@ Kimmo: Cheers!

@ Keith: Well... probably, unless, of course, I do something else like...

"Pick some low-hanging fruit!"

I decided to do a couple of other easy tasks and take a little break from fabricating components like the generator. It's all got to be done one way or another, so some simpler stuff.

Really, what happened is that before I went and did a lot more work on filling and sanding in the rear corners of the hull side armor, I wanted to see how much would be visible once the air outlet louvers and rear hull roof supports were in place.

So, I built the PE air outlet louvers from the Voyager set PE35171. This is a pretty simple assembly which is a direct replacement for the kit parts.



I didn't encounter any real issues with building it. Do pay attention to the pattern of holes for the top louvers. There are three holes along the top edge and two holes along the bottom edge of each top louver, so they're not symmetrical and could be easily mixed up. Voyager does make a note of this in the instructions, so the info is there - just don't get on "auto pilot" and start gluing or soldering before you're sure of how the louvers are arranged.

I chose to glue this PE assembly into the upper rear hull armor plate and make it all into a removable sub-assembly for now.



If you're just building this more or less as designed, an easier way to get it all lined up would be to glue the rear upper hull plate into position. Then glue the two PE interior corner pieces into place. You could then easily get the louvers lined up with the slots in the PE corner pieces, building the PE assembly in situ inside the rear hull.

I also scratched up the support for the rear hull roof area over the gearbox compartment.



As near as I could tell from my reference photos, the vertical supports are not totally symmetrical. The middle support is off-center and lines up with the seam between the two center panels of the gearbox compartment roof. Note that these two panels are not symmetrical - the left / port panel is wider than the right / starboard side panel. My guess is that this was done so that the air outlet louver assemblies can be serviced, if needed. If the center bars of the louvers and the center roof support all lined up, then it would be impossible to remove the bolts holding the louver assembly together.

At any rate, it looks a little odd with none of these parts which look like they should be on the centerline of the tank off-set from the centerline and each other. However, going by the photos I have, this all seems correct (to AFV Club's credit!).

I've also added the "bridge" running from side to side under the rear edge of the armor roof plate between the engine and gearbox compartments. Flanges from this bridge support the edges of the gearbox roof panels and service doors, and the bridge, itself, serves as the mounting point for the fuel fillers (one on either side) and some other smaller components.

There's a good photo of this bridge on page 32, Ampersand's "The Churchill Tank: Part One: The Gun Tanks." (The photo is of a Mk.I, however, in the absence of better info, this is all I had to go with.)

Here's a view from the rear looking forward showing this bridge support.



The two semi-circular cutouts are for the lids of the fuel fillers which flip open from front to rear.

Finally, here are a couple of general views of the framing and roof supports and the air outlet louvers dry-fitted in place.





So, getting close to being done with the interior of the gearbox compartment. All that's left to do:

1) Turret Generator
2) Fuel Fillers x 2
3) Oil Filters x 2
4) Compressed Air Reservoir
5) Sheet metal sponson hole covers x 2 (each side)
6) Pneumatic, hydraulic, and electrical lines

And of course, painting and assembly!

Happy modeling!

This is really fun to watch, as a new modeler, it is both motivating and overwhelming. Keep up the Great work!

@ Bryan: Thanks for the kind words and welcome to Armorama. Don't be overwhelmed, though. We all started at the same beginning and simply knowing what is possible is often the key to unlocking success.

Don't hesitate to ask questions if you need or want help with something. There's no shortage of folks here who will be glad to offer advice or share their knowledge.

Happy modeling!

Very tasty bit of scratch building here with the brass!

Great stuff here! A real tutorial in how to scratch build. Looking forward to seeing how it all looks completed.

Mike's work is a huge motivator for most of us and when he brings his stuff to our local AMPS club meetings here in Columbia SC. I have to provide napkins for the members because of all the 'drooling' over his build...

He is a gold mine of information and a nicer guy you couldn't wish to meet... And I am priviledged to have him as our AMPS chapter president and friend..

Keep the updates coming Mike.

Keith.

@ Andrew: Thank you very much, but I can't take much credit for the PE air outlet grate. Voyager makes some pretty nice PE that's designed at least as good as anyone else's and much better than most.

Stay tuned for more on Voyager's Churchill PE upgrade sets.

@ Chris: I hope the build continues to hold your interest and that you find some more ideas as it progresses.

@ Keith: Aw shucks, Keith, you're gonna make me blush if you keep that up...

@ Matt: I appreciate the kind words. I really enjoy the research and discovering new little details.

BTW: For anyone interested in more ideas and illustrations of scratch-building, I highly recommend that you check out Matt's Canadian Grizzly build here:

Armorama::Tasca M4A1 Grizzly Guardian

(Give Snuggles a noogie and a scratch under the chin for me!)

For that matter, here's another of my very favorite scratch-builds, Steve Tagner's Char B1 bis. (Some of you may recognize Steve's name from the photo credits of the Ditsong Museum's Universal Carrier that I used in my Riich Models Universal Carrier Mk. I build.)

Steven Tagner::Char B1 bis Scratch Build

Ok, so I can't believe that's it's been nearly a week since my last up-date. Just been busy with model club stuff - newsletters, meetings, etc and work around the hacienda.

I have managed to get some time at the workbench, just not much time to take photos and post up the work.

Anyways, I've gone off on a bit of tangent and progressed from the PE cooling air outlet to the gearbox compartment deck and hatches. Why? I don't know... It just seemed like the thing to do.

I've made a new copy of the kit part B26. I considered modifying this kit part, but once I looked at what I'd have to do to make it with the service hatches opened, it was easier to remake the entire assembly than deconstruct the kit part and put it back together.

The basic deck and hatch parts are made from laminated .030 and .010 sheet plastic. The center deck appears to be made of two plates, and this was made from a single piece of .030 sheet with two smaller pieces 015. laminated to it to create a neat panel line down the middle.

The doors were also made from piece of .030 with .015 laminated on top. This was to get them the same thickness as the center panels and also allow me to create the recessed latch bolts. These are made by drilling holes in the thinner, .015 sheets before gluing them to the .030 pieces. Once dry, the latch bolts were added into the holes for a neat recessed look.

I used the Voyager PE replacement hinges and assembled these to be workable so that I can use the deck and hatches as a "mask" when it comes to finishing the exterior of the tank. I'll complete the inside of the gearbox, then glue on the deck and hatches which, when shut, will mask off the inside of the compartment.

The tool clamps are the Voyager PE parts with securing wing nuts made from left over DML Pz IV injection molded wing nuts threaded over .010 dia. styrene rod. Voyager does provide PE wing nuts for this, but they're too 2-dimensional looking, and their shafts are too short. The prototype clamp parts are all held onto the deck by upside down bolts that are welded headfirst to the deck. The clamp parts fit loosely over these bolts, and the wing nuts hold the clamps and tools in place. The Voyager PE parts simply didn't look the part to me.

Finally, I have added the hatch safety hold-open chains and hooks.

These are shown on a diagram on page 78 of Montgomery's Haines Churchill Book. They're also mentioned in one of my other references, as in "Driver's, don't forget to use the safety chains..." Finally, I could find at least one photo of these chains still existent on the Churchill Mk VIII that was in the Aberdeen collection.

I made these chains from 42 link per inch chain with hooks and rings on either end made from brass wire. As near as I could figure, these chains were secured over the tool clamp bolts, but this is not 100%. However, it did make sense, so that's how I've modeled mine.













The tools are still loose to be painted separately, and I still have to do some work on the pickax head. It's the Voyager resin part from the update set, but it's a bit too "thickish" and needs to be thinned down to wedge under the sledgehammer head.

So, that's all for right now. Lot's more to still do in the gearbox compartment, but hopefully it won't be an entire week before my next update.

Happy modeling!

Brilliant Mike, coming along nicely...

Keith.

Yup

Top banana, but how are you planning on painting that????


Andy

Hah! Mike has already created a working 1/35 scale compressor and paint sprayer. Getting the paint thinned "just right" is the hardest part, though.

Mike - those shovels sure do look scale thin. Incredible work, SGM.

I don't know how I kept missing the last few updates. Really impressive stuff going on in that gearbox area. So nice to see a break from Panther Tigers and Shermans.
J

@ Keith: As always, I appreciate the encouragement and kind words my friend!

@ Andy: Everything to this point is un-glued and the photos are of dry-fits.

The gearbox compartment deck and doors will come off, as will the tools from their clamps. All of the internals will come out. I'll paint and finish all of these separately and then reassemble it all (except for the tools - those will go on during final assembly and finishing). The gearbox compartment deck and doors will be finished on their interiors and glued in place. with the doors shut, they will act as the painting mask for the rest of the gearbox interior.

When finished, I'll display the model with the doors open (thanks to the working hinges), secured with their safety chains.

At least that's that plan...

@ Jeff: Oh, behave! You know if what I've explained to Andy above doesn't work, I'll have to hire you to do the painting now!

@ Jerry: I guess you could say I'm in my "Commonwealth period" now... I'm sure I'll be returning to the more common stuff sooner or later, but for now, I'm finding the more slightly obscure subjects interesting. Stay-tuned with this build for that "obscure" stuff. The Churchill is just a warm-up...

OK, so to breath some life back into this thread before I need to put it on life support.

The last week has been pretty busy, but I have done a little more PE work just to make a bit of progress. These photos are of the Voyager PE turret stowage box.

Voyager makes some good PE, but this little project is a wee bit complicated. The faceted lower rear corners add extra side joints and there is an interior spacer that creates another folding and soldering job. At any rate, with good planning and sequencing the folds and soldering jobs, it can be built into a presentable subassembly.













This is entirely assembled with solder and the hinges and lock hasp work. I've used two different temperature solders - a "high" temp silver solder (Stay Brite) and a "low" temp rare earth (Tix Solder) solder and liquid flux. My soldering iron of choice is a miniature butane torch. I sequenced the folds and solder joints so that I did the earliest joints with the high temp solder and the last joints and details with the low temp solder and avoided all need (this time!) for any heat sinks.

Anyways, back to the interior of the gearbox soon.

Happy modeling!

I listened to your in depth explanation of how you constructed (or is that concocted) the hinges for the bin and was mesmerized to say the least.

The whole build is nothing short of amazing and inspiring, it really helps me become more ambitious in my building.

The only thing missing from your display on saturday Mike, was the key for the padlock Oh I know, you forgot to bring it with you!

And by the way, it was SOP to lock all the padlocks on an open hasp or small attachment eye nearby before leaving the departure point for action or training exercises.

That way the loss of keys didn't result in damaging the hasps and bins in order to gain access.

Keith.

After some of your most recent builds, I'm surprised to hear that you plan on gluing the gearbox deck down, especially with how much time you put into scratching the entire compartment.


Looking awesome Mike, keep it up.

I think the bar has been raised for calling things fiddly.

Kimmo

I know it's just a freekin box,but I also know just from looking at it how much work was in that. What impresses me is that you finished up with such a CLEAN and unbent product. Mine would be bent in at least one plane and would seriously have some big flaws somewhere.
You,Sir,are the patience-meister.
J

@ Keith: Thanks for the info about the padlock SOP. I'll keep it in mind as I progress along.

@ Jesse: Thanks for the comments. You're not the first to make that same observation to me, so I'm giving thought to how to secure the gearbox deck while still keeping it removable. Probably a couple of small brass pins... More to follow.

@ Kimmo: Well, I don't know about that, but thanks for the props!

@ Jerry: I think one tip that might help some guys is give thought and consideration to the sequence of folds and bends, and also to consider that they can solder joints progressively as the part is being made.

Here are a couple of in-progress pics of the "treasure chest" being assembled. Because the triangular corners made for two more joints over a normal square box shape, I decided to solder up those joints as I was folding the box and not to wait until I had the whole thing folded and do all the joints at one time.

This made for stronger and cleaner work since I could reach all of the joints easily, and with each solder joint, the entire box became sturdier which helped me get the later folds and bends tight and sharp. Also, adding the spacer box in the rear early in the assembly helped with both of those aspects of the job, too.



In this first photo I've soldered the angled corners and the rear spacer box and am ready to make the box end bends. Having this work done now meant that I could make sharp and tight bends on the ends and also adjust them some before soldering without opening up the earlier bends and folds. This keeps the box square.



In the second photo, the ends have been soldered and I'm making the final bend or fold with the rear panel of the box. Again, with everything else already soldered together, I was able to make this last bend and adjust the last two joints to get them tight for soldering. Also, these last two joints were soldered with low temp solder which wouldn't effect the earlier solder work.

Anyways, just some food for thought...

On to the ol' Churchill.

I've made the two oil filters that are on the rear of the gearbox compartment bulkhead. The tops of these fit up under the intermediate deck panel and behind the bridge that supports it and the front edges of the compartment hatches and rearmost deck panels (where the tools are). This was convenient since it meant the tops are hidden and that I didn't have to detail them (the tops are quite interesting looking, though...).

Also, I've scratched up the turret motor dynamo which sits on the compartment floor and is driven by a belt running off the gearbox input shaft. Not much to say about this bit. A short section of appropriately sized aluminum tubing makes up the main body part, and the rest of the details were made using more or less "standard" materials and techniques.









In this last photo, you can see the turret motor dynamo test fitted in the compartment. There is an electric cable that runs from the dynamo (generator) into a chase on the floor of the tank. (Later I will add the other hydraulic and pneumatic lines that run through this.) This chase is still "roughed out" and will be sanded into final shape later. Also, you can see the flexible drive from the speedo drive wheel. In this test fit I was trying to determine the routing of these cables and the positioning of the drive wheel and dynamo. I don't have any detailed information on these components, just scrap views (various photos or maintenance sketches), so I'm trying to figure what makes sense from a manufacturer-operator stand point. The flexible speedo drive shaft cannot interfere with the drive belt to the dynamo and it also must curve gradually and run up the right side of the tank to the driver's position. It seems reasonable at this point that it was routed to the rear of the forward gearbox mount, but that may change as I add all the components during final assembly.



Anyways, that's all for now...

Happy modeling!

Ok, so a little more progress in the details of the gearbox compartment.

The whole point of the exercise has been to display a fuel filling operation with the Churchill. That means that I need to model the fuel filler necks and lids, with at least one open.

These components of the Churchill are typical Old World Crafted with a bit of flair and no shortage of small parts.

Because these will be very clearly visible, you might could even consider that they will be highlighted by the composition, they should be represented by well detailed parts.

The fuel filler necks are curved funnels with hemispherical hinged lids held by wing nuts. To replicate the basic parts, I decided to vacuum form the funnels and lids. I made the forms from short pieces of aluminum tube with thick styrene disks on the ends shaped into hemispheres. I used .020 thick styrene for the vacuum formed pieces.



Here you can see from left to right the vacuum formed pieces, the forms, and one set of the funnel and lid removed from the sheet and cleaned up.



Here you can see the fuel filler funnel body and lid in detail. Note the shape of the bottom of the funnel which will have a lateral fuel pipe running from it at a right angle into the rear hull sponson.

Still lots of little details to add to these, but getting the main body parts formed was an important step.

Happy modeling!

I honestly think that building a real Churchill from scratch would be far easier than what you're doing Mike. This is simply master class stuff

Gary

@ Gary: LOL! Well, I build models because I can't afford the real thing.

Lot's a stuff going on with house guests and the holiday, so very little time at the work bench. However, I have been plugging away at the fuel fillers and now have them ready to install.







Just for fun, I counted the parts, and each fuel filler assembly has 18 pieces. However, they should look the part (no pun intended!).

Happy 4th of July to all my American friends here, and happy modeling to all!

You're going to put reference book publishers out of business if you keep this up. That's some fine work yet again.

Kimmo

Indeed it is BUT I fear he may have miscounted the number of threads on the locking stud that the 'Butterfly' nut is positioned on....

No doubt Mike is going to tell me that will be sorted out later after painting and will also ensure equal numbers per filler port ... Ain't that so Mike...?

Lovely work Sir and I am happy to note you are still able to drift away into the land of models regardless of hosting the masses....

Happy 4th to you and yours as well

Keith.

Top notch, Mike. It's starting to fill up nicely.

Outstanding work