Tamiya 1/48 M8 75mm HMC + P&GM M8 Ammo Trailer + Star Decals US M8 HMC -- FINISHED

[dnl42]

Youse!

 

I will build Tamiya's recent 1/48 M8 75mm Howitzer Motor Carriage. It will tow Paint & Glue Miniatures' M8 Ammunition Trailer as suggested by markings on Star Decals 48-B1022 US M8 HMC sheet. I'll get pix up later.

This is Tamiya's 1st 1/48 M3 platform; let's hope they do more!!! 

 

Fun fact: The M8 HMC was built by Cadillac. 

[modelling minion]

8 minutes ago, dnl42 said:

Youse!

 

I will build Tamiya's recent 1/48 M8 75mm Howitzer Motor Carriage. It will tow Paint & Glue Miniatures' M8 Ammunition Trailer as suggested by markings on Star Decalls 48-B1022 US M8 HMC sheet. I'll get pix up later.

This is Tamiya's 1st 1/48 M3 platform; let's hope they do more!!! 

 

Fun fact: The M8 HMC was built by Cadillac. 

I have been looking forward to this since you mentioned it in the chat, the ammo trailer will add to the interest too. I'm sure Tamiya will release other versions of 1/48 Stuarts but they do seem to move at their own glacial pace when it comes to releasing other versions of kits they have released.

[PlaStix]

Hi dnl42. Great to have you taking part in this GB with what is an excellent choice of kit. I would usually choose a 1/48 kit to make but I already had a couple of 1/35 kits, so felt I ought to make one of them! Looking forward to following your build.

Kind regards,

Stix

[dnl42]

Thank you @modelling minion and @PlaStix!

 

And here are the photos. The boxart

 

And box contents

 

 

The bars replace the weight of the cast metal hull bottom Tamiya no longer provides. Ooh, and some string for a tow cable; none of the M4s include a tow cable.

 

Two of these

 

The Star decals; I'll be doing the A scheme

 

And the M8 trailer. Just add paint!

    

 

Thanks for looking! 

[modelling minion]

All the makings of a great project, the ammo trailer looks really good. 

[PlaStix]

It does look a nicely detailed kit, as usual from Tamiya in their 1/48 range.

[dnl42]

Thanks modelling minion and PlaStix! This is an especially welcome project right now. I do love trailers and other seldom-modeled items. 

 

The chassis and upper hull went together quite nicely I used 15m epoxy for the weights. The idlers all still rotate, which will make painting the rubber parts much easier. As usual, the sprockets use Tamiya's poly caps.

 

There's nice weld detail, but my cell phone can't quite capture it. I cleaned up the small parts after gluing as Tamiya refuses to place the gate on the locating pins and they're far too small for my paws. 

 

Thanks for looking! 

 

[dnl42]

And here's the turret.

 

There's not a lot inside the hull. Absolutely nothing forward, under the gun.

The chassis, hull, and turret are still separate. Time for paint.

 

Thanks for looking. 

 

 

[modelling minion]

That looks like its gone together really well, and quickly too. Excellent work 👏. 

[Bullbasket]

You've done a good job on it so far. Nice work.

 

John.

[dnl42]

Thank you @modelling minion and @Bullbasket. 

 

Thanks to @JackG, I have found out in another thread that the exhaust deflectors may not have been present on an M8 in France in July/44.

The question is, do I want to remove them now? They need screens if I keep them.

 

In any event, I need to add a tow hook for that M8 trailer. I don't think Tamiya ever provided a spare in any of their M4 kits, but I can now design and print one if I need to.

 

Thanks for looking! 

[modelling minion]

Hmmm, interesting about the exhaust deflectors, I imagine its tricky to find clear pictures to prove how they looked one way or the other. Will it be much of a job to remove them?

Its very good that you have the ability to print a tow hook and I look forward to seeing how it turns out.

[dnl42]

2 hours ago, modelling minion said:

Hmmm, interesting about the exhaust deflectors, I imagine its tricky to find clear pictures to prove how they looked one way or the other. Will it be much of a job to remove them?

Its very good that you have the ability to print a tow hook and I look forward to seeing how it turns out.

At first, I was leaning heavily to removing them, but, well, there's the actual doing now. Now given the equivocal information, I'm inclined to leave them on this build.

Of course, now that I've seen and understood the screens, I need to deal with those. I'm not sure why Tamiya ignored the screens as they already have two examples on the rear deck. 

 

It's very good to have distinct projects when you're learning a new skill, and these parts will be valuable.

[PlaStix]

That looks to be coming together rather nicely! Hope you manage to sort out whatever you decide to do about the exhausts/screens okay.

Kind regards,

Stix

[dnl42]

I was beavering away in Fusion yesterday and today.

 

Here's the current screen sans a frame I might need for printing. While not woven, the cross-sections are round. I constructed the lower-left parallelogram and then patterned it to the required size.

 

And here's my rendition of the tow pintle with remote release. The shape is based on the illustrations in TM9-791 Armored Trailer M8.

 

[PlaStix]

Well they certainly look good on 'paper'! Looking forward to seeing the printed versions.

Kind regards,

Stix

[modelling minion]

I agree, they look very good to me.

[dnl42]

Thanks @PlaStix and @modelling minion! The proof will indeed be in the printing.

 

Here's where I'm stopping.

I separated the cam(?) from the body to allow me to connect the M8 75mm HMC to the M8 Armored Trailer.  In the best of all possible worlds, I'll avoid gluing the trailer to the pintle when I glue it all up. We'll see. 

 

Next, successfully printing the screen and pintle. 

 

Thanks for looking.

[dnl42]

Well, my first print attempt was almost successful. The problems seem to be self-inflicted, so it's a matter of designing printable model.

 

I first tried using Chitabox's support for the actual part. That wasn't working for me on parts this small, especially with another model where I needed 135 copies of a smaller part. Google told me about adding support in Fusion, so I tried that. After about 4 failed attempts, I figured out a good approach for the pintle. Good but not perfect as the remote release cable ring didn't work out. I suppose both the ring and the support were too thin. On the screen, I tried a support box and let Chitabox support the frame The screen looks pretty good here in its support frame.

 

Sadly, the screen is way too flexible, almost like a fabric. I'll first try making the screen much larger and cutting the patch I need out of a more robust support frame. If that doesn't work, I'll have to make the screen more robust.

 

And here's the pintle freed from the supports. I'm quite happy with it modulo the missing remote release ring, which should have been at the mid-left of the pintle body. The remnants of the handle are visible. I don't recall if the ring was present before I washed it in IPA. In any event, I'll either reduce or eliminate the handle taper.

As you can see the cam is in place. I had modeled the cam to be cut out by adding a gap to match the JLC saw scarf so I could cut it out. Well, that didn't work. Back to a separate cam and body.

 

Thanks for looking! 

[modelling minion]

I think that your printed parts look very good, I wonder if the screen might be easier to replicate with some etched brass though. 

[dnl42]

8 hours ago, modelling minion said:

I think that your printed parts look very good, I wonder if the screen might be easier to replicate with some etched brass though. 

Easier? Yes, no more than a dozen clicks away.

 

More desirable? Not when learning awaits! 

Of course, the lesson could be etched brass is the best approach. 

[dnl42]

Learning to print is clearly a non-linear process.

 

This time, the screen were excellent while the pintles are MIA. Those stubs at the lower left are the only remnants that made it out of the vat... I'm not sure what happened, I thought they were well supported, but I must have done something very wrong for all four to fail.  I wonder if I need to help Chitubox put more/larger supports between the raft and the modeled base plate? 

Google tells me the above white artifacts indicate over-curing. I need to work on that...

 

I printed 2 screen models, one at the right size with a frame and the other larger with the idea of cutting the screen out.

 

Here's the framed version

And unframed, which is a little wrinkly.

I think a larger mesh is worth trying.

 

Thanks for looking! 

 

 

[Bullbasket]

I don't know about anyone else, but none of those images will open for me.

 

John.

[modelling minion]

43 minutes ago, Bullbasket said:

I don't know about anyone else, but none of those images will open for me.

 

John.

Same here unfortunately.

[dnl42]

Dang, sorry...

 

I have noticed that postimages is increasingly failing to serve images. I have a paid account. I think it's time to look for an alternative.