, so i added abit more......and it clogged :/. So it was cleaned again and i gave it one more shot, with the smaller nozzle. Unlike every other time i had tried this time the airbrush was clogged before had even passed air through it 0.0 . So I was again stopped cleaned it and packed it all away having only got the front slightly black and more paint on myself than the tank. So you guys got any words of wisdom? The paint is Humbrol 33 matt black (acrylic) never had a problem brush painting it.

The pictures (and yes there is a very thin layer of 'black' on the tank)

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Thanks,

George

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Hi Dan,

I've been thinning the paint with water as it says on both the site and bottle that it can be thinned with water. I have thought that might be the problem but having thinned acrylic with water previously, I didn't give it much thought.

George

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If your using tap water, it depends on how soft the water is in your area - if it's hard (ie you get a lot of limescale in the kettle) that will likely be the cause of your clogging. In that case, try distilled water. And also if you can, get some Winsor & Newton acrylic flow improver. You only need a drop or two in your mixed paint, but it really does make spraying acrylics much easier.

Just came across your thread, & your Chieftain is coming along very nicely - hope you get your paint problems sorted soon!

Keith

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Hi Keith.

Thanks for the info and kind words :). I never thought about the issue being the hardness of the water, I believe my area gets hard water from what I remember from my GCSE Chemistry lessons. I'll give distilled water a try and see if i can get some acrylic flow improver if that doesn't work.

George

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