Hey, guys,
I just bought Italeri #367 M-925 5-ton Shelter Truck from Ebay. I am planning on converting it to a gun truck in OIF. I've read that there needs to be a lot of scratch building on this kit. My biggest concern is getting the right set of tires. Any recommendations as to which tires I should get? What company makes resin tires that are used in OIF and what on-line hobby shop sells them? Thanks in advance.

Petition2God,
I think CMK makes a M939 series tire set.
But you dont want the M923 set. You want (10) wheels
not (6). I also think Trakz does some detail set for M939/923 series trucks. Cheers

Vodnik has made a review of some available sets of wheels on his website :
http://vodnik.net/pages/bigfoot/wheels.htm
I know that Ordnance Models had released 2 sets of replacement wheels (Goodyear and Michelin patterns) but I think that they are now OOP....

HTH
Frenchy

What truck do you want to build?

Out of the box your kit builds into M925 - this truck has 10 wheels (duals on rear axles) and a winch.

If you want to build it as OIF M925 you need a set of new wheels, but no-one makes new pattern tires for 10-wheel 5-ton truck as used these days. The only replacement set for 10-wheel trucks is a set from Real Models, but these are old style tires, as those in the Italeri kit you have and they are no longer in use today.

You can also go different route and convert your truck to M925A2. This is a 6 wheel truck with significantly larger wheels and single wheels on rear axles. Several companies make wheels for A2 trucks. They call their sets "M923A2 wheels" or "M939A2 wheels", but it's all the same. Several manufacturers also make M923A1/M939A1 wheels, but for typical OIF truck you should use A2 wheels (A2 have CITS - central tire inflation system, while A1s don't have it). Some manufacturers call their wheels "Big Foot wheels", but in such case it is not clear if these are A1 or A2 type.

M939A2 wheels are available from Ordnance Models (OOP), CMK, Hobby Fan, Real Models, MR Modellbau and probably some others which I forgot. I would advise against CMK wheels - they are much too small and don't look right. They are smaller even than underscale wheels in Italeri M923A1 "Big Foot" kit... Ordnance wheels are flattened to represent the effect of the truck weight, but this is much overdone (and they are OOP).

Just note that to build your truck as A2 variant you need several other modifications, not just wheels. Some of them are described in my article about detailing Italeri kit (http://vodnik2.republika.pl/pages/m923a1-mods/m923a1-mods.htm), but as I wrote about A1, there is at least one more change needed for A2 not mentioned in my text - different fuel tank.

And one more information - all those 5-ton trucks are officially known as M939 family. They are also commonly called "900" family.
M925, M925A1 and M925A2 are all cargo trucks with drop sides and with winch.
M923, M923A1 and M923A2 are identical to trucks listed above, but they don't have winch.

A"nothing" trucks have 10 wheels
A1 trucks have 6 larger wheels
A2 trucks have 6 larger wheels and CITS.

There are other differences between A"nothing", A1 and A2, but wheels are most noticeable.

Pawel

Also, there are two other sets of note:

1. CAM sells a set of A1 "Bigfoot" wheels that used to be the TAC Scale Dynamics sheels mastered by Talal Chouman (SP?) Thay are very nice, and very accurate for A1 wheels.

2. Tiger Model Designs also sell sets of A1 and A2 wheels. The A2 wheelset also comes with the proper fuel tank, so it makes the conversion easier.

I also recomend the Eduard PE set for the kit, it REALLY helps. I built a M923A1 (or whatever the proper designation really is) many many years ago, and used both the CAM wheels and the Eduard PE and it is a must. I left the cab roof off, but the windshield up (ala a pic I have of desert storm) and I replaced the cargo tarp with tissue paper, among other things.

Now to build all those other "Bigfoots" I have in the pile...

I actually want to recreate M923A2 as used in OIF. Just like the photo shown at the bottom. As far as resine tires are concerned, I cannot find CMK or CAM resine tires online. I will do some more online search. Thank you Vodnik, Jacques and Frenchy for the great info. More help is always appreciated.
Maybe I need to caste my own set of tires using resin?

Give Robert Burnside (callsign Alpenflage) a PM. The last time I was in his shop he had some Real Models 5 ton truck tires for the Italeri kit. He may still have them or another brand on hand.

I've decided to order Hobby Fan's resin M939A2 tires. They were the only ones readily available w/out breaking my bank. I will have to copy a lot of things after Pawel's super-detailed M923 even though mine is never going to be that good. Thanks y'all.

ok, first a small goof.

Tiger Model Designs is now selling the Tank Workshop kits (and producing them). They have the M923A2 wheels with the proper A2 tank.

However, looking over the TMD site, it looks like the M923 and Hemmit series wheels are currently OOP. Darn. I have e-mailed TMD to see what is up and if they will come back out. IIRC the sets were like $15 or so, much cheaper than the HobbyFan sets I have seen.

At www.greatmodels.com they have Real Models, Ordinance Models, and MR models wheelsets listed...you may want to give them a check. Hit the search button, then type in M923.

Thanks, Jacques.
Yea, I checked TMD's site also and did not find any M923 wheels. I am aware of greatmodels.com selling those wheel sets but I know that Ordinance model sets are out of production, and Real Models and MR model sets are actually about the same price as HobbyFan set if you buy it from Luckymodel. Besides, Luckymodel has it in stock as opposed to greatmodels that is unreliable and never has such resin sets in stock. I've had bad experiences with them- their back-orders took about 3 months and even double charged me for the same order. I avoid greatmodels unless they indicate that things are in-stock. O, yea, let me know what TMD says though b/c I have not ordered HobbyFan set, yet.

P2G