Greg, will be looking at more stuff today, re: hubs, etc., and let you know.

Re: leg, better, many thanks for your inquiry. Pain is better. I go back to the surgeon for the first time since the operation this coming Monday, hopefully get staples out, and MAYBE start to consider putting some weight back on the leg. In fact, I've already been cheating and putting some weight on it already ... probably not good, but doesn't seem to hurt much worse by doing so. I've been at home, away from work, for over 3 weeks now, and it's getting OLD! I am going crazy being stuck in the house. I should be working on models, but I haven't really felt like it, mentally, and what I really need to do is a bunch of airbrush painting, and access to the airbrush, and post-painting cleaning, will be hard with limited ability to stand. Ah, the joys of life's trials and tribulations!

The El Cheapo tool to model damaged zimmerit:



The zimmerit detail on Dragon kits is soft and easily removed. Sharpen and shape the tip of the screwdriver in the eyeglass repair kit by grinding with a Dremel tool or on a sharpening steel. Takes all of two minutes and it will cut through the zimmerit ridges, without damaging the underlying surface, like butter. You will have a nice, smooth surface. I've modeled damaged and chipped zimmerit on Dragon 6303 this way. The same results as with a micro chisel without shelling out $20+ (the repair kit costs $2.49).

Thanks for the cheap way to modify zimmerit!

Greg: I just verified that both the Carius and 6660 kits have the same plastic and photo etch parts that make up the hubs that can be used in place of the outer road wheels. So far, then, looking more and more like 6660 will get you a Carius tank, with the appropriate mods and use of existing parts. I suppose the only way to ultimately verify this would be to compare the parts on each sprue between the kits, which I have not yet done.

Yeah, getting the head into a built if the key to a successful build. If I am stressed I can't build. I have to be relaxed.

Most likely. A lot of reference will state that Zimmerit was applied to unpainted, but primed, surfaces. Zimmerit was colored with ocher so it was a similar color to Dunkelgelb. Most pics of damaged German tanks (with Zimmerit) show a distictive difference in color, or shade, between the two areas. If the bare areas look similar in color to the still-Zimmerited areas, then it's probable that the vehicle was quickly repainted to cover the exposed primer areas.

This point, about the color of the hull underneath the zimmerit, is significant, again, because there is so much damaged/removed zim on the Carius tank. I'm not really sure what color should be where the zim is no longer present. Part of the thinking, I guess, should be to consider how the zim was damaged. Was it blown off due to artillery fire or other type of bullets/shells, or was it removed by some sort of impact with something hard then itself, like trees or buildings, etc.? I suppose that should be considered when thinking about the color in the locations where the zim is no longer present.

Actually, from an artistic perceptive, having the primer color, the rust/deep red color that is typical understood to be primer color, would be a really cool contrast to dunkelgelb. However, I want my Carius tank to be accurate, not artistic. Does anyone have any knowledge of what hull color should be, if zim has been damaged? Doesn't have to be the Otto Carius tank, specifically, but any German tank where zim has been damaged or somehow removed. What color is present in those spots? Any info about that would be valuable. Somehow, it seems wrong, just in a gut sense, that both the hull and the zimmerit would be dunkelgelb. I appreciate Biggles2's post, but are there any other opinions about this? Thoughts?

The photo's I refer to were the last ones of the Tiger 1 #217. I'm guessing only that the tank was repainted because he was to be photographed after shooting the Stalin tanks. That was why there were no turret numbers visible and the damaged areas looked the same color wise as the zimmed areas. Again no evidence to back up the statement just conjecture.