miniart M3 Lee (interior)

[Patrykd]

In my opinion the paint is too dark

[Bertie McBoatface]

I think the pigments have worked really well and suggest applying some to those very clean roadwheel tyres.

 

Also the inside of the track where the roadwheels run would be clear of paint.

 

Other than these quibbles I'm very impressed with your build. I'm doing one myself next year and I'll be delighted to reach your standard.

[Milan Mynar]

To build models made by Miniart is really artwork. They are ultimate kits with many parts. They are completely out of my modeller´s abilities. I admire everybody who finished MiniArt kit.

[Kingsman]

1 hour ago, Patrykd said:

In my opinion the paint is too dark

I would have to agree.  And it's too green.  OD was not a true green, being made solely from ochre and black.  Early war - this tank's period - OD was quite brown but later it became more greyish.

 

Another point on the chipping.  The native colour of steel armour plate, whether face-hardened or rolled homogenous, is a dark chocolate brown.  There would not be bright silver wear or chipping on the armoured parts.  But there might be on the sheet metal parts if the damage was fresh: it would rust up in days.  Armour plate on the other hand rusts only very slowly compared to milder steels.

[Model Mate]

Thanks for the feedback folks - I admit I'm not much of a stickler for true-colours; I tend to just grab what's to hand, and with all the oils and so on, this one has ended up getting darker and darker. Good point on the steel Das Abteilung - I shall try to restain my graphite use! I'll be adding a bit more dirt and dust to the running gear once it's in place on its base.

 

I’ve had a few days off, and the opportunity to get a fair bit of model time in, so this update is a biggie from me! MODEL FRENZY!

 

I popped the hatches off with the flick of a scalpel tip – Klear/Future works really well as a temporary glue.

 

…and started thinking about the diorama. I’d got hold of Miniart’s Soviet gun-cleaning tank crew, so the plan is to have them cleaning the gun barrel and tinkering with the motor on the steppe, before heading off into victorious battle.

 

Now, it might be logical for me to shuffle over to the diorama section and/or the figure pages here on BM, but I’d like to get my initial work on these subjects at least started here – I know a lot of us mud ‘n rivets types at least flirt with both of these, if everyone’s ok with that? Please let me know if not and I’ll move those bits out.

 

First the figures.

 

The Minimart set is as expected, great. Although I did find a bit of flash(!) on the mouldings. The mould seams are engineered to be as inconspicuous as possible, running down the back of the boots in the natural seam for example, but the figures did need quite a lot of cleanup. Now please forgive me if I’m teaching granny to suck eggs here, but I found a tip a while ago that really works (maybe here on BM – I can’t remember) – use the back of your blade (scalpel, Xacto) to scrape/flatten them; not the sharp side. It really works. Smooth over with Tamiya extra thin and you’re done.

 

What didn’t work though, was making up the figures – seemingly the easy bit. As I would usually, I started glueing them together (minus heads for the most part here) and bingo, you’ve got all your chaps lined up, but of course, 3 of these boys are all supposed to be pulling on the same stick, and the tiny variations in arm angle, lean, resulting centre of gravity and so on that result when they’re made up individually means they won’t be able to. A lack of any kind of locating tabs in the moulds really doesn’t help here….

 

Luckily I hadn’t completed all of them. The centre guy was fixed, the rearmost was also done and pretty off line, but the front man hadn’t had his arms attached thankfully. I snapped off back-man’s right arm and cleaned up the joint as best I could.

 

The kit comes with a two part moulded stick, which looks a bit lumpy to me, and would be a massive pain to use, breaking and bending as well as not looking very good. I replaced it with a 100mm length of iron wire, rolled flat and straight under a metal ruler.

 

Next, I drilled everyone’s hands out. The entry and exit points are reasonably clear on the mouldings, and I managed to get pretty clean holes, working up from 0.5 to 0.7ish diameter and then “wiggling” the holes a little to get a slack fit for the stick. I also drilled foot holes (1 per figure) and added metal pins.

 

I took a piece of HIPS board (High Impact Polystyrene) that I’ve been using on my current diorama build, and drilled holes for the boys, moving and re-drilling until I got them positioned about right, with middle-man holding the stick like an oversized javelin. I then fitted back-man’s right arm back on. Badly. Front-man’s arms were lifted into position and glued a bit better, but there were still some serious gaps.

 

And here comes my second top tip, and I think this might be original(?) – probably not. I used the drill swarf from the earlier hole drilling and laid swirls onto the joints, damping them into place using plenty of Tamiya extra thin and smoothing over with the brush. Instant; on demand sprue-goo.

 

The other chap (mechanic) was a doddle.

 

Lesson learned – this kit is a KIT and needs treating as one (complicated, and poorly aligned) model in its own right.

 

I also cleaned up the heads and fixed them onto bits of wire for separate painting.

 

Both the bodies and heads were given a very thin, brush applied coat of Humbrol 67 matt grey. I always prime figures using this paint, highly thinned, but I tried applying it really thin this time, as a wash really, to try to get a bit of preshade. Hopefully, the acrylics onto top can be applied thin enough to show a little shade through.

 

There is another challenge with the figures. They’re designed (I think) to be attending a T-34. They come with a bunch of T-34 ammo boxes and shells – clue. But the T-34 has a turret. The M3 has a hull mounted gun that is lower than a T-34’s and can’t depress any lower than I’ve fixed it. The gun cleaning crew are pulling down, and the angles don’t match up.

 

So I laid out the tank and the figures onto the HIPS base-board using shims of HIPS, with the boys standing at a bit of a slope whilst servicing the tank below. I’ll build up the ground using plaster and so on around this.

 

[Model Mate]

And there’s more! – Diorama time….

 

I prepped the HIPS base-board by cutting a few slices into it to help provide a key for the filler and then shovelled on a load of pre-mixed filler with a fair bit of PVA added. I pushed a few cocktail sticks in the figures’ holes with 3mm depth gauges marked with masking tape – the idea being that I could build the whole base up by 3mm to maintain the slope and levels I need. Side boards wiped with olive oil were taped into place to shutter the sides.

 

I shovelled in nearly a whole tub of cheap filler, left it to dry and immediately started fretting over it. The HIPS is reasonably flexible. Dry plaster isn’t. Wet plaster is – very, i.e. runny and heavy. All in all, I wasn’t convinced, and sure enough, as it dried out, cracks appeared. And it looked rubbish, needs painting and offers little chance to tinker with levels later if they’re off (which they almost certainly are).

 

In the bin with this! So: plan B. Should have been plan A really….

 

I reinsulated my boat a few years ago with 25mm Kingspan insulation panel seconds. The offcuts have proved to be a brilliant diorama material, and it’s only my starting to run low on them that prevented them from being plan A I guess.

 

Anyway, I knew I needed the pulling crew to be 15mm higher than the tank, dropping down to 5mm for the front man. I cut a piece of MDF and no-more-nails’d on a slice and a half of the insulation board in irregular lumps, after cutting a cross hatch into the aluminium foil backing to prevent it warping with all the PVA and water that will sluice all over it in due course. 

 

 

To finish off, and smooth off, use your fingers like sandpaper – works a treat.

 

I ended up with a few steps in the landscape, so I mixed the dust/shavings that resulted from all the scraping with diluted PVA and mashed it into place to fill the gaps. The texture was very different to the surrounding smooth, rock or dry mud-like surface, so I extended it in patches other than just the join areas to increase the variety.

 

Once the basic lansdscaping was done, I placed the figures and the tank on the scene to check the levels. All good, so the holes for the figures’ feet were marked with cocktail sticks and the tank-track footprints were roughly scraped into the base using the handle of a paintbrush.

 

With the infills touch dry-ish, I gathered my tile grout and cat litter and started sloshing watered down PVA all over it. I like the colour of this insulation board; it’s got a good variable earth tone and it’s a shame to lose it all under paint, so I’m keen to find a technique/system that doesn’t rely on painting at all, but can bring the right colour as the wet materials are applied.

 

I added a few drops of Vallejo acrylic khaki to a pot of watery PVA and dribbled this in random splodges across the landscape. These had grey tile grout sprinkled over. I really need to get a light brown or white coloured grout as this grey is pretty resistant to taking on another colour. Alternate splotches of PVA hosted little piles of finely-crushed cat litter and raw cat litter (with the blue bits painstakingly removed) and the whole lot was soaked in the coloured PVA and then left to dry.

 

[Model Mate]

Thick and fast! ....I really like having a bit of time off work!

 

So back to the crew and the tank while all that PVA dries – could be a while!

 

I decided to go a bit further with the whole prime/preshade business and drydrushed the figures with white enamel. I tried this reasonably successfully on my recent 1:12 scratchbuilt figures, and can’t see why it wouldn’t work at 1:35. I plan to spray their main uniform colours at least.

 

The interior of all the hatches and doors were brush painted with Tamiya olive drab and then scratched using a sponge and Vallejo Russian uniform green which worked much better than my earlier grey on the outside. A black oil wash and a touch of burnt umber preceded a final drybrush with the aforementioned Russian green. I also dirtied-up the insides of the engine doors a little.

 

Next I airbrushed the boys with Vallejo model-air IJN brown and just a tiny drop of water. Too much water makes this paint go a bit funny in my experience, but a tiny bit helps if flow really well. Here they are partying in the sunshine on the roof of my boat – looks like they’re having fun – especially the chap with the oversized coat. He’s not wearing his jacket under this, so I masked him and sprayed his shirt using Tamiya yellow-green about 50/50 with Tamiya thinner.

 

I think the preshade worked rather well, though perhaps I should have sprayed the white primer coat rather than drybrush it for a smoother result on the highlights.

 

Back to the land…..

 

After all the mud and rocks had dried overnight, I mixed up some more khaki-brown diluted PVA and dripped and dribbled squiggles and pools over the base in a random pattern, though I avoided the large rock piles. I sprinkled 2mm autumn static grass on, concentrating on the lower level. More squiggles and I applied summer, then spring 2mm, focussing mainly on one side and the “hill”. More PVA squiggles followed for an overall coating using my “left-over” bag – all the sweepings from previous dioramas; some long, some short. I also glued on a couple of brown and dark green tufts at the edges.

 

 

And back to the tank (after all this is in the armour section!)…..

 

I’d already pre-painted some of the tools and so snipped them all off the sprues – familiar, delicate Miniart parts; anyone recognise this problem….?

 

I also painted the twisted copper wire cable I’d made up, but I admit I lost my enthusiasm for tackling a load of miniscule PE required to fit this lot onto the back deck for now. Maybe I should have fitted it earlier, before painting? Not sure either way to be honest; if I’d glued them on earlier, I’d only have knocked them off a billion times by now, though I’ll doubtless need to do a fair bit of in-situ and touch up painting to finish them off the way I’m doing it.

 

I glued the headlight lenses in using a drop of Klear, after “painting” the inside using a silver permanent marker, and got the black wash applied to the track horns, followed by a swipe with a soft graphite block/pencil. The front tow-brackets got a chain added and I brushed a bit of extra pastel dust over the lower hull. From what I’ve seen of these Soviet machines in period photos, they don’t feature covered in kit and stowage, and my lot are preparing for battle, so I’m choosing not to cover it all up with jerry cans, spare wheels, blankets and so on, though if the tool deck is a disaster, that might change!

 

Here’s how everything stands now (minus the crew as they’re drying after a spray coat of Klear). My couple of days off have come to an end, so don’t expect then next updates to be as quick or detailed!

 

 

[Bertie McBoatface]

You should use the broken axe. That's where real ones break.

 

This is coming along really well. I like the second base very much and the cleaning crew look like a Stalinist statue, fabulously heroic.

 

 

[edjbartos]

Great work, tank looks great, really nice detail. The figures really do look good and I like the way you have done the diorama and shown us how to have made it. Good work 👍

 

Ed

[Bullbasket]

You've certainly covered some ground since I last visited. It's all looking very good. I like the idea of using the corks for holding figures whilst painting them. That set of figures is very good. I think that I have the same set included in their Soviet truck kit.

 

John.

[Model Mate]

I pulled out the paintbrushes and started attacking the crew. I’ve been wavering between “traditional” acrylic painting and using oil washes. I’ve found my figures often look a bit too “clean” and toy like when I just paint them using acrylics and I find it difficult to get shading and highlights right. The fact that acrylics dry so quickly doesn’t help here as there’s little opportunity to adjust coats as you go. I’m keen to try different techniques and try to find other/better ways to paint. For these, I’m planning to preshade, spray base coat(s) (already done), then add details using acrylics and shadows using very thin oil washes.

 

I applied burnt umber and then a brown/black mix to the shadow areas and after leaving them for a bit, “dry-brushed” them using a slightly thinner-moistened flat brush to remove the paint from the highlights. At this stage it was difficult to determine how things were going due to the figures being pretty shiny.

 

When all was dry, I sprayed them using well thinned W&N matt varnish. Overall, I’m reasonably happy, though I know I can do better, particularly with the faces. I really must use my magnifiers rather than just strong reading glasses. They do look suitably dark and dirty, which is overall what I was aiming for. On the downside, middle-man somehow lost his right hand in transit which is a bit of a pain (for him and me!).

 

 

 

[Model Mate]

I fixed the chaps onto their stick and replaced middle-man’s hand using a blob of green stuff. The hand and the stick got a coat of paint and the boys were all superglued into position. I’ll add a little tile grout around the pulling team’s feet to hide any gravity defying antics and show where they’ve disturbed the soil in their efforts. They’re already sunk into the pretty soft foam already, so it’ll just be a touch up really.

 

 

I realised that the tank was hovering a bit, and not sitting firmly in/on the ground, so I deepened the track marks. I placed the vehicle in position and marked the extents of the track using cocktail sticks.

 

I then joined these up (and extended them to the edge of the base) using a smallish file to press into the foam earth. The coloured PVA had seeped nicely into the uppermost levels of the foam, and crushing it like this produced a nice, broken earth effect. Once the tank’s in place, I may run a little more PVA along the edges of the track-trenches and sprinkle a little more tile grout on as crests of displaced top gravel/dirt.

 

Just the tank to finish really. I’m at that point where I want it all finished now, and lo and behold, there’s the tiniest flecks of PE left to attach the tools which I’m not looking forward to. One of the jacks has already fed the carpet monster, but as this vehicle appears to have plenty on board, I’ll put that down to wear and tear!

[echen]

The carpet monster has a lot to answer for!

Terrific figures. They'll go well with the well built Lee you've produced. 👏

[Bullbasket]

Have to  agree, those figures do look really good. Nice work.

 

John.

[metadyne]

excellent work, the M3 really lends itself to an open hatch scene, it's big and the open hatches really show off the interior and make it look like a mechanical object and not just an empty shell. Your use of the figures really sets the scene too. Lovely work. 

[Ned]

Oh no, I've just gone and bought one. This will be a 40+ year itch scratched, I've wanted one of these oddities ever since Airfix did them in the late 1970s.

It was that radial engine that did it.

[dov]

Hallo Mate

 

Well done.

I start my tank right now. The track chain causeses a little headache.

I concern about the glueing process, to keep the links loose for free movement!

 

Happy modelling

[Model Mate]

Finally there! I decided I really needed to blow the dust off this one and shift it from the shelf of doom where it’s been languishing for far too long.

 

I’ll admit I cut a few corners right at the end here – there’s a fair few tools and external fittings missing. The engine deck didn’t really find a comfortable home in the scene, and was a bit of a botch anyway, so I simply left it out.

 

The doors were stuck on, a few last pieces glued in place, some oily gubbins from the engine plopped on the floor and an aerial from stretched sprue added.

And that’s it – I’ll post a few more pics in RFI.