interesting project

meanwhile - at least for domestic use - Australian army purchased 6x6 Mercedes G-Wagons as replacement for the old landrovers

Thanks for your interest.

Dead right - currently for domestic (& probably not SOCOMD) use. I saw a 6x6 G wagon for the first time last week. Not that impressed. I guess the bugs will be wrung out as they are brought into service. Still yet to see the surveillance variant.

Really like this ,need to build me a 1/35 scale one I think.
Terry

I've crawled all over the 4x4 version, and i'd hate to drive one. for me, I could just fit behind the wheel, (6'2" tall, and big build), with not much room to move.

Great work greg. do you have detailed pics of the lrpv's?

That does sound tight. One of the mods that both SOCOMD trucks received was a new, non-LR steering wheel of a smaller diameter (350mm). That helped larger guys fit & reduced the chances of injuries to the upper leg if there was a mine-strike.

I've squirrelled away some pics of the late-mod trucks. Pretty hard to come by.

I'd like to finish that build of mine in 1/35, but I don't have it anymore.

Thanks Terry. It's a pretty simple subject, lots of straight sides. The roll cage & gun mount are a little tricky. One thing some people miss is that the truck was both lengthened & widened.

Yes buddy I picked up on the width bit ,do you know by how much.
Terry

Cheers Terry - ever since I saw a drawing being sold as reference without the additional width I've become a little 'evangelist' about the width thing.

I'll do the maths and get back to you.

Greg

Greg you are a star thank you .
Terry

Too easy Terry.

I've got an overall width of 2140mm in 1/1. That figure includes the brush guards & sideboards though. I'll dig a little more - I'm sure I've got the firewall dimension somewhere too.

Got it - 'Panel, dash, inner, 1812mm LG'. Hope that helps.

Time to move on to the sponson stowage bin lids. The 5-bar chequer-plate is from Kit Form Services in the United Kingdom. Very nice, btw.



Close-up of the bins: holes were punched using a punch & die set:



Still need to add the hinges & rivet details.

Very nice ,thank you for the measurements ,
Terry

nice work.
the kfs stuff is great. I have around $1000 worth of truck stuff from KFS, and it's worth it.

Too easy Terry, glad to be of assistance.

Matt, I agree, the KFS stuff is magic. Just about run out of the chequer-plate though. The tray, pack trays (side racks) of the LRPV & the SRV-SF consume 5-bar like crazy. Doesn't help when the modeller screws up, either.

Finished the LHS bin lids too:



These are 6mm thick IRL, so I had to fabricate the lids to match 0.375mm in-scale. Mine are somewhat thin: I cut & punched the lids in PE & 0.25mm styrene sheet, laminated them with CA before gluing them to the sponsons. This ensured a more forgiving styrene-styrene mating surface.

More in a couple of days.

nice work. can we have picks of the wheels please?

Too easy Matt - I'm away from the bench for a day or so, so this is what I have with me:



Better pics when I get back.

The 3D printed wheels turned up from shapeways - I rushed the clean up of the tyres before I primed them, so I'll have to revisit them. This is a wheel with the spare hub:



And this is the tyre tread pattern:



Once again, the CAD work done by Denis Loep is amazing!

Time to revisit the tray floor. There's a raised floor covering the front third of the tray, with odd rectangular cut-outs on the RHS (individual weapon stowage) and on the LHS (wiring loom). This was added with 2mm styrene sheet and covered with 5-bar chequer plate (compared to 1-bar for the tray floor). The chequer plate was bolted down using scale hardware 0.8mm nuts and bolts.



This still needs to be covered with anti-slip.

Here's a couple of shots of the tray floor and RHS wall:

looking good greg! I like the tyres, they have come up good.

Thanks Matt. The wheels do look good. Pretty thankless work at the moment. Lots of hours, not much visible in terms of results.

After masking off the tray, I added some Games Workshops 'roughcoat' textured spray as antislip on the Kit Form Services 5-bar chequer plate PE. It was a little sad to see that beautiful etched brass disappear under the textured paint!



Just have to add the rivets, tie down rings and rifle-butt holder and the tray floor interior is done!

I have a can of that games workshop spray too, what great stuff that is!

Matt - I agree; the Roughcoat works a treat!

Next up is the front tray wall. To make things difficult, the two vertical stiffeners aren't evenly spaced. Using the evenly spaced tie-downs along the top of the tray wall as reference points, the upright positions were plotted. These were fabricated using 1.5 x 2 mm rectangular rod. The tamiya tape is plotting the location of the MT-F301 mounting tray.

Once the verticals were done, the horizontal stiffener that runs across the top of the tray wall was added, again using 1.5 x 2 mm styrene.



The hieroglyphics on the right are plotting the individual weapon upper mount and the conduit routing for the power distribution unit.

The ammunition stowage rack for the LHS tray wall was next. This rack holds 3 x 100-round liners of 50 calibre ammunition & is bolted to the LHS tray wall. The basic structure was fabricated using Evergreen 2 mm angle stock, building the floor first, then extending upward. The diagonal & the frame around the top was made from doubled up 0.25 x 2 mm stock. Quick for check with a 50 cal liner and it was set aside for drying. Still need to make the lower support frame.

By way of background for this next step, there's been an evolution of the LRPV over the almost 25 years of service. Some of those modifications have their catalyst in operationally sustained fatalities. One of these, was SGT Andrew Russell, who was killed in action on 16 Feb 02 (http://www.defence.gov.au/vale/sgt_russell/sgt_russell.htm - RIP). As a side note to the build itself, but part of the impetus for if, is to - in some way - remember those who crewed these vehicles, lived their lives, served their country and were killed in the course of their duties.

Back to the model - specifically of the tray. Originally, the tray floor was stepped, a rearward-facing seat was installed and there was a pintle mounted machine gun mounted (5.56mm or 7.62mm).

Anecdotally, this configuration was 'found wanting' post the 1998 deployment to Saudi Arabia as part of the Australian response (Operation Pollard) to Iraqi shenanigans (to use technical term). Apparently the need for a heavier (ie 12.7mm) calibre was identified. At the time, the Mk19 Mod 3 40mm hadn't been purchased by the Australian Defence Force (ADF): this came in 2001 as part of a procurement to support the Australian commitment to Afghanistan (Operation Slipper).

To facilitate the firepower upgrade from 12.7mm, the seat & associated step was removed from the tray, the floor levelled, the original roll-over protection system (ROPS) & machine gun pintle were also removed & a new ROPS, incorporating a ring mount was developed & installed. This was the configuration used in Afghanistan in 2001 & Iraq in 2003. Part of that mod was the fitment of a 50 calibre ammunition stowage rack to the LHS tray wall, bolted directly to the wall and floor (as per the last update).

That ROPS/ring mount configuration was found to be too high for certain operational tasks, so it a new, lower profile ROPS/ring mount was developed & fitted.

At around the same time, as a part of the analysis of the circumstances of SGT Russell's aforementioned death in action, there was an additional mod to the tray floor (the one with the 5-bar chequer plate seen in previous steps) fitted.

As part of that mod, the ammunition storage on the LHS tray wall was relocated to be fitted suspended from the LHS tray wall. This suspension required an additional bracket to be fitted to the underside of the ammunition stowage rack (the that I fabricated in the last update).

Firstly, the front, bottom & back of the support bracket was made:




Then it was bent to shape & fit checked:



Then it was glued to the ammunition stowage rack & the side braces added:




This was then fit checked with a scale 50 cal liner:



The floor of the rack will be opened up to match the rack support bracket once dry. Phew!