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The story of Moritz. *finished*


Maddoxx77

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Next up is the story of Moritz. Better known as Sturer Emil or Selbstfahrlafette auf VK 30.01(H) 

Moritz was one of two Sturer Emils that were build and saw combat on the eastern front during the offensive to Stalingrad. 

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Moritz claimed 22 kills before he was left behind by it's crew. The Russians claimed the vehicle and it exists to this day in the Kubinka tank museum.

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i bought the Trumpeter kit. 

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The sprue count is low. Parts look crisp, little to no flash visible.

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I ordered 2 figures from Alpine to add to the model. Mainly to show the size of the Tank.

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This time i made shure i ordered the real ones 😉

 

So, i think this will be a fun project. No diorama this time. Maybe a simple base but nothing too fancy. 

 

Well, that's all the info and progress for now. If you want to tag along, go ahead. The more, the merrier. 

 

Cheers guys!

🍻🍻🍻

Edited by Maddoxx77
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Count me in on this one Maddoxx, looks like a great kit, looking forward to see what you'll do with this. The Alpine figures are great, I did the one on the left with the machine gun on my Panzer IV build and the figure is fabulous, good choice....

 

Ed

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Good luck with your build. If you have settled on 'Moritz', then have fun discerning the details that distinguish it from 'Max' when in service. I believe this mainly shows up in different stowage positions around the fenders and casement.

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43 minutes ago, Ken-l said:

Good luck with your build. If you have settled on 'Moritz', then have fun discerning the details that distinguish it from 'Max' when in service. I believe this mainly shows up in different stowage positions around the fenders and casement.

Thanks for the heads up. I'll try and do my research. 

For now i've started with the build of the lower hull. 

First impression of the kit: very nice and clean molding. Crisp details altough a bit soft on some parts. Very little cleanup and the fit is tight but good.

A point of critisism though. I personaly don't like it when manufacturers try to offer a challenge in a build and by doing so they over complicate things. 

In this kit Trumpeter made the roadweels consist of various parts. Unneccecary imo.

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However, the fit is good and there were no problems. All the roadweels, returnrollers, drivesprocket and idlerweel are dryfitted.

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I testfitted the rubber track to check if there is enough room for track sag, there is. 

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The sturer had quite a bit of sag as seen on the reference photo's.

 

A positive note: there is some clever engeneering done by trumpeter.

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The swingarm is shaped like a bolt. That way it can only fit one way on the lower hull

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It makes all the weels completely leveled. I like it. 

 

That's it for now. 

Cheers guys!

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Great start Maddoxx!  The number of road wheels is typical of German AFV's and Trumpeter have copied the over-engineering well with the number of parts for each. 

On the plus side, nice touch from them with the swing arm locator. 👍

 

 

Keith 😁 

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After the tip from @Ken-l i started with some research on Moritz. As he pointed out. The 2 Sturers were a bit different, mainly the way some tools and stowage were added. 

First i started scratchbuilding the holder for 2 20 liter jerrycans that go on the left fender.

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Photo's also showed added stowage boxes welded or bolted on the right fender under the antenna mount.

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I found 1 box in the sparesbox so i have to do some more scratchbuilding.

 

But there was a problem. Moritz carried spare roadweels on the front where the second driver cazemate was. The box didn't have spare roadweels. 

So i decided to butcher an old Tiger model ( the one i used to learn to apply zimmerit ) 

The weels were to big so i cut off the outer rim, sanded them and then used AK paintstripper to remove all the paint. 

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As you can see they are almost the same

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Now i have 3 spare weels that can go on the model. A loosely added tarp will hide most of the differences.

 

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That's it so far.

 

Cheers guys

👍👍👍

 

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Question for you guys. I'm scratch building the armored headlights as seen on this Photo

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So far this is the result

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I'm having doubts about the wire. It seems a bit too thick. What do you guys think?

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32 minutes ago, PeteH1969 said:

Looks good to me, but it wood be in real life a steel cover over a headlight it would not be solid the cover would cove the headlight on 4 sides with a power cable going to the light from one side.

 

I hope that helps?

 

Pete

Hmmm yes i know what you mean. I had a good long look at the photo in close up and i decided to redo the headlights. 

This time i made the headlight itself a bit wider and i used 0.5 mm copper wire instead of the lead wire. 

I think this is a closer resemblance of the real thing. 

With what you said Pete i could make 2 covers from leftover PE to go around the lights. I'll give it some thought.

This is how it looks now.

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I also made a start with the ammo racks.

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Tomorow i'll start with the interior of the upper main structure. I've got a lot of good reference photo's so i'm looking foreward to it. 

 

Cheers guys!

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