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Tasca Sherman Firefly VC

Building the Sherman VC

As quite some time has now passed since the initial release of this kit, and many very good build articles have appeared in print and on the ‘net, I won’t take you through another step-by-step build up of the kit. I’ll focus on how I painted, and what I added to, the model. It was clear from building the lower hull that Tasca had thought of the modeller wanting to add an interior and had included the internal fire wall between the engine bay and the fighting compartment. I decided not to fit an interior this time, as it was the exterior I really wanted to play with on this model.

As mentioned in the introduction, detail on the kit is very nice and subtle. In some areas I felt, although probably very much to scale, the surface was a little too subtle and could be slightly obscured by painting and weathering. So with Mr Surfacer 500 and a sponge in hand I dabbed away at the transmission casing, being careful to avoid covering the lovely little foundry numbers included by Tasca. The cast areas of the Turret received the same treatment. On the upper hull weld seams were exaggerated with a Pyrograv and then softened with a layer of Mr Surfacer.

Next the two parts of the hull were glued together and smaller detail parts attached. At this stage I also fitted the body of a driver figure, minus head, firmly into position. The whole hull and turret assemblies were then primed with Mr Surfacer 1000, thinned with cellulose thinner, and sprayed on with an old airbrush. This added a further fine texture to model, which would hopefully look good under layers of paint and weathering. Everything then got a coat of Tamiya Olive Drab.

The suspension assemblies were built up and painted then given a wash of black oil paint before attaching them to the hull. On the left hand turret “cheek” I decided to add some track as appliqué armour. I had several links of Fruil’s metal track for the Panzer IV left over from a previous build and liked the idea of a workshop crew making use of parts of an enemy Tank to protect the Sherman crew. A rough, heavy rust layer was created on the tracks by mixing a dark orange/red colour from oil paints, whilst this was still wet Mig Pigment powder, Rust, was dabbed onto it to give a very flaky appearance.

At this point the kits decals were applied, the large Blue numbers on the hull sides and blue circles on the turret providing a welcome splash of colour to an, otherwise plain, OD scheme. Decals were sealed with a good coat of flat acrylic varnish in preparation for oil washes.