Early King Tiger with Porsche Turret

[Retired Bob]

I decided that I needed a Porsche turreted King Tiger in my collection.  After doing some research last year during the Tiger GB I decided that one of the first 5 King tigers to enter service with s.Pz.Kp.(Fkl)316 would make an interesting model to build.  The Dragon kit provides decals for one of these tanks, white 13, however it is not possible to build this tank with just what is provided in the box.  These first tanks had some different features and I will highlight these as I proceed with build.

The Dragon kit with moulded zimmerit is a good basis as all the King Tigers with the Porsche turret had a zimmerit coating, the kit also includes a turned aluminium barrel and an etched fret for the intake mesh and tool brackets.  For my reference material I will use the Waldemar Trojca  King Tiger book.

Starting at the top, the first problem is with the turret, Dragon has represented the cupola as being welded to the turret roof (weld highlighted with a black wash) all the Porsche turrets had the cupola bolted on, so the moulded representation of the weld needs to be removed and a plasticard insert added to the cupola underside to replace the thickness of the removed material.  The roof panel welds should be flush or proud of the panels so they need to be improved with some stretched sprue melted in with thin glue.

That was quickly dealt with and now looks like this:

Thanks for having a peek, some work on the hull tomorrow.

 

Edited February 11, 2020 by Retired Bob
missing word

[Redcoat2966]

Same for me too Bob.....I need to move to add to the display cabinet. I started one many moons ago, but never finished, and it never made the move home from the States. So always on the lookout for a KT2.

 

The Zim' looks good on this one.

 

Looking forward to seeing you move on this one

 

Regards

Simon.

[Retired Bob]

The next problem to sort out is the front of the hull, according to my book the first 8 King Tigers were made without the indentation in front of the gunners periscope, also Dragon have made 6 square lumps, 3 behind each mudguard, as attachment blocks.  The mudguards were actually attached with a piano type hinge so there should not be any lumps there at all, so they need removing, the indentation filling and the zimmerit restored.

Some plastic card and glue goop soon sorts those problems out.  while the zimmerit is being restored I attach the machine gun cupola and blend the zimmerit around it, attach the periscope covers and the headlight bracket, then use some copper wire for the headlight cable.

While I'm playing with the plastic bits I can always do a bit of heavy metal, Dragon provides their excellent magic tracks with this kit but these early versions had a different track type that used 18 tooth drive sprockets, so I have obtained the correct type from Fruilmodel, even though they call it a Hunting Tiger on the box.

The Dragon kit track is on the left and the difference with the Fruils is obvious.  Time to make tracks. 

[Redcoat2966]

Wow, those tracks look like a handfull........trust the Germans to overbuild 'em..

 

Nice attention to detail so far Bob.......

 

Simon.

 

 

[Retired Bob]

2 hours ago, Redcoat2966 said:

Wow, those tracks look like a handfull........trust the Germans to overbuild 'em..

They certainly did Simon, Luckily they stopped using them after this first batch of 8.  There was a similar type of track on the JagdTiger that had Porsche suspension, except that the 3 narrow links between the main track links were a different cross section.  Fruil also make a set of those #ATL-41, I have a set for my JagdTiger with Porsche suspension. More tracks.

[Retired Bob]

My next task is to change the rear panel, for some reason when Dragon made their King Tigers with zimmerit on, they did not leave the areas free of zimmerit where the exhaust covers and other items go, also there is a cover that needs removing.  According to my reference book, yet again the first 8 tanks did not have the cover under the left hand exhaust (coloured black) it was added to 9th and later tanks to "insert a coolant heating device"??

These early variants also had exhaust covers like on Tiger Is, so I removed all the zimmerit above the exhaust outlets.

It will look better when the covers are fitted.  Any comments or questions are welcomed, thanks for looking.

[Retired Bob]

The 5 tanks allocated to this unit were numbered 02,10,11,12 & 13.  Number 11 was well photographed after it was disabled by it's crew on the 17 June 1944, all 5 were very unreliable and were disabled by their crews.  I am going to use these photos and build my model as number 11.

As can be seen from this view from the rear, the covers over the exhaust pipes and the domed cover over snorkel pipes just behind the open engine hatch.

 

As can be seen in this photo, there is no indentation in front of the machine gunners periscope, the transverse welds on the turret roof are raised not recessed as Dragon mould them and of interest is the German cross is partially covered by the track guards.

 

 

[stevehnz]

Enjoying watching this. Its not my scale & the only Porsche turreted Tiger I'm ever likely to do will be the Airfix 1/76 on, but I do like watching a good build. sometimes I even get light bulb moments from them that I can apply to little builds.

Steve.

Edited February 13, 2020 by stevehnz

[Jasper dog]

I'll tag along if I may, a fascinating and educational build of a great subject. 

 

Excellant attention to detail too, btw.

 

Darryl

[FalkeEins]

me too.. I'm interested in getting a peek at the Trojca book too. I'm guessing I'd need to re-mortgage the house to acquire one .

[Retired Bob]

17 hours ago, stevehnz said:

Enjoying watching this. Its not my scale & the only Porsche turreted Tiger I'm ever likely to do will be the Airfix 1/76 on, but I do like watching a good build. sometimes I even get light bulb moments from them that I can apply to little builds.

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.

 

13 hours ago, Jasper dog said:

I'll tag along if I may, a fascinating and educational build of a great subject. 

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.

 

10 hours ago, FalkeEins said:

me too.. I'm interested in getting a peek at the Trojca book too. I'm guessing I'd need to re-mortgage the house to acquire one .

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. 😉

[vaoinas]

It's great to see a build with so much attention to historic accuracy.

I'll be following this one with a great interest.

[Retired Bob]

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. 

 

[Jasper dog]

Tracks look hard work but well worth the effort!

 

As for wind and rain, we've got tomorrow and Sunday to look forward too!

[Retired Bob]

58 minutes ago, Jasper dog said:

Tracks look hard work but well worth the effort!

Let's just call it a labour of love, not much blood spilt, and it's over and done now. 😀

 

1 hour ago, Jasper dog said:

As for wind and rain, we've got tomorrow and Sunday to look forward too!

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. 

[Retired Bob]

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.

[Retired Bob]

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

 

[JeroenS]

The barrel looks amazing. Very interesting project too!

[Redcoat2966]

Looking really nice Bob.........and yes, I'll vouch for Armorscale barrels, they are quite the part. Bought one for my Sturer Emil, worth the price. You have to try and imagine what it was like to be a T-34 or Sherman crew to have face up to a barrel that was as long as their own tanks........., poor sods...

 

Keep it up.....

 

 

 

[Seahawk]

10 hours ago, Redcoat2966 said:

You have to try and imagine what it was like to be a T-34 or Sherman crew to have face up to a barrel that was as long as their own tanks........., poor sods...

My late uncle went ashore with the Guards around D-Day.  He hardly ever spoke about the war but I do recall his saying that it was not fun knowing you would be coming up against tanks which could put a round into your tank and out the other side.

Edited February 15, 2020 by Seahawk

[Redcoat2966]

15 minutes ago, Seahawk said:

My late uncle went ashore with the Guards around D-Day.  He hardly ever spoke about the war but I do recall his saying that it was not fun knowing you would be coming up against tanks could put a shell into your tank and out the other side.

YES SEAHAWK.......Very much so. I saw a documentary where a Cromwell tank commander felt the round go through between his legs after I think decapitating the driver and out the engine compartment......it was alright saying the T-34 and Sherman won the war, as we had plenty of them, but usually that's said by those who didn't have to go out in them......

[Retired Bob]

9 hours ago, Redcoat2966 said:

YES SEAHAWK.......Very much so. I saw a documentary where a Cromwell tank commander felt the round go through between his legs after I think decapitating the driver and out the engine compartment......it was alright saying the T-34 and Sherman won the war, as we had plenty of them, but usually that's said by those who didn't have to go out in them......

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.

[Retired Bob]

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.

Edited February 20, 2020 by Retired Bob
missing word

[vaoinas]

So it's the dual build now. 
Impressive to see that kind of speed building the models.

[Retired Bob]

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.