Cheers Dave!
In theory however I haven't even started weathering yet!

Paul - haha, appreciate the reminders mate.

Jon - I hope I haven't made you disheartened with your build, it's still looking great.
Personally I like how the turret looks and if you can apply the same technique to the hull it should be great. The hull looks like you masked the disruptive camo somehow which may explain the harder edges? The side-skirts look great and true to your references.

Good luck with it mate, I'm sure you'll sort it out nicely.

It's interesting that a lot more people seem to 'paint as they go' from looking at the thread than I'd have expected. Seems it can lead to these kind of situations where things don't quite 'match' therefore I find doing it all at the end seems to work better. However it's a personal preference thing and I don't want to put others off techniques they're happy with.

Keep up the good work gents.

James

There are so many fantastic builds on this forum that I have been a bit put off uploading pictures and sharing my now snail's pace progress.

Jon, the T69 looks great. Can't you just respray with very low pressure, a fine line and a steady hand along the hard edge camo on the hull?...

I finally got around to applying some paint. You can't tell from these pictures but there is some subtle colour variation going on. I used the Vallejo Russian Green colour modulation set.

Along the way I seem to have knocked off a couple of the tie-down handles at the back of the turret. So I replaced them with copper wire, like this..



And a few more pictures...





I plan to paint the tracks tonight.

Cheers!

PS Woopeee I have discovered how to upload pictures full size so you can actually see them...

Matthew looks great what kit did you use ??
dave

Mathew nice build there




Paul

It's the Trumpeter T62 model 1972, with the MIG resin turret and appliqué armour and a turned metal barrel (not sure about the latter's providence)... It's a nice kit - only the dushka doesn't look quite right...

Jon I have to agree with everyone on the hard and soft edge camo. You could easily just go back with the airbrush and soften up the edges some.

James, once again some beautiful work on an ugly tank. The little touches to the paint give it life.

Matthew, love the overall Russian green, nice to see one not painted up in toiletban scheme. One idea you should look into on the turret is to paint the anti-radiation layer in a light off green grey color. This area faded mush faster than the rest of the tank since these were made from a composite material.

Well I final go my paints in Monday and have begun painting. Here is my inspiration which will also be the title of the dio I will be building for it. It’s just one of the many Russian tanks that were captured by the SADF during the Angola civil war. I’ve got the base green and some modulation done and the first layer of filters applied. I still have a few more filters to do, trying for that sun bleached look, but not too over weather since these were fairly new tanks. The center 55 gallon fuel drum still needs to painted, but I will be waiting till all the filters are done so they don’t bleed over on the lighter grey that I will be using.

Okay, so here goes....

Before...



and after...





a bit less in the Holliday household but still doesn't bear too close scrutiny. The worst bits might just get treated to some oils spills (oops!) to hide them.

A night off I think to indulge in something entirely non Type 69 related.

Happy tanking to the rest of you chaps.

Nicely done Jon!

Looks a lot better from the pics you've posted, certainly the hull and turret look a lot more 'unified' now.

Good work mate.


Chris - your base coat looks great a lot of variety in tones. This is certainly an interesting subject. Tell me, if these tanks are fairly new what is the reason for the early T-54 angular fuel tanks, simply leftover stocks or are these very early T-54's?

Matthew, certainly are better pics, can appreciate your work a lot better now! Looks great so far.

James

James from what I have read and gather is that when Russia got involved in the Angola civil war, they supplied a very large military aid to the MPLA which meant cleaning out some of their older stock piled tanks. When I say they were new tanks, I don’t mean those that just rolled off the assembly line, but those that have seen limited service prior to being sent to Angola. I can’ think of a better way to get rid of older reserve equipment so newer stuff could be brought in place. For the fuel tanks there are plenty photo’s that show the early T-54’s that went through upgrades having both early and late style fuel tanks. As you can see from the photo they are in pretty good shape for older variants. Can’t really tell if the center tank is a T-54 or 55. I can’t see the ventilator dome or the angled welds on the front hull.

Interesting Chris,

That makes sense. They had probably only been on 'cold war patrol' duty beforehand so wouldn't be too beaten up.

Certainly an interesting subject, I have been looking into some African armour of late including Ugandan Shermans and Somali tanks, certainly some interesting and often overlooked AFV's on the continent.

James

here are some good links to check out. One on the Soviet equipment that were captured by the SADF.....a very large amount at that.
http://www.africancrisis.org/Article.php?ID=49126&

And one that is a good starting point for researching African conflicts for ideas.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_modern_conflicts_in_North_Africa

james there a link for the Uganda Sherman that I did last year https://armorama.kitmaker.net/forums/189534#1585967
and a great sit for references http://esotericarmour.blogspot.com/2011/09/ugandan-m4a176w-m1-sherman.html
hope that this helps dave

Christopher nice paint job there, the colour modulation is nice and subtle, and looks realistic
As to the middle tank in your picture, I'd tip on a T55 as it has a fume extractor on the barrel. Back in the day they taught us in "vehicle recognition" that this is a T55 recognition point. I always said "if your that close to soviet tank to see it's fume extractor, then something has gone seriously wrong ".
Also, didn't the T55 have the fume extractor fan removed from the turret roof?
If it was a T54, you should see this next to sight in front of the loaders hatch, as you can on your build.
I hope I haven't just told a load s...t, as it has been a long time since my last veh.recognition class

Jon well done on the camo job , now it looks uniform and needs some beating up




Paul

Thanks guys for the comments I need to pick up some more oil paints this weekend to change some of the modulation around some.

Paul it's just hard to tell if the vent in on the turret or not since the IR light is in the way. The fume extractor is not all ways a solid way to tell the T-54 from a 55. The T-54A/B both went into production with the new barrel and extractor. And yes the vent domes were removed from the turret on the T-55, they went to using a different style vent that drew air from the lower side of the turret much like the small opening on the back side of the T-62 turret.

Did a bit of painting. And, tried to do some chipping. It turnsed out I suck a bit in both. But yeah, could be worse.

Josip
from the pic the panit looks good and the chiping on the front fenders as well
dave

Nearly there!

Just got one more piece to fit (rear position light that I broke off, and lost, when painting )

But apart from that it just needs a liitle more paint in places and some 'patination' - I think it sounds a little less brutal than 'beating up'!



with Miniarm dushka mount fitted. Only occurred to me afterwards that the it's not quite right, I don't suppose a Chinese tank's ammo box would be adorned with a star. I have decided to leave the gun off, partly because the one at Saumur is sans weapon and also because I don't have a decent example of a Type 54 AA mg.



My attempt at fabricating the lever that synchronises the IR lights elevation with that of the main armament.

Should be able to break out the paint box in a couple of days - great fun!

Jon nice work so far, sucks about the parts breaking off, been there before plenty of times. You know it just occurred to me that you can use on the DSKH from bronco's type 64/yw-531, they include the correct type 54. As far as the ammo box goes, I seen some with the stars and some without

Nice recovery [rebuild] of that lost part

Josip she's looking just fine there . Get some wheels and tracks in place and that will make the world of a difference

Jon nice piece of recovery scratching there Is that your fabricated canvas on the mantlet?
If so, looks good , fine job sir.




Paul

Yikes! Panic attack... Just realized the campaign end date is 1 May not 31 May... Had better crack on....

I was thinking about something. I know the NVA had T-34s, T54s, and T72s. As best as I can tell they didn't get T62s. I wonder what happened to all those East German tanks after reunification. I figure most of these were sold, scrapped, or put in reserve status. But it makes you think about a T-54, T55, or a T-72 in NATO 3 color scheme.

Too late for this campaign but could be the basis for an interesting project down the road.

tracks painted. decals applied over a wash of Klear. now a shiny toy-like tank. now begins the endless weathering...



oh, and as you can see, I knocked the dushka off by accident while handling the turret

cheers

Mattthew

Congratulations to everyone on the quality of their builds.I'm calling my Syrian T-62 done. After seeing the Miniarm DSK I ordered one and may replace the kit one when it arrives. As you can see from some of the pics it is snowing in the Golan Heights today.

Looks great Cam! I don't think I'm going to get mine finished in time, as usual. Been too busy with some other builds. And you can keep that snow right there in the Golan!