Quoted Text
For the M3 Stuarts, the idler was all steel. There was an idler with a rubber tire made for the later M5 and M5A1 vehicles.
And while the blue is a terribly nice colour, these vehicles had no blue. The Caunter scheme colours were Light Stone (or Portland Stone), Silver Grey and Slate. The Silver Grey is what is being depicted as blue and it's not, it is actually a light grey-green colour.
There are a couple (really only 2 or 3) German colour photos from the period showing some trucks in caunter scheme with silver grey replaced by a blue, but there is no indication that any of the tanks were ever painted with anything other than silver grey.
Your Light Stone is too orange, as well, looking more like the old Humbrol Desert colour that was more a German/Afrika Korps colour than allied.
And while the weathering has been achieved nicely, the amount of rust is waaay too heavy. The camo colours would be relatively fragile, but these vehicles were painted in US OD underneath and if the camo wore off, the OD would be what you started to see instead. There is very, very little rust ever visible on US tanks even after years of service, the paint was that good.
The rubber-tired Rear Idler was also a smaller diameter, and a stamped wheel. The steel-tired Rear Idler was of welded construction, for those that take an interest in such things. And yes, the rubber-tired Rear Idler came during 1944/45, in M5A1 and M8 HMC production, although many M5A1s and M8s served right up to VE and VJ days and beyond, with their steel-wheeled Rear Idlers still intact...
I heartily agree that the paint on US-made equipment was MUCH MORE DURABLE than the competition's, bar none. So was the general quality and reliability of US equipment. PERIOD!
However, as to color accuracy, I'm sure that Rascar used what information (probably the kit's erroneous painting instructions) that he had access to at the time of his build. IMO, I'm pretty sure that the SILVER-GRAY (LIGHT GRAY-GREEN) in the Caunter Scheme is the correct color to be used, but in wartime, as anyone with a bit of knowledge knows, sometimes what is handy is used, in lieu of what "official instructions" require... Let's remember that some sources state that certain Tiger Is and Pz.III Ausf.Ns in Tunisia were supposedly repainted in captured stocks of US OD... More likely, this might have been RAL8000...
As a personal preference, I go A LOT lighter with my own weathering of ANY military vehicle, though this is not meant to criticize Rascar's work.
Managing Editor
