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Mercedes L4500 A (AWD) and Anhanger (trailer)


Kelscale

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I started building my L4500 a year ago and although it reached the primer stage in March this year it has set idle since. I was recently inspired by some war time pics of columns of German vehicles abandoned during the retreat to the Seine in Aug 45. This led me to sketch up an idea of a small dio that involved a couple of vehicles which had been driven/pushed into a ditch at the side of the road. I will also add a few GI's inspecting the booty.  As I already had a few candidates already built and some in primer I set about choosing two which could work together.

 

The Zvezda 1/35 AWD L4500A has no tilt cover in the kit so I could display hastily thrown in loads, partially fallen out of both vehicles. With that idea in mind, I also decided to compliment the Mercedes with the ancient Azimut resin cargo trailer.  Although not stated on the box or in the instructions its military designation being Anhänger (Mehrachs) mit geschlossenem Aufbau. This was already built but as it had required a whole bunch of surgery on one side to cover a glaring gap it had also been left on the shelf of doom. You would think you couldn’t really go wrong with essentially a simple square boxy design, but the French company did 🙄   With essentially only one side visible, as both vehicles would be tilted at an angle in the ditch and butted up against a thick hedge, the trailer could be utilised without further work. This decision also determined the direction both vehicles would be displayed.  This was also fortunate as I had modelled the L4500 load bed cargo bin door open with items hanging out on the same visible side.

 

I won’t include a build log or build step pics as member Lummox is recently in the process of a detailed build of the L4500 where he scratch-builds many items and adds photo etch. He also addresses the shortfalls and addresses the issue of some inadequately moulded parts and missing components.

 

Apart from being a little creative in the cab by adding a few additional items including a fire extinguisher and adding rudimentary cooling pipes to the engine my kit is pretty much built out of the box. What was essential to address was the strange tyres included with the kit.  As they are moulded with the hubs an aftermarket set was purchased.

 

As both vehicles were likely to have had camo applied in the field, I was happy to create my own patterns. I started with the trailer which was Dunkelgelb base coated then lightly colour modulated.

 

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After a few attempts I was finally happy with this artistic pattern.  Although I didn't copy this from any ref pic, it does have a fleeting similarity with the box art, although that has been long since binned.

 

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The details on the rear door exteriors are extremely crude and there are no details on the inside faces.  As both doors will be displayed open, and the exterior features hidden it gave me a chance to add them back to front. A few missing hinge plates were added along with some interior details like side rails. A door mechanism catch plate on the floor was also added.

 

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To fill the void at the back of the interior some old rubber tyres and containers from the spares box were attached to a piece of card that was cut out to locate behind and between the wheel arches. This could be dry fitted and would form the basis of the visible load which would be complimented with more items that will be added fallen over and out of the back. These will be painted and added at a later stage.

 

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The trailer was then weathered in the following steps which occasionally required going back and forth and repeating to create a layered effect.  

 

Step one was some oil mapping and fading. Raised areas were also treated with a highlight colour of the base coat and shadows with a darker shade. This was then sealed with a coat of Tamiya semi clear gloss mixed with Clear yellow to bring back the colour tone and protect it from further steps.

Oils were used again to create a pin wash and create faint streaking and chipping.

The next step was a sprinkling of rust and dirt-coloured oils. These were flicked over the trailer from a distance along with some mud splatter marks carefully added closer behind the wheels and at the front where it would have attracted a lot of dirt build up. Any un-realistic larger spots were blended in to ensure a scale friendly appearance.

I then felt it then required an opaquer layer of dust around the lower areas, so a dust-coloured acrylic mix was created with Tamiya flat brown, German grey and Buff. This was lightly blown over the lower areas with an airbrush.

Finally, some small, selected areas of exposed metalwork were treated to rusty stains where the paint had chipped off.

 

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Although the trailer wheels are more oval shape than circular, they have been improved and will be employed and dry fitted for now.  I am still searching ref pics (which there are very few) so see if any alternative wheels and tyres may be suitable.

 

The load item parts will all be painted and weathered as I move onto positioning the vehicles on the groundworks so for now, we can move on to the L4500

Edited by Kelscale
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  • Kelscale changed the title to Mercedes L4500 A (AWD) and Anhanger (trailer)

Good evening from a windy North Wales, UK

 

Addressing the many ways of painting trucks is always worth careful consideration. For a kick-off handling it under paint can be tricky and then the cab interior often needs to be painted before being closed. Zvezda has not been too sympathetic with the engineering on the L4500 cab.  The roof rather than being one sheet as per the real vehicle has strangely been split into two sections. The front section is incorporated into the front windscreen panel. The rearward section is than a separate piece. Two avoid the messy job of cleaning the joint line after painting the interior I opted to connect both roof sections together during the build stage.  This still allows the interior to be painted and still affords good access to add instruments to the painted dash, which incidentally Zvezda don't provide in the kit! 

 

Another point of note is the cab doors are an extremely tight fit once the cab panels are fixed, so care is needed to dry fit them whilst attaching the rest of the main panels. This ensures even under paint they will (it is still a squeeze!) locate in the closed position once the cab is painted.  Once these little conundrums are resolved it was time to don a mask and move things to the spray booth.

 

The model had already received a primer coat of Mr surfacer 1500 so it was straight into base coating the cab interior. Once that was completed, I had to source some appropriate dash decals and fire extinguisher label from the spares bin. It has been well documented that it is looking likely the kits instrument panel and especially the protruding main circular binnacle is actual a post war feature. Fellow modeller Lummox has addressed this issue on his build so check out his 'work in progress' blog for how he resolved this.  Once the seat cushion and other small details inside were hand painted everything was sealed with a coat of satin varnish. Before I gave it a pin wash the kit's clear plastic windows were fitted, as they locate from the inside.  PVA glue held them in place and once happy with the fit, four tiny spots of rubber superglue were used to ensure they didn't fall in during masking. With the cab interior complete it was time to move on to the exterior.

 

I'm not a huge fan of hyper paint modulation on military vehicles. Especially when it comes to grading individual panels etc. It all looks too cartoony for my taste; however, I do think highlighting the base coat in a Zenethal style does have its merits.  I have been pleased with how this effect looked on a few of my recent monochrome finished builds. I figured even with a light coat of camo this was how I would paint this vehicle.

 

Using my trusty homemade mixes of Tamiya acrylics, the base coat consisted of four shades of Dunkelgelb with the highlighted colour only being applied from above.  The camo was completed with some acrylics I had not tried before. I had not heard of MRP paints until recently but had only heard good things about them.  One being, they sprayed well and could be used direct out of the bottle without thinning.  I had a great experience with them. They did indeed spray well without the need of thinner and although the red brown colour was a little thicker than the olive green, fine lines could be obtained even using a 0.4mm needle.

 

In my pre-occupation and enjoyment of how this painting session was going, I only snapped a few quick shots with my phone so apologies for the odd-looking pics. The black background coming from the handy app PhotoRoom to remove all the background paraphernalia around the spray booth.

 

 

Base coated cab. The exterior of the plastic screen has a shallow grove around the outside to represent the seal, so this was painted with a fine brush with a rubber colour. The demarcation line will be cleaned up with oils at a later stage.

 

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The load bed in MRP paint camo.  This was deliberately made to look untidy and lightly applied. The edges being finely formed first and then the pattern blocked in. The base coat modulation is difficult to see in this pic but will work better once further filtering, mapping, and weathering steps are made. The engine and gearbox are base coated in black primer and only dry fitted at this stage.

 

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The next step to tackle was the engine and gearbox. As it would only be visible through the driver’s side engine panel and from underneath I wasnt going to go overboard so these visible areas would receive most of my attention.

 

This is how it turned out

 

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At this point, I gave some thought as to how weathered the L4500 would need to look. In the late summer of 1944, the headlong retreat towards the Seine meant vast moving columns of tracked and wheeled vehicles heading rapidly in one direction. With than in mind and the fact that so much of the underside of the truck would be visible I decided to weather this area first.

 

Armed with some nice cruddy under vehicle reference pics at hand I had an idea in my mind of how I would approach the next few stages.

 

I had blended oils and pigments successfully on a few tiny areas of previous projects and as the process had worked to my liking again on the engine this convinced me to follow the same approach.  I have always liked the excellent 502 range of Abtielung oils so along with the old white top bottles of MIG pigments I started on the lubrication points of the running gear.

 

Soon it was clear that I liked the effects that blending the two mediums could create. Testing the process on an old tank beforehand gave me an idea what results could be achieved when mixing various amounts, colours, and blending techniques. Importantly, as with normal oil application it is important to bleed out the linseed. Apart from the oil colours like grease for example, this will always ensure a totally matt finish.

 

This is what I ended up with after a prolonged session at the bench

 

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Edited by Kelscale
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The next steps involved completing the camo on the cab sub-assembly. Once completed it was sealed with a coat of Tamiya semi-gloss varnish mixed with a drop of clear yellow. A pin wash with oils was then applied. Darker at the bottom areas.

Next up was to create a first layer of road dust. This was carried out using the hairspray technique. A colour close to the rubble pigment used on the underside was mixed with grey, brown, and buff acrylics and carefully sprayed from frontal and underside areas that dust and dirt would have hit the vehicle.  Once dry this was agitated with water. Being mindful that rainwater and general crew activity would have impacted this dusty layer more in certain areas, I went about removing some of the paint. I used downward stokes of the brush to recreate vertical streaking and highlighting areas like door edges, handles, and generally places where crew members would have sat or worked on.

 

The cab sub assembly ready for fixing to the chassis. Masking liquid was used to protect the windcreen and rear window

 

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52 minutes ago, Lummox said:

Yay! You just can't have too many L4500s :wink:

Too right😉   I have got the Maultier in the stash.  Might stick the Einheitsfahrerhaus on it and do a kit bash in the future

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23 minutes ago, Lummox said:

Awesome paint work - that cruddy underside is truly a work of art.

Any chance I can drop mine off at your gaff and let you paint it for me?

Cheers. First pop at this on such a large area. I think it came out well. Difficult not to keep refining it but it's meant to look random

 

What paint scheme are you planning?

 

 

19 minutes ago, Lazy Modeller said:

Marvellous work on the Bussing

Cheers

LM

Cheers LM, thanks for the kind words

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I always look forward to tying in all the sub-assemblies. It’s great when they are a simple fix but, in this case, there were numerous potential pitfalls ahead.  One of my main concerns was that as you cannot add the engine after the bulkhead is located, the only way you can have good access to paint the engine is to leave fixing the cab sub-assembly to one of the last building steps. Also adding the fenders to the chassis before fixing the cab in place meant that another fitment issue could arise.  Compounding this is the fact that locating the whole thing over the engine in situ was an extremely tight fit.  Once negotiated then additional care would be required to get the cab to sit square on the chassis as there are no locating tabs, only two fat runners underneath the cab floor. Affixing would be by eye with help from the rear window and front panel spacing.

 

I am glad to report all went well. With the wheels now attached the next steps will involve balancing all the weathered components together and attaching all the small fragile items such as wipers and latch chains.  Those chunks of plastic representing the trafficators is still bugging me. I need to find a way of making them look a little more convincing

 

It's coming together

 

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That engine looks perfect. The colour and texture of the oily crud, and the colour of the exhaust manifold are spot on.

I've worked on engines for years, and find it really frustrating that I cannot reproduce the look of one even though I know exactly what they should be like, but you've nailed it.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Managed to sneak a few more hours at the bench over the last couple of evenings, so as most of the metal bodywork is complete, I started with weathering the wooden cargo areas where I left off.

 

Utilising the same pallete of oil colours that had been used previously I continued along the driver’s side wooden side rails adding general dirt and wear build up. Starting with the lightest colours and working back and forth along the side this process involved adding the oils dry, and occasionally even a little damp, depending how much blending out was required. Some areas also received various colours dry brushed on for some variation. Finally, I added some staining and speckling with more diluted mixes.


 

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The graffiti was hand painted on with acrylics as was the tarp hanging out of the storage box. 

 

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The cab doors are still only dry fitted but I am happy with matching the interior finish on them, although admittedly the kits handles look way oversize!

 

To combat the lack of actual trafficators I simply painted a dark grey stripe down the middle of the kit part to simulate the arm inside the housing.  Not perfect but I am happy with it.

 

In the next session I am hoping to complete the rear cargo panel and start on the actual loaded items. I am still slowly accumulating aftermarket bits and bobs that will fill the cargo area, so I will also begin building and painting these items.

 

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Edited by Kelscale
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