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Why did Dragon not include enough fuel tank e
TopSmith
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Posted: Wednesday, July 29, 2020 - 02:46 PM UTC
I have a Dragon 1944 T34 premium edition kit. There are two sprues alike that have the fuel tanks. There are two fuel tanks on each sprue but only 3 end caps for the fuel tanks. 4 fuel tanks with only 6 end caps. Nothing is missing on the sprues. The sprues were designed that way. You end up with one fuel tank with no ends.
RobinNilsson
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Posted: Wednesday, July 29, 2020 - 07:20 PM UTC
"The answer my friend is blowin' in the wind"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G58XWF6B3AA
RobinNilsson
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Posted: Wednesday, July 29, 2020 - 09:28 PM UTC
Is the finished model supposed to have 4 fuel tanks?
I.e. is there an immediate problem or is it just a question of why on earth did they do it like this?
No space on the sprue for the fourth lid but why waste space on two useless half cylinders.

Could one set of tank cylinder halves be dented so that you have the option of pristine vs dented tanks?

An extra fuel tank could be a nice addition to the spares box so the extra lid would be nice to have ...

Those end caps don't look horribly difficult to scratch build. If there isn't enough of the PE-handles then those that face towards the adjacent tank can be bent from some metal foil (, aluminum food containers, metal food "paste" tubes or metal tooth paste tubes) or even thin styrene strips
ivanhoe6
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Posted: Wednesday, July 29, 2020 - 11:04 PM UTC
Sounds like another Dragon Frankenkit. I built their PzI Befehl Wagen kit. On the real thing and the kit the body was lengthened and an extra road wheel was added. Well, it wasn't added to the kit. I went back & forward with "Dragon Care" with them finally admitting it was an error. BUT... I could not produce the sales receipt. It gave them a loop hole not to honor their screw up.
I vented here on Armorama and a member donated a pair of road wheels to finish the kit.
Could you scratch the end caps or go with 3 tanks and have an empty cradle with dangling straps?
Good luck with the T-34 !
HeavyArty
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Posted: Wednesday, July 29, 2020 - 11:55 PM UTC
Usually, the T-34 only carried 3 external fuel tanks; two on the right and one on the left. So Dragon got it right.
Tojo72
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Posted: Thursday, July 30, 2020 - 12:24 AM UTC
My AFV Club T-34 only came with three tanks also.

Looking at online Tamiya T-34 pics,only 3 tanks on board too
DanEgan
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Posted: Thursday, July 30, 2020 - 02:07 AM UTC

Quoted Text

Usually, the T-34 only carried 3 external fuel tanks; two on the right and one on the left. So Dragon got it right.


Correct. All T-34s that had cylindrical fuel tanks had three when they left the factory.

Only the self-propelled guns on the T-34 chassis carried four.

So there is no problem here.
TopSmith
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Posted: Thursday, July 30, 2020 - 03:29 AM UTC
So.. why not make an additional end cap or one less fuel tank?

All the fuel tanks provided were dented.
Grauwolf
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Posted: Thursday, July 30, 2020 - 05:01 AM UTC
[quote]So.. why not make an additional end cap or one less fuel tank?/quote]

Well, only Dragon can really answer that question.

Cheers,
DanEgan
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Posted: Thursday, July 30, 2020 - 06:06 AM UTC

Quoted Text

So.. why not make an additional end cap or one less fuel tank?

All the fuel tanks provided were dented.


Because its a lot cheaper to re-use existing sprue designs than it is to make entirely new ones. That's why Dragon kits so frequently have a ton of extra parts. They make lots of variants of each vehicle, unlike e.g. Tamiya who tend to make one variant of each major vehicle.....so no unused parts.

GeraldOwens
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Posted: Friday, July 31, 2020 - 10:54 AM UTC

Quoted Text

I have a Dragon 1944 T34 premium edition kit. There are two sprues alike that have the fuel tanks. There are two fuel tanks on each sprue but only 3 end caps for the fuel tanks. 4 fuel tanks with only 6 end caps. Nothing is missing on the sprues. The sprues were designed that way. You end up with one fuel tank with no ends.

The fourth fuel can is not needed. You only install three.
KurtLaughlin
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Posted: Sunday, August 02, 2020 - 01:45 AM UTC

Quoted Text


Quoted Text

I have a Dragon 1944 T34 premium edition kit. There are two sprues alike that have the fuel tanks. There are two fuel tanks on each sprue but only 3 end caps for the fuel tanks. 4 fuel tanks with only 6 end caps. Nothing is missing on the sprues. The sprues were designed that way. You end up with one fuel tank with no ends.

The fourth fuel can in not needed. You only install three.


The kit directions themselves show only three tanks installed.

KL
KurtLaughlin
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Posted: Sunday, August 02, 2020 - 01:52 AM UTC

Quoted Text


Quoted Text

Usually, the T-34 only carried 3 external fuel tanks; two on the right and one on the left. So Dragon got it right.


Correct. All T-34s that had cylindrical fuel tanks had three when they left the factory.

Only the self-propelled guns on the T-34 chassis carried four.

So there is no problem here.


On their SU kits they lop off the tank halves from the T-34 kits (but keep the ends) and give you a new sprue with just tank halves and another sprue with tank halves and the 4th tank's end caps.

KL
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