IDF M1 Super Sherman.

[Bullbasket]

Many thanks Chris, and thanks for the info about the MJ Miniatures. They do look good. I assume that they are 3D printed. My only doubt with them is will they get damaged, removing them from the backing. I'm going to get a set though, as Historex stock them. Pity that they don't do them in 1/48th as well.

 

John.

[Kris B]

The guy removing them with sharp blade, so hopefully this is the way as it can be done. 

[M3talpig]

Coming along nicely John.....always like to see a bit of scratch building, i take it you have a thing for Israeli armour at the moment.....can't say i blame you there early years were fascinating armor wise, watching your last couple of builds is making me want to do an early M48 or a Centurion or even a Sherman AMX thingy.

See what you did....i blame you   

[Hewy]

You certainly don't do things by halves john,cracking scratch building 👍

[Bullbasket]

21 hours ago, M3talpig said:

Coming along nicely John.....always like to see a bit of scratch building, i take it you have a thing for Israeli armour at the moment.....can't say i blame you there early years were fascinating armor wise, watching your last couple of builds is making me want to do an early M48 or a Centurion or even a Sherman AMX thingy.

See what you did....i blame you   

Thanks for your comments. Is it that obvious?But you are right. I do find the IDF stuff fascinating, up to, but not including the Merkava. Somehow, it doesn't do it for me, but there again, I'm not a great fan of any modern AFVs. Chieftain is about as modern as I get.

 

John.

[M3talpig]

3 hours ago, Bullbasket said:

But you are right. I do find the IDF stuff fascinating, up to, but not including the Merkava.

If i remember just before my long lay of from modeling the last Israeli model i did was a Verlinden blazer conversion based on the Tamiya M60 kit....was a very enjoyable project, but yes see what you mean modern armor tends to leave me a little cold.

[Bullbasket]

On 25/06/2020 at 06:03, Hewy said:

You certainly don't do things by halves john,cracking scratch building 👍

Thanks Glynn. Much appreciated.

A bit more done over the last couple of days.

First aid box made from thick card with added catch from an etched set for the Crusader. The three spare track links that were carried each side were cut from an old length of Hobbyboss tracks and cleaned up as best as possible. Hopefully, they will look better under a coat of paint. Shovel added and detailed with etched parts from an Eduard Sherman set. Stretchers were carried by many of these tanks, and so I made one from two pieces of Slater’s rod, and some paper soaked in dilute PVA glue. Once it was dry, it was fixed onto the rear of the left track guard, and secured to the shovel with a couple of straps.

 

Rear lights and etched brass brush guards added. The grouser vents are another piece of rubbish in this kit. I removed all of the detail from the front, glued a small base to each one, the same shape as the recess that they fit into, added an etched brass mesh to the front, a bolt head on top,and then glued them in place.

The engine deck, once again, is a poor fit. A bit of trimming was required before it would sit right, but even then, because the rear edge was beveled, it left a large gap. To get around this, I filed the edge down until it was no longer beveled, and then glued strips of 30x10 card to it. Before gluing it in place, I removed the moulded grab handles and replaced them with wire.

 

Exhaust deflector added.

 

John.

 

 

[Kris B]

Small unusual thinks added make the model unique. Looks good as always. 

[Bullbasket]

13 hours ago, Kris B said:

Small unusual thinks added make the model unique. Looks good as always. 

Thanks Chris. Your comments are much appreciated. The hull is almost finished now.

 

John.

[flashlight]

Very nice detailing, they will add a lot of realism to the model!

 

Have a nice day

Nick

[Bullbasket]

19 hours ago, flashlight said:

Very nice detailing, they will add a lot of realism to the model!

 

Have a nice day

Nick

Many thanks Nick for the comments. The hull is finished now, so hopefully, I'll be able to update the thread later. I'm just snowed under with work outside at the moment. I have a barn to demolish!

 

John.

[flashlight]

3 hours ago, Bullbasket said:

... I have a barn to demolish!

 

John.

Good luck with it and stay safe!

 

Nick

[Bullbasket]

The folding stowage shelf in the kit is way too thick, even if you fill it with the crew’s gear, so using it as a template, I cut a new one from 10thou card, and assembled it along with the hinges on the sides, made from 10x20 strip. Underneath, I glued four equal lengths of stretched sprue, to represent the gun cleaning rods.

 

Late, and post war Shermans, carried an infantry telephone on the right hand rear of the tank. There isn’t one in the kit, but the Easy Eight kit does contain one, so that was glued in place, along with a cable made from 15amp fuse wire.

The remaining tools were glued in place, along with some etched brackets and straps. The shaft for the pick axe in the kit was puny, so I carved a new one from thick cad, although I think that now, it’s a bit too big. Too late now.

 

Last bits and pieces around the front of the hull; periscope and headlamp brush guards in place from a Hauler set. The brush guard for the horn is from the etched set in the kit, but I’m not at all happy with it as it’s too thick. There’s a better one in the Hauler set if I can just pluck up the courage to solder it together.

 

 

The bow machine gun arrived after the photos were taken, so will be added later. Finally, I added a 5 gallon oil drum onto the forward track guard, and tied it in place with thin wire, and fixed a step to the transmission housing. I made it from some scrap etched brass.

 

Thanks for looking, and any comments are very welcome.

 

John.

[Terry1954]

This is coming along very nicely indeed  John. Love all the excellent added detail.  I may do a Sherman variant next, although after the IDF AMX-13, I'm tempted to resurrect a couple of shelf queen's, in the form of two M60's, one of which is part way through conversion to an early IDF Patton with the early round turret.

 

I know what you mean with "other" jobs. I've been pretty busy in the garden myself on some "restructuring"! Good luck with the barn.

 

Terry

[Bullbasket]

Thanks Terry. Yes, go with the M60. It would be a nice change to see this tank in it's earlier configuration with the IDF.

 

John.

[Dads203]

That’s looking the dogs mate, again the attention to detail is superb and the execution is first class John 

[ScanmanDan]

I didn't see this one till just now.  Excellent!  I love all the little details which will make the build sing when it comes time to paint.  I'm going to have to pinch that idea to tie something on with a wrap and twist of wire.  👍👍👍

[Hewy]

I agree, looking special john, i know how difficult those periscope guards are to get right ,they're so delicate, great job on those too

[M3talpig]

John that is looking lovely ....but i think you have the wrong gun travel lock on it ....now i might be wrong (i usually am according to the wife) but the Shermans sold to Israel were after the mutual defence program rebuilds and one of the mods to most or all was the changing of the travel lock..... instead of it being a gravity lock they converted them to a proper over the barrel lock...i know your a bit of a Sherman man that's the only reason i bring it up .....as always love what your doing bud this is gonna look BOMB next to your M51

 

Edited July 2, 2020 by M3talpig

[Bullbasket]

12 hours ago, Dads203 said:

That’s looking the dogs mate, again the attention to detail is superb and the execution is first class John 

Thanks Dan. It's an enjoyable build, but not as straight forward as I thought it would be, as I'm finding out.

 

John.

[Bullbasket]

20 hours ago, ScanmanDan said:

I didn't see this one till just now.  Excellent!  I love all the little details which will make the build sing when it comes time to paint.  I'm going to have to pinch that idea to tie something on with a wrap and twist of wire.  👍👍👍

Thanks Dan. The wire is a lot easier to use than finding a suitable thickness string.

13 hours ago, Hewy said:

I agree, looking special john, i know how difficult those periscope guards are to get right ,they're so delicate, great job on those too

Thanks Glynn. Yes the Hauler ones are quite delicate, but not as bad as the Eduard ones. They collapse if you just look at them!

13 hours ago, M3talpig said:

John that is looking lovely ....but i think you have the wrong gun travel lock on it ....now i might be wrong (i usually am according to the wife) but the Shermans sold to Israel were after the mutual defence program rebuilds and one of the mods to most or all was the changing of the travel lock..... instead of it being a gravity lock they converted them to a proper over the barrel lock...i know your a bit of a Sherman man that's the only reason i bring it up .....as always love what your doing bud this is gonna look BOMB next to your M51

 

Ah! Thanks for pointing that out. Along with the bow machine gun and replacing the horn brush guard, that was one of the jobs that I wanted to tackle (but promptly forgot!!). When I built this tank a couple of year ago in 1/35th, I did get it right. Also, your photo has reminded me that I also need to add some casting marks.

Thanks all for the comments.

 

John.

[Bullbasket]

Turret.

As I said earlier in the thread, the turret in the kit is the wrong one (round loader’s hatch), but fortunately I have an Easy Eight kit from Hobbyboss, which contains the correct turret (oval loader’s hatch). Unfortunately, that produces a problem. The E8 turret won’t fit onto the M4A1 hull because for some reason, Hobbyboss have made the turret rings two different sizes (about 2mm in diameter). My knowledge of Shermans isn’t that extensive, but I would have thought that the T-23 turret, whether equipped with an oval loaders hatch or a round one, would have been interchangeable between E8s and M4A1s.

So then I thought that I would just mate the E8’s upper turret with the M4A1’s lower. They’re incompatible! But, with a bit of snipping here and cutting there (and a wodge of Milliput), I got the two halves together. It just amazes me that Hobbyboss would produce kits in this fashion. I couldn’t see Tamiya producing them like that.

I also glued the mantlet with it’s dust cover in place. Again, this was a lousy fit and required some Milliput. While I had some filler made up, I put some around the rear ventilator, to represent the weld bead.

 

 

24 hours later, everything rubbed down and I’m happy with the result.

These tanks carried L section brackets on the rear of the turret for storing the .50 cal. MG when not in use. In the E8 kit, these are separate items, so it was easy enough to take a file and reduce the thickness before gluing in place. I also detailed the mount for the MG which goes onto the rear ventilator, with a couple of circles of card and the locking handle.

 

That's it for now. Possibly another update tomorrow. Thanks for looking and any comments.

 

John.

[Kris B]

Brrr, brass guards. You won with them. 

[Bullbasket]

2 hours ago, Kris B said:

Brrr, brass guards. You won with them. 

Yes, but I may have to change the one for the horn.

 

John.

[fatfingers]

Afternoon John,

 

Great work with the turret 👍

 

Regards,

 

Steve