Hello from Norway to all. First time posting here, and It's a bit intimidating showing off , with so many great builds.

I'm just returning into MB again, both In rc (1/16) and smaller scale. So most of the 1/35 -1/48 I have done is out of the box as of now.

I found this kit in a dark corner at my LHS while shopping for a 1/48 JP.


By maxmekker at 2012-06-08


By maxmekker at 2012-08-24


By maxmekker at 2012-08-24


By maxmekker at 2012-08-24


By maxmekker at 2012-08-24


By maxmekker at 2012-08-24

It has no zimm, and some of the 'horns' ore spikes on the back plate is wrong. Also lacking the rain guards (?) on the front plate, so I made some up with evergreen, though they are to thick.
Also the zimm set form Eduard Etch Set don't line upp 100% all over, and beeing a etch set battle damage is a bitt hard without bending it beoynd.


By maxmekker at 2012-08-24


By maxmekker at 2012-08-23


By maxmekker at 2012-08-23


By maxmekker at 2012-08-23

Hi Stian and welcome! This kit is old, but not bad at all. You did a nice job so far. I see you chose the Eduard set for zim. I used them twice and had the same kind of problems as you both times... Making battle damaged areas on them is diffuicult. Maybe if you cut the area you want to ''destroy'' and then glue them on the kit? If you do that be carefull not to stress the PE too much or they will give you hell when you try to glue them. Good luck. Waiting to see it painted.

You will overcome these challenges and come out with a model that you feel good about, and even admire more than you first expected you would.

Hej Stian. Welcome to Armorama.
Pity you went for the Italeri model when there is such a lovely DML kit available. The big problem is the kit supplied tracks .... Italeri have horrible tracks that don´t hold the paint or position very well.
Maybe place a post here on the "buy and sell" forum or on Little Norway site, to see if somebody will donate a set of the Dragon tracks if they have purchased aftermarket tracks for their own project?

Great tip Frank. I know this was an old set, and I read the rew . about the tracks, and found out for my self to :-) But I got the set virtually free. He had a stack of old kit's and I thought if it's bad , I can make it a practise set.

Update soon, but tonight I'm doing weld lines on my 1/16 JP :-)

Got most of the PE Zimm on. Wrong castings and alignment issu's made it a time consuming work. I will cover up the most with mud :-)


By maxmekker at 2012-08-26


By maxmekker at 2012-08-26


By maxmekker at 2012-08-26


By maxmekker at 2012-08-26


By maxmekker at 2012-08-26

Soon ready for primer.



By maxmekker at 2012-08-30

By maxmekker at 2012-09-01


By maxmekker at 2012-09-01

Always liked these monsters, keen to see the finished result, haven't built one of these for years.

Comming along.


By maxmekker at 2012-09-01


By maxmekker at 2012-09-01

Hi agian Stian. Dont worry too much about this being an old kit ... get decent tracks and you´ve got the worst issue sorted. Look what Marian Bunc did with his Italeri Elephant on Missing Lynx today. A good paint job and weathering ... nobody is looking at the details!!

dang, I knew I should have bend a fender :-) That's a nice looking build, thanks for the link man.

By maxmekker at 2012-09-04


By maxmekker at 2012-09-04


By maxmekker at 2012-09-04

Really nice work on the old Italeri kit. Would Tiger 1 tracks work with this kit and if they do does it require more links than the Tiger 1?

Thanks Darren

Tiger tracks . Maybe. I don't know. I'm really just in the start of modeling
again after many years. So all this 'hop ops' I have to look into. I could use a track recomendation for varius kit's as I have up to now just done a tamiya 1/48 KT+ JP out of box build. And this one. And I have a 50% done 1/35 Tiger.
I would love to get some tracks to get the sag right for my future builds.

here are my 1/48 kits


By maxmekker at 2012-08-21


By maxmekker at 2012-08-21


IMG_3500 (Large) by maxsollie, on Flickr

And since I'm in the showing of mode , my 1/16 KT

By maxmekker at 2012-08-12

Ok, so I broke out some green. Not sure if I'm happy with it, but maybe it will blend in nice with lot's of blackwash and mud. What do you think.?


By maxmekker at 2012-09-05


By maxmekker at 2012-09-05


By maxmekker at 2012-09-05

Hi Stian, it's looking good, and that green does look like the pattern seen in a number of photos (Italy I think?) maybe it needs to be a little more bold... or maybe not.

On the tracks, of course you could spend double on the tracks over what the model probably cost you:
Friul Elefant
I'm not so sure however that the kit tracks are that bad. I still have this model, as built decades ago, and the tracks are quite well detailed for vinyl, and on both sides, and are of the correct pattern.

I think I am right in saying that this kit represents the later version, with the bow machine gun, and that requires the late tracks, as the kit supplies. Tiger I tracks might visually pass for the early track type, though the drivers are probably in the wrong place, but not for the late.
It just so happens that a while ago I did a sketch to show the difference:

Thanks for the info m8. Great

The latest work over the weekend and today.
In the background you can spot what I have been working on also in the weekend, so not much time for the Elefant, but I share what I have done. thanks for having a look.


By maxmekker at 2012-09-11


By maxmekker at 2012-09-11


By maxmekker at 2012-09-11


By maxmekker at 2012-09-11


By maxmekker at 2012-09-11

Nice zim and cammo job so far. Looks good!
J

Well done. Can't wait to see it when it is done.
I remember when we had to make Zimmeritt with paste and comb it after it was applied! I am that old!! lol

You've done a great job with that old kit. I've done a few in the past. While I've found the kit tracks to be lacking, I've always have been able to get away with using them through judicious gluing to get the sag, and a good paint finish.

Personally, I think the PE zim presents a more challenging problem. I've used the Eduard stuff a few times and have always had fit problems with it (pieces cut the wrong size, holes not lining up with the hull bits, etc). Also, unlike resin, or home done zim, any battle damage must be preplanned from the beginning with little chance of doing it once installed. It's a little late for this build but if you use this stuff again in the future, I've found that light puttying around the zim sections helps reduce the sharp cutoff line and allows it to blend in a bit better.

Keep up the good work!

been a long time since I posted about this build. Not much done either since I have started several other builds..
:-) Got some tracks to get it all together though

Waiting for the mud application on these monster tank Very good job so far.

Cheers


Garry