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Marder! Detailing Tamiya's SdKfz 139 Marder III

The Super Duper Superstructure The superstructure was worked on while the gun parts cured. The side panels had some nasty ejection pin marks that needed to be sanded off first. Once cleaned up, they were added to the main superstructure part. The antenna base on the exterior of the superstructure plates is missing a vertical portion and the two braces. The Tamiya box art clearly shows the missing bracket parts. These were added from strip plastic and sliced rod for bolts. On the inside of this was the radio connection for the antenna and the communication conduit for the crew's intercom. These were fashioned from thick plastic strip and rod. The actual wires were made from wire solder. The floor mounted shell storage bins were added and the entire interior given two coats of Polly S Dark Yellow. The communication junction boxes were painted RLM 66, scale black.

   

MP-40 Ammo pouches taken from a Tamiya Germans Weapons set were added to the inner sides of the ammo bins for the main gun. The tie downs for the cold weather tarp were added to the exterior of the superstructure. These were fashioned from a strand of copper speaker wire formed in a jig. The desired size and shape of the loops were first created in plastic in male and female forms. The wire was laid across the forms and the male and female parts mashed together to form the uniform tie down loops.

A total of 16 were used, four on the front glacis plate, three each on each of the two sidepieces. The cage at the rear of the vehicle was assembled. There was a little bit of flash that needed cleaning, but nothing to write home about. Four bolts were added to the exterior underside of the superstructure. They were added were the superstructure floor steps up from the fighting compartment to the driver's compartment. Got That? Good.

I also added the power line conduit for the Notek light, a handle for the transmission hatch, and retaining chains for the caps of the smoke grenades on the rear of the vehicle. I had decided to display the driver and radio operator's hatches in the open position. Retaining arms for the visors were added from 1/72 scale Bf 109 cowl framing photo-etched parts cut in half and added these to the open visors.