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Build #2 IJA Super Heavy Tank 150 ton O-I FineMolds 1/72 **Finished**


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My very own Big and Japanese build, not two words you hear together often. 

 

My next entry for this group build, I threw this in with an order from HLJ to bulk out the order and the fact that it was much cheaper than I've ever seen it advertised in the UK. 

 

I have a general rule that I dont do paper panzers, however I couldnt resist this one. Is this military or other? There is some evidence they started to build one.

 

I believe this is the only 1/72 armour kit that FineMolds do. You will see but this is a beast and does not look like 1/72 scale kit at all.

 

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Great box art very Victor/Warlord/Commando

 

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look at the size of those sprues, that is a 1cm square cutting mat.

 

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There are two of the sprue above.

 

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Some nice decals, there are 8 different marking options for various real and fictional units.

 

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welcome along..... and of yeah this beast is AWESOME!!!!!!!! :yahoo:

 

This is something very different and right up my alley, I probably would have bought it too, just for what it is....even in tiny scale! :D

 

You really don't hear or read much about Japanese "projects", so great to have one along. Normally "WhatIf" builds are frowned upon but with a Japanese GB they're just part of the fun. All those turrets!!! :thumbsup:

 

The model looks nice and detailed by the photos, what you'd expect from Finemolds, and you even get some fun/crazy/difficult schemes as well.

 

Good luck with this build, should be lots of fun, I know I'll be following this one with interest!!! :popcorn:

 

 

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That certainly is a monster B) 

 

Strange that the Japanese still subscribed to the multi-turret tank idea long after most other nations had found it lacking, and they clearly went with the late-war German idea that what you need is a massive supertank that crushes everything in its path rather than the Allied one of having a decent enough medium tank, but thousands of them...

 

Looks a nicely detailed kit, I don't see any commander figure? Would be good to have one to emphasise the sheer scale of the beast :) 

 

Cheers,

 

Stew

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11 hours ago, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

Well you learn something everyday, I never knew the Japanese did a  ねずみ (Maus). 
 

(I do hope thats correct as I used Google translator)

 

The Japanese use the same word for mouse and rat, nezumi, still it fits either way. I have been tempted to buy Model Collect's Ratte in 1/72 but it truly is huge.

 

Fun fact the literal translation of O-I is 'big one'.

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9 hours ago, Stew Dapple said:

That certainly is a monster B) 

 

Strange that the Japanese still subscribed to the multi-turret tank idea long after most other nations had found it lacking, and they clearly went with the late-war German idea that what you need is a massive supertank that crushes everything in its path rather than the Allied one of having a decent enough medium tank, but thousands of them...

 

Looks a nicely detailed kit, I don't see any commander figure? Would be good to have one to emphasise the sheer scale of the beast :) 

 

Cheers,

 

Stew

 

Its also strange given that they are an island nation, with a lot of bridges.

 

I don't usually do figures but I have been thinking it could do with one, as you say for scale purposes. I have a few IBG kits that could donate a commander.

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14 hours ago, trickyrich said:

I probably would have bought it too, just for what it is....even in tiny scale! :D

 

It would really be a beast in 1/35, if anyone did it. Maybe finemolds will to add to their Japanese armour line.

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Spent a few hours on this and have the lower hull and wheels done. There is a lot of wheels 8 bogies with 4 wheels each. The kit is going together really easily almost all the parts have accurate keying making it a very smooth build so far.

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Here is a 1/72 Revell Cromwell for scale.

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22 hours ago, trickyrich said:

 

You really don't hear or read much about Japanese "projects", so great to have one along. Normally "WhatIf" builds are frowned upon but with a Japanese GB they're just part of the fun. All those turrets!!! :thumbsup:

 

I have never heard of this so I did a bit of digging, and it seems it is not even clear if it is strictly a "what if" or not. Most sources acknowledge that there were plans to built this beast, but disagree as to whether or not one was ever completed. All seem to agree it was abandoned as impractical, but like the Maus and TOG, it may be that at least one was completed. The documentation was supposedly lost, but I see Wiki says that Fine Moulds claim to have managed to buy copies from somewhere - now whether or not the plans themselves are "what ifs" like the so called Hitler Diaries is another matter, but it will be fun to see it built.

 

Pete

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I have been looking for 1/72 Japanese tank crew or even tank riders as I think it should set the model off with the rest of my collection and make sure it doesnt look like a 1/48 model. When I used to paint Warhammer 40k space marines I used to always avoid helmetless ones maybe its about time I learned to paint faces :).

 

I was having a look through my unbuilt IBG WW2 Japanese armour kits several of which have some crew bonus figs. There seems to be two different sprues with two crew each.

 

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I'll leave the hatches off until I decide, if anyone knows any ww2 Japanese crew or tank rider sets please let me know.

 

Cheers

 

Calum

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I have the turrets together bar the hatches. The main turret does feel a bit small compared with something like the Maus, although I believe the design is from 1943 so maybe the armament was thought to be ok for that time. 

 

For scale is my build #1 in this group build, the Type 60.

 

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A fair bit of spraying here.

 

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It took me a good while to work out the paints I need for the colour scheme, which involved a fair bit of raking around the net. As a basic guide to IJA AFV camo the yellow disruptive stripes are only on the early schemes, late war the basic 3 colour scheme paints also changed to I think more subdued tones.

 

I'm going for early war, as everyone likes those lurid yellow stripes.

 

The paints below are Tochi-Iro, Midori-Iro, Cha-Iro and Yellow, or in Vallejo equivalents (maybe).

 

71.042 Dark Brown RLM61

71.134 Midouri Green

71.035 Cam. Pale Brown

71.135 IJA Chrome Yellow

 

Well it all made sense to me at the time :)👹

 

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In his Osprey book on Japanese tanks Zaloga says that the early camo was a base of what US intelligence referred to as "Artillery Brown", with patches of dark Mahogany Brown and Dark Green. Sometimes the various segments were separated by a thin black line, and often there was a pattern of 4 bright yellow lines which usually seemed to meet at the top of the turret and looked roughly cross shaped when viewed from above so your paints should be fine, though the chrome yellow may be a bit bright unless you "weather" it down. Getting the line round all the subsidiary turrets may be tricky - bit like me painting an A9 in the Caunter scheme a while back.

 

Pete

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7 minutes ago, PeterB said:

In his Osprey book on Japanese tanks Zaloga says that the early camo was a base of what US intelligence referred to as "Artillery Brown", with patches of dark Mahogany Brown and Dark Green. Sometimes the various segments were separated by a thin black line, and often there was a pattern of 4 bright yellow lines which usually seemed to meet at the top of the turret and looked roughly cross shaped when viewed from above so your paints should be fine, though the chrome yellow may be a bit bright unless you "weather" it down. Getting the line round all the subsidiary turrets may be tricky - bit like me painting an A9 in the Caunter scheme a while back.

 

Pete

 

I actually have that book and used it for my half assed research, mainly looking at the colour profiles :).

 

that is Vallejo's take on the yellow used but as you say reality was probably less bright.

 

I know most tanks just had the 4 lines that met on top of the turret, but there is a suggestion that a large tank may warrant additional lines.

 

I know what you mean about the turrets will need to decide whether or not to spray the camo with turrets on or not.

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Things are starting to come together, literally. The tracks went together like a dream even painted. I had painted the Vallejo track primer stippled them with Ammo Kursk soil enamel and then dry brushed with some ammo gun metal pigment, but they will likely get more treatment later.

 

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The tank as a whole was sprayed with Vallejo 71.035 for Japanese Earth Brown, or Tochi-Iro.

 

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Exhausts were sprayed Vallejo rust

 

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And then everything was glued together resulting in some greasy fingerprints.

 

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Very happy with this so far, time to break out the camo putty.

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You should be happy with it, it's looking brutal B) 

 

Though I can't help but feel it has an element of "What you get when you let a Warhammer-obsessed 10-year old design your tank" look about it :D 

 

Should look great with the camo on B) 

 

Cheers,

 

Stew

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57 minutes ago, Stew Dapple said:

Though I can't help but feel it has an element of "What you get when you let a Warhammer-obsessed 10-year old design your tank" look about it :D

 

Well in that case it could do with some sponson mounted lascannons.

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I just cleaned up and glued the arms on one of these guys. They are bonus crew men from an IBG Type 2 HO-I kit.

 

I'm posting this pic to actually motivate me to paint these two crewmen, who look like they will just be surveying the ground ahead of them. I'm thinking this tank would probably need a ladder :).

 

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15 hours ago, sardaukar said:

Actually it was painted Cha-Iro which is tea colour and not earth colour. Getting my Japanese browns mixed up. 👺

Wouldn’t that be green then? 🍵😝

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