M31 Recovery Vehicle

[Sgt.Squarehead]

8 hours ago, Foghorn Leghorn said:

Death ray sounds better though. Actualy, concerning that pic, interesting layout of boxes on the top of the hull. With those (and the the death ray) it looks like the turret couldn't rotate.

But it obviously can because the jib's pointing to the rear. 

[Andy Moore]

9 hours ago, Sgt.Squarehead said:

On reflection, I'm pretty sure it's a spare VVS spring TBH. 

 

8 hours ago, Foghorn Leghorn said:

Death ray sounds better though.

 

Yes, a death ray equipped M31 is definitely the way to go 

 

As it happens, the M31 in the photo is one of the marking options with the kit and carries the name 'Invader', but Takom show it with Black over OD camo.

 

There are four other marking options including 'Georgia', which is the one I'll be going with

 

 

 

 

 

Regarding the stowage, most photos show them piled up with kit, but you get nothing in the box except for the spare wheels. I'm sure it wouldn't have hurt Takom to throw in a couple of jerry cans at the least. I've got plenty of bits I can dig out for it though

 

So, I've got most of the hull together now. As I mentioned above, Takom has slightly retooled the lower hull by adding some strengthening ribs and these do make assembly a bit easier. The small flat plate that forms the floor of the recess for the main gun now sits on two supports, whereas on the Lee I built last year that plate only attached on the edges. Don't know if they'll add the revised hull to the existing Lee and Grant kits, but it would be nice if they did

 

 

Another thing that's made the assembly of the upper hull easier is something I figured out on the Lee build. That is to trim a millimetre or so off the connection tabs (in the red circles) which allows the panels to be wiggled about a bit and improves alignment

 

 

The only area left to do now is the engine deck, although I've got to do a bit of detailing on that before it's added

 

 

 

It's not without gaps here and there, but they're pretty minor and nothing a quick smear of filler won't fix

 

 

The transmission cover has had a bit of texturing added with Mr Surfacer, although it'll need a light sand to remove any areas that are too rough

 

 

And lastly for today, the side doors have been attached and a weld bead added around their edges with stretched sprue

 

 

Andy

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[SleeperService]

Going back to the death ray. Mundanely Sarge is right it's a spare VVSS spring. While the box above the 75mm mount is fixed the other boxes aren't. They look like ration packs to me. Likely just piled there until they could be squirreled away later, unless the ARV was on a grub run. Ditto the jerrycan is likely to be the water version.

 

Great start to the build and a very Belated Happy Birthday from me too. 

[Sgt.Squarehead]

I think it's the rule with M3 kits that at least one joint will always fight you.....That whole hull shape is just a big two fingers to Dragon & their slide-moulds isn't it? 

 

Takom may well be right about 'Invader', I can see two tones on the photo, but identifying the colours they represent is a judgement call, black over OD is equally plausible and they would have spent a lot longer researching it then me.....I've enquired with the owner of The Sherman Tank Site if he might have or know of a picture of 'Georgia'.

 

[Andy Moore]

5 hours ago, Sgt.Squarehead said:

Takom may well be right about 'Invader', I can see two tones on the photo, but identifying the colours they represent is a judgement call, black over OD is equally plausible and they would have spent a lot longer researching it then me.....I've enquired with the owner of The Sherman Tank Site if he might have or know of a picture of 'Georgia'.

 

Cheers Sarge,

 

Yes, there's definitely a camo on that M31. A bit of crude photo manipulation shows it more clearly. It just comes down to whether you interpret the darker tone as being the OD, in which case the lighter tone would probably be sand, or the lighter tone as the OD and the darker as black. One thing's for sure. the pattern doesn't match Takom's scheme. Nor can I see any indication of the Invader name on the door. Not really a problem in the grand scheme of things, as I'm not doing this one

 

 

Something else the photo shows is the vague outline of the vision hatch on the side door. Takom don't represent that on the kit door, only the raised lip around it. I'm assuming a plate was just welded over the opening after the hatch had been removed. I should be able to replicate it with a rectangle of thin styrene sheet.

 

Andy

[stevej60]

Great progress Andy lookingforward to this one!

[Sgt.Squarehead]

1 hour ago, AndyRM101 said:

I'm assuming a plate was just welded over the opening after the hatch had been removed.

That would be my assumption too, a rectangle of thin of card and another of your weld-beads should do the trick nicely.

 

PS - You can add negative texture to your cast bits using a bottle of good old Humbrol Liquid Poly.....Splash a generous dot of glue onto your target area and immediately begin randomly 'stabbing' at it with the rather stiff brush provided, continue until you see the first hint of 'furring'.  Leave it overnight to harden up and knock it back here & there with wet & dry, looks a treat and should provide interesting contrast to the positive texturing with putty.

[Ozzy]

She's coming along nicely Andy.

[Andy Moore]

A bit more progress, although some of the work has revealed other areas that will need extra detailing. I need to be a bit careful about how far I take the extra work as it can end up being something of a black hole. You're constantly finding more things to add and you never quite get to the end as a result.

 

Anyway, we're not at that point yet, but I'm trying to keep the big picture in mind and not get bogged down in too many small details that will hardly be seen at the end.

 

First up I've added the plate covering the hatch on the side door. it's just a small rectangle of 0.5mm plasticard with a stretched sprue weld bead around the edge. The pencil arrows are there to remind me to drill then re-fill the door hinge mounting points. A few photos show them roughly filled in but still visible, so I'll replicate that here

 

 

The engine deck is on now, and there are a few things at that end that will need some attention. There's an angle bracket that holds the supports for the jib when it's facing backwards, and Takom just have it perched on the back of the deck. It'll need re-positioning slightly, maybe thinning down a touch, and some weld beads added

 

 

 

I've also drilled the holes for the rear light cables and added some short lengths of aluminium tube for the entry points

 

 

I've done the same at the front for the headlight cables. Incidentally, Takom mould the gun ports blanked off in their M3 kits, but I'm not bothering to open them as I'm intending to have some tarps and other stowage over that area

 

 

Also at the front end, I've been looking at the stowage boxes. I'm thinking of leaving the lid off the one below the driver's hatch, so I'll have to scratch build a new box since the sides are a bit thick on the kit box, and the whole thing is slightly undersized too

 

 

 

Back at the, err.. back, I've started getting the big stowage bins together. They too need some extra detailing, starting with the strap loops which Takom mould as solid tabs. I sliced those off and replaced them with thin fuse wire

 

 

I'd quite like to leave these off, at least for the initial painting, so I can get better access to paint the tools that are strapped to the sides. Problem is the bins need weld beads added where they join onto the hull, so I'm probably going to have to attach them before painting.

 

Also with the rear bins, I'm going to need to rework the spare track hangers, as Takom seem to think they attach by magnetism

 

 

The real hangers are simply two strips welded to the back of the bins, so they'll be pretty easy to do. I can then cut the spare links from the kit hangers and mount them on the new ones

 

 

So that's where I'm at right now. Quite a few fiddly little things to do before I can continue with the main construction.

 

In other news, I've ordered the old Italeri field toolshop set which should allow me to add some generic clutter to the finished build. I'm now idly searching for a suitable figure, as I think the finished model would benefit from one.

 

Andy

[Ozzy]

I've been looking again at the above picture M31 going over a Bailey bridge, I built the Bronco bridge years ago I used one section the other year on the MTO GB. I'm very tempted to build a M31 pulling a Sherman and use the remaining two sections of the bridge.

[Portaler]

Cool ! At least seems to be a lot of reference material which is good (although I guess can be bad too though if it leads to a lot of scratch building :-))

 

[Hewy]

Superb small  but significant details,  it will most  definitely add to the finished model

[Hockeyboy76]

Some lovely work as usual Andy. 

[Andy Moore]

Just a small update. I've scratched the new stowage box on the front of the hull. Quite a simple construction although cutting out the small slits on the side panels was a bit fiddly. I've got to make another one for the top of the hull, then make new lids for both. The lids will be a little harder as they'll need a folded lip around the edge. I'll probably have to make them from brass sheet or something similar

 

 

 

I've also done the angle bracket on the back. In the end it was easier to make a new one rather than thin down the kit part. This still needs all the rollers and other brackets adding

 

 

Andy

[Hewy]

Exemplary work

[Will Vale]

Nice work on that box, how difficult you do the slits? Etch saw?

 

Will

[Bullbasket]

That's a definite improvement on the kit part. Question. In the photo of the real thing, have those front track guards with the chequered plating been added during restoration or were they standard? 

 

John.

[PlaStix]

Always very impressive modelling and presentation Andy!

Kind regards,

Stix

[Andy Moore]

5 hours ago, Will Vale said:

Nice work on that box, how difficult you do the slits? Etch saw?

 No, just marked and drilled each end of the slit with a fine bit (0.4mm), then squared it up with the tip of a blade.

 

49 minutes ago, Bullbasket said:

In the photo of the real thing, have those front track guards with the chequered plating been added during restoration or were they standard?

Not standard on the originals to my knowledge (such as it is). I believe the one in the ref pics is in an Israeli museum so it could be a local modification?

 

Andy

[Will Vale]

10 hours ago, AndyRM101 said:

 No, just marked and drilled each end of the slit with a fine bit (0.4mm), then squared it up with the tip of a blade.

Thanks for the info, sorry for my inability to put a coherent sentence together. I blame lack of sleep...

 

And belated happy birthday to boot You are marginally more grown-up than I am!

 

Will

[Andy Moore]

12 hours ago, Will Vale said:

You are marginally more grown-up than I am!

Maybe in years Will. Not so sure about common sense 

 

I've added the new spare track hangers on one of the stowage bins. The retaining pins were still to be added here. I'm leaving the spare tracks off the other bin and I'll just have the empty hangers, but I've had to fill the mounting holes for the original kit parts before adding the new parts. I've finished adding the rollers and whatnot to the angle bracket on the back as well. I had to scratch build a new bracket for the forward facing roller, as the kit part pinged off into the ether

 

 

The hanger brackets have got some tiny weld beads that more than likely won't show up on the final build. They do add a bit of extra reinforcement to the brackets though. Oh, and I really need to deal with that seam gap on the corner of the bin

 

 

The suspension units have now been added to the main hull and I've also started building up the turret including the fake gun/broomstick. All the stowage boxes are only loose fitted at the moment. There's still quite a bit to add to the rear deck before I can think of attaching them permanently. At least some paint's hit it though, albeit only a bit of black primer around the wheels

 

 

 

 

Andy

 

 

Edited January 16, 2018 by AndyRM101

[beefy66]

Great work with the track hangers Andy getting more and more tempted by this kit as you unravel all the details 

 

beefy

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

Great work so far on this Andy 👍. 

In some weird way without tracks and just sitting there like this. The model looks like some artists odd concept for a moon buggy from the 1950’s.   

[Hewy]

I agree with beefy, I'm tempted, no I'm sold, i'll have one, great work andy nice details

 

[Sgt.Squarehead]

Taking shape a treat Andy.