Good choice with the PzH side skirts. I figured that standard Leo 1 or Leo 2 skirts would be too short.

Sunday update! Scored some Leo II tracks, will see if the drive sprockets need updating. Did some work on the running gear, cleaned up all the road wheels:

and assembled the suspension:


Wheels are just dry fit for now. finished off the new fenders:

And fitted the ERA to the hull frontwith some spacers for the tow hooks to clear the ERA:


I will add some angle brackets and then do some surgery on some more ERA blocks to fill that nasty gap between the upper and lower glacis. You can see some warping of the resin, I may take it off and soak it in some hot water and try to straighten it out. The skirt ERA is warped as well.

Early Sunday update today, the outlaws are coming over so may not have time later...finished off the front ERA, think it needs a bit of adjustment plus some bolt heads on the brackets.

Then on to the ugly bit. As the KPz.70 evolved, the missle launcher sight was removed as well as the retractable 20mm cannon. With this, the turret shape was simplified to reduce production cost and improve the armour homogeneousness (is that even a word? ). So on to some surgery, this must go!

Lots of plastic sawdust later:


Great view, but not so good as far as protection goes, so time to fill it in. First I blanked it off with some plastic sheet to provide a base for the filler:


The base layer was added with Milliput and roughly shaped, then Squadron Grey Putty was used to smooth it in. Lots of sanding and shaping later:


The underside of the turret also needs to be cleaned up:

Now we have a nice smooth turret as a basis for the spaced MEXAS style composite armour modules. First I built a new mantlet module out of sheet styrene and tube. I will add some bolt details later, just concentrating on the major pieces right now.


Then started on the first turret armour module. I started by boxing in the main shape with sheet styrene. I glue stretched sprue on the inside corners for added strength.

The the face of the module is added:

Some bracing inside is added to maintain the curve:

That's it for now, if I can finish off that first module today I will post it up later.Cheers!

Hi Colin.
Nice work so far!
I was playing with a similar idea, posted here:
https://armorama.kitmaker.net/forums/225433&page=1

Still did not go too much far from that point, I'm out of ideas about how to resolve the rear hull and the turret baskets and/or tool boxes.
I'll keep looking at your work, and perhaps "steal" some of your ideas...

Hey Hugo, yes, I stumbled upon your build and wondered if you had finished, well, if you see any ideas you like feel free to use them!

The past week has been filled with adding the applique armour to the turret. I had one side done and wasn't happy with it so I tore it all off and started again, I am much happier with how it turned out...


...until I look at it from the front!

Somehow I mucked up the measurements and didn't notice until now, too busy working on each individual side and not comparing! Argh! Now, do I add to one side or take off from the other to even them out. Adding will be easier, but what do you guys think?

For the turret bustle I am thinking a larger storage basket or bins.

If it doesn't prevent the turret to fully rotate, I'll say add.
Visually, I always prefer less clearance space under the turret front.

Just my .02

thanks Hugo, actually I had already started adding to the right hand side, good to know there is someone who thinks like me!

Maybe put a piece of equipment on the left (shorter) side, like a spotlight or a big smoke system?

Slowly making progress! Got the turret evened out, it is still a wee bit off but not as noticeable and once I add all the other bits it shouldn't show.I added brackets and Meng bolt heads for the applique armour as well.


I needed a break from all this filling, sanding and otherwise futzing about with turret armour so I decided to tackle the gunners sight. When I was visiting my parents over Christmas we decided to clear out a bunch of my Grandmothers old stuff which had been collecting dust in my parents basement for years since she passed. She was very crafty so lots of stuff for the wife, sister in law and niece to pick from, but I also found some useful items! Among the containers of sequins I found some nice large flat ones in blue, green, silver and red and thought they could come in useful. The blue and green ones are perfect for coated optics!

Trim it down and slide it in:

Shazam! Coated optics for the gunner!


I think Grandma would be happy to see her stuff being put to use, even if not in the originally intended way!
I also decided to add some anti-slip to the applique armour, and I have seen pictures where the whole armour face seems to be textured. I used Tamiya putty thinned with a bit of Tamiya enamel thinner stippled on with an old brush.

Then time to add on some grab handles. the kit has perfectly good ones....if half weren't broken. So, I made new ones out of brass rod and plastic strip.



That's it for now!

Cheers

Graat job for now.

Cheers

Thanks Cesar!

Just a small update this Sunday as I have admittedly been neglecting this a bit to concentrate on finishing off my Nashorn for the AFV Club Campaign which ends this month. My Leo II tracks arrived:

With the applique armour the turret lifting lugs would have to be relocated, so using a spare Leo II lug, I made some copies out of styrene strip and added them to the turret roof with stretched sprue weld beads.


have also roughed up an air conditioning unit to add to the back of the turret, still waffling on additional storage bins.


Cheers!

Loaders Hatch? Auto loader?

Auto loader as per the original.
Cheers

Finished off the storage bins and AC unit then added a shot of primer, a bit of cleanup is required. Just blue-tac'd in place right now so hanging loose. I have to gin up some mounting brackets and supports.




Cheers

Sunday update time! Decided to do some correction work on the rear engine panel. Compared to the Munster KPz, the kit has too few louvers on the rear panel, 6 vs 11. originally I wasn't going to bother with fixing it, but as I have progressed on this I have become more obsessed with it, so I decided to have a go at fixing it. A bit of advice though, it would be much easier to do BEFORE you attach to the main hull! I started off by scraping the louvers thinner to make them more too scale and to make room fro the additional louvers I will slide in between them. The new louvers are 0.3mm x 2.0mm styrene strip. Here you can see how it looks compared to the kit louvers.

All done, before a shot of primer, still needs a bit of cleanup:

Primed up, looks better to me!

Next up are the exhaust covers. Again looking at reference pics, the hinges at the top are modelled too big on the kit, they should sit flush with the louvers:

The outer lip around the cover should also be flat, so I carved that and the hinge off, and made new hinges out of sheet styrene and some brass tube I had lying around.

Now they sit right:

The infantry telephone box is next, it looks too big when checking reference pics, but first, some more turret work. I started adding anti-slip to the top of the storage boxes I made:

then I masked off the main turret and started applying it there as well. It is just Tamiya putty thinned with a bit of lacquer thinnner stippled on with an old brush.


Pull the masking off and:

Circular bit without texture is where the RWS will be.
I decided to put an Ultra-Cap over the recessed section where the autocannon barred used to be stowed, new electronics in the turret! So I sanded off the anti-slip and made a cap out of sheet styrene. Using my handy punch and die set, I made small circular masks for the bolts and then textured it.

Then I used some HO scale nuts I picked up from a local LHS that was closing down, $2 for a pack of 175 of them, great for this!

I trimmed them all to the same length and inserted through holes drilled in the plate:

No having to line up bolts and rods! Mounted on the turret:

Just need to add a pressure relief cap to it now.

Colin, your work on this project is simply amazing. Despite the angst Black Label kits seem to generate, I have thought they would make good platforms for hypothetical subjects. Problem areas can simply be modded out, covered with reactive or add-on armor, or covered with mud and stowage from conflicts they never fought in. This is great work and thanks for sharing. I will be looking forward to the completed project.

Best wishes,

Ian

Thanks Ian! I am having a lot of fun with this and letting my imagination go a bit. I can see how this kit would be quite frustrating for someone who wants to build an accurate model, and there are some questionable shortcuts Dragon made as well, but as you say, with a what-if build you can hide a lot of the warts! I am curious as to how it will all turn out in the end...

Early update today, working on the smoke dischargers, adding the tiny chains from my PE stock.

And I have been inspired by this photo of a Challenger with a combination of reactive and slat armour to add some slat armour of the rear of the turret and hull:

So off I go with a rudimentary jig:

and surprisingly quickly I have two sets for either side of the turrt:

Now mounting brackets:

I mounted the smoke discharger brackets to make sure there is no interference and added some mounting pads for the slat armour brackets:

Slat armour up!

Making sure it clears the rear engine deck - just barely! May have to take the bottom slat off.


The slat panels are just friction fitted to the brackets, I will leave them off for painting. Need some panels for the rear and then will start on the hull.
Cheers

Outstanding work!!! It is turning out as a very impressive model.

Great craftmanship in this build.

I wasn't totally happy with my first attempt at slat armour, had some interference between the mounting bracket and the smoke dischargers, plus looking at reference pics there were more vertical slats and it went around the rear of the turret, so I tried extending it and adding more vertical elements, but it didn't work out as well as I hoped:

I just wasn't happy with how it turned out so I tried another method and gave up on that too...

Third times a charm! Much happier with how this turned out, just need to add some support brackets off the storage bins.


And I worked on the hull side slat armour:


The skirts forward to the slat armour will have ERA like the Chally ref pic I posted previously. All tacked/taped on temporarily.

Wow - I'm lovin' it! That slat armour really brings it up to date. Remind me about the main gun choice again?

What a impressive convertion!

Thanks guys! The gun will be the 120mm L44.

Not much of an update this week, took a break to work on my 21cm Morser, but did do a little bit. Finished off the slat armour for the other side of the hull:

Now I just have to do the rear module and I can move on! Whew! Started working on the brackets to hang the slat armour off the skirts:

Cheers

Well, Easter weekend, house guests, some illness and hockey playoffs (Go Oilers!) have conspired to slow down progress over the last couple weeks. I have been working on the side skirts and reactive armour. I am trying to use the add on ERA from the Bradley resin ERA kit my client provided. both sides were warped but soaking in some hot water followed by a press under a few of my sons 1000+ page textbooks solved that! I trimmed them down to the proper length and fitted them to the skirts. The weight tends to pull the skirts down so I added some braces from the hull above the suspension. It looks all right I guess, but I'm not completely happy with it. Lining up the slat armour with it leaves the slat armour sitting lower than I had planned. I am thinking I may have to custom build the ERA blocks to fit the skirts better. Thoughts?