HI, Just got a real nice box full of goodies from up at R and J this week. Two sets of the lovely Fruil tracks: one set for Dragon's "Battle of the Bulge Tiger II, and the other for Dragon's Jagdpanzer IV A-O kit. Super nice.

Although there seems to be more flash and more drilling involved in putting both of these sets together than I've ever had to do on any of there other sets that I can remember. Don't know if their molds they use to form these links with are getting old or worn or what, but I do hope that they improve them in this area. After all, at $30 a pop, they ought to be a tad bit better that these two sets were. But I'm not complaining mind you, compared to my luck with the Dragon's so-called "Magic track" links, the Fruil's are a God-sent to me personally.

Also got in Blast's resin detail set for Trumpeter's 105mm gun mounted on the French Hotchkiss tank. A super nice detail set consisting of nothing but resin--about 65 to 75 pieces I think--and a very nice set of instructions to go with them, not only showing where these addtional pieces go, but also a seperate sheet showing some other changes that should be made to the kit as well. Very nice and very well molded pieces, all of them. This is one kit that I plan to hopefully do come the winter months when the snows are blowing and the temps. are a tad bit lower than here today--in the mid 90s. If anyone is thinking of doing some additional detailing on this Trumpeter kit, I would highly recommend this resin set from the Blast people as being well worth the money spent.

The only thing I didn't get was my order for the 1/16 scale PE for Trumpeter's T-34/85, but I guess we can't have everything. No time to build this kit at present anyway.

Needless to say, my credit card is shot for the time being, but I think I got some good buys here.

Take care, Sgirty

R and J are a good mail order supply for stuff that most others can't or won't supply As far as the Fruilmodels tracks go I love them By the flash,do you mean having to re-drill the holes for the wire?

Personally I use the wire that comes with the tracks I have done a few sets of those tracks So far I have been very lucky and haven't had to re-drill but maybe a few links per side

What I do is look each link over If any need re-drilling I put them to the side It's a bit tedious but it's better than grabbing a link only to discover it needs re-drilling

Hi, I've found on these two sets that most of the holes have to be drilled out to some degree. I'm not to sure that 'drilling' would be the correct word to use here, as maybe more of a 'polishing effect' of the holes with a drill bit may be a better way of saying it. Once that's done the wire slips right on through with no problem.

This is something of a 'pain' to have to do, as I've been working on and off for about three days now in assembling both sets of these tracks, but then again, the finished products, I think, are well worth the time spent on them They really, really look good. There has been some 'flash' around the sides of the links here and there, esp. on the Pz. IV tracks, a lot more than I have ever found on any other set that I have ever put together. So this leads me to think that maybe this set may have been something of a 'border case' in quality, or maybe the molds they are using are getting a might aged. But for whatever reason, they'll look pretty good once they are done, painted, and on.

Have nothing but praise for the folks up at R and J. They really know their stuff and work very hard at getting anything that you are looking for. If they can't get it, then chances are, I don't think anybody can.

Take care, Sgirty

SGirty,

your comments about the Blast set can be duplicated for the set for the Marder I. Awesome, ans do far almost no problems cleaning them up (though the floor was tricky).

Pardon my Stupidity, but what R and J?


Herky

A mail order outfit Here's the link [url][http://www.rjproducts.com//url]

They will let you know how fast or slow they can get the product in Great customer service

It seems to be a bit hit and miss with Fruil as to whether you have to drill the holes out or not. I have had many sets where there has been no flash and only one link or so needed drilling out.

But then i have also had a few where there are lots of holes that need drilling. The last set i put together was the Transport tracks for a tiger 2, they were really bad, but the set before, for an M-113 were very good.

And i totally agree with you they are much less stressful than the "Magic Tracks"

Regards from the Swamp

Hawkeye

Yes, The people at R&J just rock. I ordered somethings from them a month or 6 weeks ago. I called and left a voice mail with my phone number and I wanted to place an order. They called me back within 10 minutes. Got my order in less than a week. I also told them that when the happened to get the new DML 88 model to go ahead and send me one of those. I recieved that Saturday.

Great service...

Shaun