M49 Fuel Tanker

[Hockeyboy76]

Some great trucking work as usual dude. 

[busnproplinerfan]

Seems they don't care about ejection marks in trucks as much as they do with tanks.

[JeroenS]

So there I was, happily sanding the filler away, and I could only think of one thing: the M35 has the same sprues! It's going to be Groundhog Day. I don't know why I decided to build 2 of these trucks, I really don't like doing things more than once. Well, things like these anyway. 

 

 

And then I found out there's a pin mark on the outside! Who does that? Is that even legal? It shouldn't be....

[modelling minion]

Never a fun task filling these holes and doing it twice is even worse, the parts do look better for it though.

I thought that it was just Airfix that put pin marks in visible places, obviously not!

[busnproplinerfan]

Anyone know where to get an M54A2 for not much? Just asking.

[JeroenS]

1 hour ago, modelling minion said:

I thought that it was just Airfix that put pin marks in visible places, obviously not!

Nope, apparently not! I haven't built that many kits since my return to this lovely hobby of ours 3 years ago, I think something like 13, but these are the most pin marks I've seen so far. And in very obvious places too. Having said that, there's not much else wrong with this kit in terms of fit and I'd rather fill some holes then having to spend a lot of time making parts fit at all.

 

Anyway, the cab floor and walls have been assembled and I hope the marks will be alright like this. 

 

 

I always try to assemble as much of the cab as I can in order to paint it in one go, instead of having to assemble painted parts. Also, I want to paint the chassis separately as well. 

 

The instructions have you mounting the part with the underside of the engine and the fenders first. 

 

 

You slide it in at an angle to fit it under the little knob on the transmission which I've encircled. I don't like that, because what I'd like to do know is build up the cab, glueing the parts in situ, so I know everything is in the right place, and then take everything off again to paint chassis and cab separately. 

 

The cab side walls fit over the fenders. 

 

 

The radiator at the front. That would be the part that's out of focus 🙂 

 

 

And finally the hood. 

 

 

If I were to glue the cab's parts now, I wouldn't be able to get it off because of that little knob. So either I'm going to cut the knob off completely, or I will make a hole for it in the underside of the "engine" so I can slide the whole cab back over it once paint is on and glue the whole thing to the chassis. Dry fit of the cab looks promising. 

[JeroenS]

11 minutes ago, busnproplinerfan said:

Anyone know where to get an M54A2 for not much? Just asking.

The real thing or the model kit? Just asking 🙂 

[JeroenS]

OK, being Dutch I compromised... I cut out a piece of the engine and I left some of the knob in place to help with placement of the part. 

 

 

Of course I cut off a little too much so there's now a small gap but the underside of the truck will not be on display anyway. My plan can now be executed. Well, tomorrow. 

[busnproplinerfan]

7 hours ago, JeroenS said:

The real thing or the model kit? Just asking 🙂 

Love the real one but no where to park it and I'm not a mechanic to fix it. Use it to go to the mailbox on the corner. I'll stick to the smaller one.

[JeroenS]

1 hour ago, busnproplinerfan said:

Love the real one but no where to park it and I'm not a mechanic to fix it. Use it to go to the mailbox on the corner. I'll stick to the smaller one.

Probably a good choice... the mileage must be terrible on such a thing too 🙂 

 

I bought my M35 on ak-interactive.com. They have an m54 for €47,50.... Could be worse I guess, but still... 

 

https://ak-interactive.com/product/m54a2-5-tpm-6x6-cago-truck-1-35/

 

[busnproplinerfan]

to bad the Cdn dollar is the s...s.

[JeroenS]

I continued work on the cab tonight. First I glued in the radiator. I "tacked" it while the parts were dry fitted on the chassis, then I took them off and applied more glue. I always use Extra Thin glue and I wanted to make sure I didn't glue everything to the chassis at this point. 

 

 

When this was done I glued the cab's left side to both the fender and the side of the radiator, pushing the latter inward a little bit. 

 

 

Next, while holding the hood in the correct place I glued the right side to the fender. 

 

Time to mount the grille. A fragile piece of plastic and some PE. The plastic was a little hard to get off the sprue because the stubs were a little short. But, my new Master Tools single blade nipper which I recently purchased was up to the job. I really like these nippers, they will also help me a lot with my MiniArt kits. 

 

 

Because I mounted the winch (this is optional) the bottom parts of both the plastic part and the PE needed to be cut away, which I did. I applied some thin CA to attach the PE to the plastic like so: 

 

 

It took some online reference photo's to track down the correct position of this grille, because the instructions are really unclear some of the time. 

 

 

But I managed, and fixed the hood in place as well. It looks like the grille is sticking out from under it but that's the lighting. 

 

Goal achieved: chassis and cab are still separate pieces and are easily put together once primer and first coat of paint are on. I'll glue them together for the final painting, but at least I know I have paint everywhere, especially on the chassis. 

 

 

Edited August 27, 2020 by JeroenS
Forgot the last picture

[modelling minion]

Definitely becoming more truck shaped Jeroen.

You are cracking along with this one.

[JeroenS]

Added stuff to the chassis. This is finished now. 

 

 

Tank is next, that should be fun!

[reini]

Looking like a truck already - and pretty fast job! No DIY parts (or completely scratch built kit) this time, but this is interesting stuff nevertheless. Kit is looking nice and detailed as-is - and the PE parts add a lot, like that grille.

[Hewy]

Nicley done jeroen 👍

[busnproplinerfan]

To bad no one makes the under hood detail in aftermarket. I want to copy the M52 as a tractor in 1/25.

[JeroenS]

1 hour ago, busnproplinerfan said:

To bad no one makes the under hood detail in aftermarket. I want to copy the M52 as a tractor in 1/25.

Right, obviously AFV Club left the door for an aftermarket engine open but there are none.

[JeroenS]

So, I got sidetracked a little bit by last weekend's Blitz Build but I've returned to the fueler and started on the tank. 

 

Lots of interesting stuff going on at the back. 

 

 

They are actually still sub assemblies. There's some more to put together but I'd like to see if painting would still work when it's all together before I glue everything in place. 

 

 

 

[modelling minion]

Some very nice details at the back of the tank there, will look great when painted up. 

[JeroenS]

Tanker buildup. 

 

Sides first. Still needs the walkways. 

 

Then the top. 

 

 

At least, so I thought but turns out it probably wasn't the optimal order as the top goes inside the side walls... So I had to "finesse" it in place. Not really a big problem, you can sort of slide/ wiggle it in. Maybe it was the better option but we'll never know. 

 

It needs a back wall, like so, and I really would like to paint it like this. But, I won't be able to mount the contraption on the right with the back wall in place. 

 

 

I will leave the back wall off, paint the pump compartment and the other bit with the pipes first (this bit also needs a couple of decals), glue that in place and then mount the back wall. After which I can paint the tank as a whole which I prefer. There are also 2 doors for the compartment, I want to leave them open but I think I'll PVA them in place so I can paint them along with the tank, then take them off again. Saves masking the painted (and decalled) insides too. 

[JeroenS]

Say, @Dads203, if I may, I have a question about colour. I think you might just be able to enlighten me. Is Tamiya XF-62 the right Olive Drab for Vietnam era trucks? And if not, what should I mix it with to get the (more or less) correct colour? 

[Dads203]

44 minutes ago, JeroenS said:

Say, @Dads203, if I may, I have a question about colour. I think you might just be able to enlighten me. Is Tamiya XF-62 the right Olive Drab for Vietnam era trucks? And if not, what should I mix it with to get the (more or less) correct colour? 

I think XF-62 is a good match, a little tamiya flesh helps for fading and a touch of yellow for modulation, you only need a touch of yellow so don’t go mad with the stuff 

[modelling minion]

A very neat job building the tank up, all the pipes and plumbing at the rear certainly make it look very nicely detailed.

[JeroenS]

I've completed the major sub-assemblies. First the sidewalks or running boards or whatever they're called were fitted, after sanding them quite a bit lengthwise. They were too wide initially. 

 

 

Then I replaced these

 

 

with these. 

 

 

The moulded on plastic parts kept bending and were bound to break. I think it would have been better if they had been separate parts, which you can attach after all the handling is done.

 

So now we have these 3 components. 

 

 

Dry fit... starting to look like something. 

 

 

 

Ready for paint.