Every Vally Shall Be Exalted - The Valentine Tank Family Vol.1 - Finished

[echen]

Wow! Just, Wow! Intricate or what?

[Bertie McBoatface]

 

1 minute ago, echen said:

Wow! Just, Wow! Intricate or what?

 

But if I can lace all that air together, paint it without clogging it, and fit it to the tank, it's going to look as ridiculously flimsy as the real thing, which would be very pleasing.

[ColonelKrypton]

30 minutes ago, Bertie Psmith said:

They do look good though, don't they?

 

They are certainly starting to look the part.

 

I must go back re-read and review the pictures of your TP/LTS/UTS adventure. I have a set of Bronco WE210 ( double I ) track links that I will have to assembly before too long. Thankfully a little bigger but still five pieces ( 1x TP, 1x LTS, 1x UTS, and 2x TP end retainers) for each link and 84 in total for each side. Every little trick and idea will help.

 

Also, I recall you posting something a while back about a mask / respirator that you had recently purchased and were quite pleased with. I looked but couldn't find the post - somewhere within the many pages of your Mk IV build I think.  What was the brand and model?

 

cheers, Graham

 

[Bertie McBoatface]

12 minutes ago, ColonelKrypton said:

Bronco WE210 ( double I ) track links

 

I've done those darned things (insufficient expletive power available here) on my RAM tank. Getting the end retainers aligned is absolutely vital or they look like a dead centipede's legs. I could not make mine move at all but resorted to 'link and length'-ing the thing. I was very new to post-elastic-band tech at the time.

 

The mask is from 3M and is a

 

5251+

or FFA1P2 R D

or 20285C

 

It has three numbers on it!

 

Cheap, comfy, no hassle with replacement carts, doesn't leak and doesn't fog glasses.

[f matthews]

I built these tracks for my MkI AFV Vally. They are made far simpler (and moderately workable) if you cut the double-bar “pin set” in half.  Glue up all the shoes, then insert the pins from each side, applying glue to

only one pin in one hole.  The other pin and hole are held in place by the first and are moveable because there is no glue in the second hole.

 

Also remember that you’ll need to build the retractable antenna system for the turret rear for the earlier radio (No. 10 iirc) and the wheels are much different on the Mk I/early Mk II than those from the Mk II/IV.

Note that the rear radiator compartment door handles are installed backwards here (my error):

 

Edited December 25, 2021 by f matthews

[Bertie McBoatface]

46 minutes ago, f matthews said:

I built these tracks for my MkI AFV Vally. They are made far simpler (and moderately workable) if you cut the double-bar “pin set” in half.  Glue up all the shoes, then insert the pins from each side, applying glue to

only one pin in one hole.  The other pin and hole are held in place by the first and are moveable because there is no glue in the second hole.

 

Also remember that you’ll need to build the retractable antenna system for the turret rear for the earlier radio (No. 10 iirc) and the wheels are much different on the Mk I/early Mk II than those from the Mk II/IV.

 

That's an interesting option for the tracks, thanks.

 

The radio is no problem because the prototype as I'm building it had no radio fit at all but the wheels, the wheels are very different, as you say. It's clear on the diagram in ITV but wasn't listed on the idiot's guide list that I was following. I'm going to ask you to keep this quiet and I'll just hope that nobody notices. Shhhhh!

 

I like your model. It's a splendid paint job. Tell me, what kind of tracks does the AFV Mk.I come with?

[f matthews]

3 hours ago, Bertie Psmith said:

 

That's an interesting option for the tracks, thanks.

 

The radio is no problem because the prototype as I'm building it had no radio fit at all but the wheels, the wheels are very different, as you say. It's clear on the diagram in ITV but wasn't listed on the idiot's guide list that I was following. I'm going to ask you to keep this quiet and I'll just hope that nobody notices. Shhhhh!

 

I like your model. It's a splendid paint job. Tell me, what kind of tracks does the AFV Mk.I come with?

The AFV has the later tracks, hut in rubber-band form, which is a no-go for me.  I had the opposite problem building the AFV Vally Mk II, which has the early MkI wheels.  I had to order a set of Accurate Armour wheels (like the ones in the Tamiya kit)!  If you were in the US, I’d happily send them to you (shipping has gotten ridiculous and is more than a whole new kit)!

Edited December 25, 2021 by f matthews

[Bertie McBoatface]

7 hours ago, f matthews said:

The AFV has the later tracks, hut in rubber-band form, which is a no-go for me.  I had the opposite problem building the AFV Vally Mk II, which has the early MkI wheels.  I had to order a set of Accurate Armour wheels (like the ones in the Tamiya kit)!  If you were in the US, I’d happily send them to you!

Thanks anyway, I’ll probably acquire a set eventually from some Vally kit or another and until then I’ll claim that the prototype was testing the new wheel design. I’ll leave them shinier than the idler and sprocket. And affix them with soluble glue.
 

I'm going to use your track method for the flat sections and mine for going around the corners, I think. Sort of a variation of link and length style. 
 

Don’t laugh at me but I was really annoyed with myself for not thinking of it independently. I spent hours not seeing the obvious! 🙄

[Troy Smith]

On 18/12/2021 at 12:33, Bertie Psmith said:

 

I’ll be using both of these excellent books a lot but it would be unfair to reproduce them at length or copy photographs as they are both still in print

AFAIK Into The Valley is OOP,  it's blinkin' expensive on Amazon.  Shame, looks a good book.   

 

Very interesting project,  I look forward to it's progression.

 

Cheers

T

[Bertie McBoatface]

5 hours ago, Troy Smith said:

AFAIK Into The Valley is OOP,  it's blinkin' expensive on Amazon.  Shame, looks a good book.   

Does that mean I can copy it freely? Is in print the same as in copyright? I don’t want to get @Mike in trouble.

 

And yes, it’s a lovely book. I must have been lucky to find it at reasonable cost. That’s what started this whole thing off. 

[Bertie McBoatface]

13 hours ago, f matthews said:

Glue up all the shoes, then insert the pins from each side, applying glue to

only one pin in one hole.  The other pin and hole are held in place by the first and are moveable because there is no glue in the second hole

 

I just tried this but handling the pieces was so fiddly, especially lining the two halves of the shoes accurately that it won't work for me.

 

However, I found the missing 'link' in my method. I've made a tiny slightly sticky patch on the bench with double sided tape. This holds the shoe / LTP still while I work on it and is far more stable than that piece of blu-tac at the end. I'm doing a link a minute now with full movement every time.

[Milan Mynar]

Hallo guys, there is a question. Which metal barrel I have to buy for this kit?

 

[Bertie McBoatface]

 

Even faster now! But there is a definite limit to my concentration on this job so I will work in short sessions allowing glue to set fully between them.

 

[Bertie McBoatface]

32 minutes ago, Milan Mynar said:

Which metal barrel I have to buy for this kit?

 

I'm sorry but I have no knowledge of those things. I've never used one.

[Pig of the Week]

Somehow I managed to miss this whole build !... just gone thru the lot, and will be following now of course...what an interesting little tank, not one I've ever really looked at tbh , epic job with those tiny track pieces

[Bertie McBoatface]

44 minutes ago, Pig of the Week said:

not one I've ever really looked at

 

Our unsung hero.

[diablo rsv]

Nice work with those tracks Bertie, probably my least favourite part of building tanks.

 

 

7 hours ago, Milan Mynar said:

Which metal barrel I have to buy for this kit?

The barrel you need for the Mk.XI. is the OQFF 75mm. RB Model do one I believe but they are getting harder to find as RB Model seems to have ceased trading.

 

Wayne

[Milan Mynar]

Thank you Wayne, I try to find RB Model product.

[Bertie McBoatface]

Perhaps inspired by the Blitzenbuilders, I'm hoofing along today.

 

 

The great thing about this track design with the two hinge pins per gap is that only one of them absolutely has to be free to rotate. It's better when they both do but the occasional seized pin is immaterial if the adjacent track plate can rotate about its twin pin. So far I have no stiff joints at all, at least, not on the model.

 

 

With the stowage boxes left off and their locators removed, this fender was completely smooth. It needed the stiffening ribs and I did these with stretched sprue and extra-thin. Here's a great little tip; when stretching sprue you feel it suddenly becoming solid again, right? If you relax your pull the instant that starts to happen, the stretched portion will harden without that irritating curve, making straight line work like this a piece of cake.

 

 

I removed my unwanted Valentine parts to a tupperware type container for safekeeping (Hehehe!). Now I can clearly see how little there is left to do before the painting phase.

 

 

These containers were, I think 20 or 40 pence each from ASDA. I bought 50 and wish I had more for the thousands of modelling uses I find for them.

 

 

From time to time I assemble the sub-assemblies, just to motivate myself. Sometimes it helps me spot troubles in the road ahead but mostly it's for the fun of it. I wonder how many of you do the same. (And turn the turret looking for enemies behind the laptop...)

 

 

The tracks grow like weeds now. I do one link at each end of one side and then one at the ends of the other. It gives the links time to dry before I attach the next one to them. I'm getting to be a time and motion man with these beauties, nothing must interrupt the flow. And speaking of flow, I have a terrible head cold and instead of stopping to reach for, use and discard a tissue each time the old nostrils reach capacity, I've positioned a folded tissue on the bench below my face so that I can simply drip without taking my hands away from the blessed work. Another top tip from Psmith! (I decided to spare you the photograph.)

 

 

I ran out of prepped track components this evening so I know that I'm a third of the way to finishing them. After this update and a Lemsip, I'll prep the other 40,000 pieces just in case I wake in the night again. 

 

   Here's a stupid habit...   

 

...of mine that I don't recommend. As I remove pieces from the sprue, I remove the sprue, piece by piece until there's nothing left. It's for that illusion of progress as above, but taken too far. While it helps me see what's yet to be done, and makes finding the pieces slightly easier, I have been known to throw small, overlooked components away with their sprues. And yet, I will continue to do it. Foolish boy!

 

[Troy Smith]

16 hours ago, Bertie Psmith said:

Does that mean I can copy it freely? Is in print the same as in copyright? I don’t want to get @Mike in trouble.

No, the book is in copyright. but there are exceptions, in the US "Fair Use", in the UK, "Fair Dealing", this is going to be quite lengthy, but I think will be of interest. 

 

It is a complex subject,  the full statement is here

 

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/exceptions-to-copyright

 

I have emphasised a few point in bold from the link that are relevant to your question on using copyrighted sources.

 

"Teaching

Several exceptions allow copyright works to be used for educational purposes, such as:

the copying of works in any medium as long as the use is solely to illustrate a point, it is not done for commercial purposes, it is accompanied by a sufficient acknowledgement, and the use is fair dealing. This means minor uses, such as displaying a few lines of poetry on an interactive whiteboard, are permitted, but uses which would undermine sales of teaching materials are not"

 

You have listed the book,  anything used would be to illustrate a point, and it is non commercial, the site is not, you are not getting paid for this,  it actually costs you time and money.    

 

"Sufficient acknowledgement

In relation to certain exceptions, if you are making use of that exception to copy someone else’s work it is necessary for you to sufficiently acknowledge their work. For example, where you have copied all or a substantial part of a work for the purposes of criticism or review, or where the use was for the purposes of news reporting.

However such acknowledgement is not required where it is impossible for reasons of practicality."

 

 

 

"Fair dealing

Certain exceptions only apply if the use of the work is a ‘fair dealing’. For example, the exceptions relating to research and private study, criticism or review, or news reporting.

‘Fair dealing’ is a legal term used to establish whether a use of copyright material is lawful or whether it infringes copyright. There is no statutory definition of fair dealing - it will always be a matter of fact, degree and impression in each case. The question to be asked is: how would a fair-minded and honest person have dealt with the work?

Factors that have been identified by the courts as relevant in determining whether a particular dealing with a work is fair include:

does using the work affect the market for the original work? If a use of a work acts as a substitute for it, causing the owner to lose revenue, then it is not likely to be fair*

is the amount of the work taken reasonable and appropriate? Was it necessary to use the amount that was taken? Usually only part of a work may be used

The relative importance of any one factor will vary according to the case in hand and the type of dealing in question."

 

* The book is OOP,  anything being used here is for research,  and given the detailed nature of the builds in hand, I would say this is research, as  you are only going to use small, very specific items to illustrate specific points in a complex subject.

 

If anything, it would act as an incentive for anyone interested in the subject to go and buy the book. 

Which right now you can't.  It is not causing the owner to lose revenue, as you can't actually buy their book, except on the used market.  

 

16 hours ago, Bertie Psmith said:

 

And yes, it’s a lovely book. I must have been lucky to find it at reasonable cost. That’s what started this whole thing off. 

 

Sadly, books of this type tend to go OOP, and very often then start to go for silly money, or, chancers try to get silly money on various sites.

 

@Bertie Psmith, from your posts,  you are a sensible and honourable chap,    I have linked and posted what is relevant to your questions on copyright and usage

 

the authors page of the publisher is here

http://mmpbooks.biz/author/27

 

this is a pdf sampler on the site

"All rights reserved. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study, research, criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, electrical, chemical, mechanical, optical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission. All enquiries should be addressed to the publisher."

 

You could write to them,  link to the thread and ask if you can use small parts as reference.    Bear in mind, (as you noticed in your Vulcan thread)  the site is much larger readership vs active posters.

 

It is one of the best informed modelling sites I know of, and threads of this nature are valuable resources,  done well  they can become the 'go to' guide on modelling a subject, as you can collate much disparate information in one place.

  

It may even generate enough interest to get the book republished.

 

HTH 

T    

[Bertie McBoatface]

21 minutes ago, Troy Smith said:

your question on using copyrighted sources.

 

 

Thank you, Troy for that lengthy and scholarly answer to my question. I shall write to the publishers, sending them a link to the thread, and formally ask their permission to post quotations and photographs of ITV. I don't expect an answer this side of New Year but I see no reason for them to withhold permission. 

 

The only legal point that concerns me is the word "private" in this:

 

"All rights reserved. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study, research, criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, electrical, chemical, mechanical, optical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission. All enquiries should be addressed to the publisher."

 

Britmodeller is scarcely private. However, "prior written permission" is the answer to everything.

 

Until/unless I get permission, I'll continue to be careful. I will also write to the publishers of BBT.

 

 

(I feel proper grown up!)

[Bertie McBoatface]

I'm three-quarters of the way through the tracks now. I'm resolved that one the next tank build I undertake, I will start linking tracks in installments from the very first day!

[Bullbasket]

12 minutes ago, Bertie Psmith said:

I'm three-quarters of the way through the tracks now.

How's the sanity holding up?

 

John.

[Bertie McBoatface]

51 minutes ago, Bullbasket said:

How's the sanity holding up?

 

 

Fipple fapple fopple dweeet.

[Pig of the Week]

3 minutes ago, Bertie Psmith said:

 

Fipple fapple fopple dweeet.

Got the pants on your head and the pens up the nostrils I assume..