Mitch K Posted December 16, 2018 Share Posted December 16, 2018 Plastic Soldier Company are basically in the business of producing items for wargamers. The owner of the company says that what he has been aiming for is something between Armorfast (too simple) and Dragon ("3000 parts, one of which falls off every time you look at it"). I think these normally come in boxes of three kits, but I bought a single example for the GB. You get two sprues, one carrying the running gear and lower hull, the other the upper hull and turret. Colour's gone a bit odd! My model is going to represent a Panzer IVG of 16th Panzer Division in Italy in 1943. The vehicle is pictured in Bruce Culver's Panzer Colours 2. The photo suggests a late IVG, with a one-piece turret lid, radio aerial on the rear of the hull and shields around the turret. I started with the turret. The vision ports on the sides of the turret were deleted by this point in the production of the Panzer IV, so they have to go! The doors go on fairly easily. The kit provides two mantlet, an early two-bolt version suitable for the F and earlier, and the four-bolt version shown here. I drilled out the MG barrel, but I'm leaving the main gun as it is. In the picture, the muzzle of the gun is covered with a canvas sleeve, and I'll do the same. The hatch covers have been removed, and the hinge removed on one side, per the photo. I cut the commander down a bit, so he appears to be more hunkered down. The detail of the rear hull is nice - I just removed the seam lines and drilled out the exhaust. The running gear is where the limitations of the kit (from a scale model perspective) are very obvious: the paired road wheels (inner and outer) are moulded as single pieces, the return rollers are far too wide and the drive spockets and idlers are a bit crude. The two spare road wheels were fitted in the box on the side of the hull. I improved these a little with a razor saw. I dd the same to the Notek driving lamp - a bit of cutting to suggest it isn't just a lump on the mudguard. The two headlights are very crude, so they went and will be replaced with carved sprue. The tools and items like the barrel cleaning rod are quite nice, certainly in this scale. Here's the major sub-assemblies ready for the next stage! 10 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PlaStix Posted December 17, 2018 Share Posted December 17, 2018 Hi Mitch. Looks like you have made very good progress already! Kind regards, Stix 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PlaStix Posted December 23, 2018 Share Posted December 23, 2018 Hi Mitch. Just checking if there has been any more progress? Kind regards, Stix 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mitch K Posted December 24, 2018 Author Share Posted December 24, 2018 Yes, barely! I attacked the road wheels with the slitting saw in the Dremel to separate them (visibly at least). The result pre-cleanup of the parts is a bit furry: the plastic is softer than most aircraft modellers are used to and is a bit odd to work with. Here's the sides on the hull. I might put a shim between the idlers and the axle blocks on the hull rear, just for appearance sake. The wheels don't look too bad in place. I think the next step will be to prime and paint the hull and start detail painting on road wheels, return rollers and the like. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PlaStix Posted December 24, 2018 Share Posted December 24, 2018 Good to see more progress and good luck with the painting! Kind regards, Stix 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mitch K Posted December 24, 2018 Author Share Posted December 24, 2018 TBH I might be drawn into refining some details like towing hooks, headlamps and such. This minimalist wargame build approach is harder to stick with than I thought! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mitch K Posted December 31, 2018 Author Share Posted December 31, 2018 Finally got something done! Christmas and new year are playing merry hell with model making. The inner surfaces of the tracks have some very bad mould ejector marks, some placed carefully so that road wheels or return rollers cover them, others totally blatant. The soft plastic lends itself to removing these by simply carving them away in the first instance. I'll prime these, then decide what further action to take. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SleeperService Posted December 31, 2018 Share Posted December 31, 2018 It's good to see a bit of lateral thinking in this GB. For what they are these seem like great little mojo restorers. You've made a good start Mitch. Two tiny suggestions; The raised circles behind the return rollers are the armoured covers for the fuel fillers. They are only on the left hull side so the others can be removed. The driver and hull gunner hatches have the signal ports fitted. They'd gone long before the Ausf G so I'd suggest cutting those away too. I'm another one who can't keep a quick simple project either quick or simple! We are in good company here 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PlaStix Posted January 1, 2019 Share Posted January 1, 2019 Hi Mitch. Good to see that you managed to find some time to work on this once the festivities were finished. Kind regards, Stix 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mitch K Posted January 1, 2019 Author Share Posted January 1, 2019 1 hour ago, PlaStix said: Hi Mitch. Good to see that you managed to find some time to work on this once the festivities were finished. Kind regards, Stix My favourite Christmas film after Die Hard is The Man Who Came To Dinner, and many times this season I have felt like addressing my family as Sheridan Whiteside (played brilliantly by Monty Woolley) did: "And now, will you all now leave quietly, or must I ask Miss Cutler to pass among you with a baseball bat?" 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PlaStix Posted January 23, 2019 Share Posted January 23, 2019 Hi Mitch. Just checking if you had chance to do any more on your Pz.IV? Kind regards, Stix Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PlaStix Posted March 1, 2019 Share Posted March 1, 2019 Hi Mitch. Just checking again if you have had chance to get anything more done on this project? Kind regards, Stix Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mitch K Posted March 11, 2019 Author Share Posted March 11, 2019 On 3/1/2019 at 2:24 PM, PlaStix said: Hi Mitch. Just checking again if you have had chance to get anything more done on this project? Kind regards, Stix Yes! And I'm going to do a proper post in the next couple of days - down to the wire I know, but the 16th Panzer will roll! 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PlaStix Posted March 12, 2019 Share Posted March 12, 2019 16 hours ago, Mitch K said: Yes! And I'm going to do a proper post in the next couple of days - down to the wire I know, but the 16th Panzer will roll! That's great news and I'm looking forward to seeing the photos. Kind regards, Stix Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mitch K Posted March 12, 2019 Author Share Posted March 12, 2019 OK, I fitted the turret skirt armour, which is very, very over-scale. To be honest it always is: the real armour was (I think) 5mm thick, so in scale that works out to about 3 thou, so compromise is inevitable. My compromise was to grind it away so the edge is scale-ish and ignore the rest! After finishing the primer I sprayed on some home-mixed panzer yellow. Starting to look the part a bit more now. Panzer grey was applied to the roadwheel tyres (black is always too stark for this) and the tracks were fixed in place. After a coat of gloss the decals went on. These came from a sheet for 1/100 scale aircraft that I picked up at a wargame show. Very nice they are too, and despite being for "rough" work on wargaming models, they would be a credit to a great many specialised firms doing designer decals. The turret numbers are spare serials from a Kora set for KNIL Hawk 75's. Final things were to pick out details of tools, guns and the like, run an oil wash into the crevices, and "mist" on a coat of Vallejo Air RAL Ivory to give the impression of dust. By putting more on lower down, dirt on the running gear was accentuated. The kit contains two commander figures: one wearing a "Schiffchen" side cap, the other a peak field cap. I painted mine in a deviation from regular uniform that was quite commonly seen: the tropical shirt worn with the black Panzer cap. The black uniform was a mark of real pride to the Panzertruppen, who would wear all or part of it even when it was not authorized. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mitch K Posted March 14, 2019 Author Share Posted March 14, 2019 Done! Next stop the Gallery! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PlaStix Posted March 14, 2019 Share Posted March 14, 2019 Hi Mitch. I am really delighted to see that this has made into the Galley! It looks fantastic - especially in 1/72 - you have done a great job! Thinning those turret Schürzen tops really paid off and improved their appearnce no end! Very well done. Kind regards, Stix 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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