You're very welcome.

Yes, really well done SU Hans. Nice addition to the collection.

Great looking Su, Hans!

Thank you all for the kind words!!

Hans,
Nice build! I love the weathering, what color did you use for the green? Good luck with your studies.
Take care,
Don "Lakota"

Thanks!!! The green is Vallejo camo olive green lightened with buff if I remember correctly. But there's rainbow filters over it, some other filters, dust, other weathering... so the original colour is heavily modified.

It’s nice to see activity in the campaign. It keeps me motivated.
Nice work going on too.
I put a base coat on today. I’ll let it set a while as I start mapping out the masks.
Kalin , you have me worried. Lol
As I have never tried masking before, I am hoping it doesn’t pull the base coat off when removing and I also hope they come off easy.
I’ll post some pics as I make progress.

You could spray a layer of varnish in between? That should protect the base layer.

I was thinking that, but you have no idea how lazy I am

Haha, I'm a pretty lazy modeller as well
But for varnishes it's easy : use a spray can man!

Aloha All,

Hans: nice work! Looks great.

I've started my Tamiya 1/35th Marder III M. I'm thinking to upgrade to a metal barrel. Otherwise I will keep it out of the box.



Happy Modeling,
Zon

It's really a pretty nice kit - and the gun barrel actually comes out, with a little care, looking quite nice. It has a nice shape and pretty good scale dimensions.

When I built this one a few years back (whew! And it's STILL waiting for the paint! ), the gun barrel was one of the orig bits I decided worked out more than well enough that I didn't need nor want a metal replacement - something I've done to most of my bigger-gun builds over the years. I fine-sanded the barrel, and then dipped it in Future to give it a very nice smooth finish (as befits a turned and machined gun barrel). I did go more whole-hoggish on the rest of it - swapped in some Tristar link tracks, added a fair bit of PE here and there, wired up the quite-visible radios, rebuilt the engine vent, have a couple turned brass rounds to stick in, etc. But it's quite a solid kit without much needed to look great, IMHO. And it's a straight-forward build, as many Tamiya kits are. There's a lot to be said for good kit engineering!

I think that the key areas that want careful attention are around and inside the gun breech and trunion rail - there will be a mid-line seam needing fill that many folks appear to miss - but which is quite visible given being open and viewed from over-head. You can easily fix these annoying seams which are down inside things and hard to fill and sand neatly by simply gluing in a new "floor" of smoothed-out alum foil or a piece of thin styrene sheet cut to fit if you have some on hand. Other than that, it's a clean and straight-forward build.

Looking forward to seeing this come to fruition!

Cheers! Bob

Hi there!
Thank you all for the kind words!
Here are some more of my progress on the project. Remaining completion of the exterior and part of the marking.




Have fun and everyone's success!
Kalin

could I get some feedback on a Stryker M1134 anti tank guided missle being allowed? At least thats how its said on the side of the Trumpter model box I have. If no I can stay with my original build. Just saw I had this in the stash already.

I would of said that the Anti tank in the veh designation and that the missiles are designed for the AT role is the big tick in the box. Not sure how often David is looking in here as he may be away on his honeymoon still ?

the honeymoon is almost over guys, I promise.

I'm trying to make more about guns than missiles simply because it's easier to run with, after all Bradley itv has tow missiles that can and have been used to destroy tanks.

hope this clarifies thing

Klaus

Wow - folks are finishing already! I've only just begun...

Grabbed half an hour at model club night, and started my KaJaPa. The hull really just falls together with none of the filing, trimming, and fettling I usually expect of a Revell kit. In fact there are giant pegs and sockets to make it all lock into place! I'm building it OOB so no major surgery to slow me down.

great work Kailin, I haven't even started yet lol

Im good with no Stryker. I will fall back on a Jagtiger probably.

Well after putting the upper and lower hulls together, I discovered a lovely gap between the rear engine deck and the rear hull plate.
Plugged it with some thin plastic strip and a (untidy) layer of filler.



Before I did that I made another discovery that the mantlet didn't properly seat onto the gun assembly, then the barrel was massively loose inside the gun assembly when you pushed it home .. joy ... After an age sanding the inner mantlet and the end of the gun mount. Thankfully it all fits now.



Main hull together, just a few little bits to put on then primer... Yay

Update time

Basecoat applied

Begin applying kit suppiled masks. Mask layout diagram a little smaller then scale, but i used a scale to apply them to the scheme.

Red brown sprayed. Looking back, I should have sprayed the whole kit.
I tried using a highlighter to map where the red brown would go, but it showed through after initail coat.

Laying out next batch of masks. I had to add some more brown, do to missing some spots the first time. And i missed again.

Dark green sprayed.

Masks pulled.

All in all i am happy with it. A few mistakes on my part. I will fix 1 or 2, but i am not too worried aboutthe minor ones.
I went back to using Tamiya paints. No clogs in the Airbrush what so ever.
Some of my jars have got to be 20 years old. Add a little thinner, mix it up and spray away.

Looking Great guys.

Marc, nice work with the mask Camo. I like it.

Tom, nice choice. I am interested on your thoughts with this build as I have one in the stash.

John. I hate to say this, but the gap actually should be there, especially at the end of the centre deck panel and where there are cut outs. The deck edges are vertical but the rear plate is angled - thus the v shaped Gap. The smaller rectangle panels at each end were welded, but shallow. Here are some pics, but remember the Bovington one (Yellow) has had some work done to it and I have been informed, by someone that worked there, that the top welds are extras added later.

Yeah, i second the comment on your camo work there Marc. Reminded me of the Tamiya kit -- it didn't have stencils as guide so I had to spend quite a bit of time with scissors and tape

Thanks for those pics Peter, they will be a great help. I knew about a slight gap but the one on the DML kit is really excessive: it was nearly 2mm or slightly more all the way across the rear section on all the plates and I couldn't bring the rear angled hull plate closer as that then left it with a visible bow, so all I could do was fill. Now with those close up pics of yours I can spend some time later getting the depth along the back welds better than they would of been.
I know what you mean about the Bovi Jagdtiger, it is a very beat up one, with a fair bit missing.
Was interested to see the position of the MG mount on the other JTiger, I've only ever seen it on the engine access cover. I wonder if it was a mod by crew or the restoration team ?

Progress to date: