hello! after being out of the hobby for 7yrs i've been astounded by the HUGE leap forward this hobby has taken,a TAMIYA T-55! the accuracy and the extras in the new generation of kits is fantastic.the one thing i'm having trouble finding info about is who,and where to find resin upgrade's for russian armor 1950 + if you can lead me to the promised land of russian armor upgrades it would be appreciated.when i left the hobby aef had some upgrades ,but if i remember correctly their quality ran hot and cold. i can be reached @ [email protected]. thanks john

Hi John,

Accurate Armor has a brilliant "Enigma" update fir the T-55. I think Verlinden used to make a replacement turret for the T-62. Aside from that there are a bunch of replacement aluminium barrels from varoius suppliers as well as decals to spice up the variety of units.

Also you can use the search engine at greatmodels-dot-com, where you can see most AM products avaliable for the specific AFVs youre searching for.

Hope this gets you started - and welcome back to the hobby :-)

Greetings from Denmark
Morten

On a completly selfish note, check out SP Designs for some interesting conversions.

Yes, AEF does some conversions, but caveat emptor, as always.

Verlinden do a T-72 conversion, the most recent one, that is actually pretty good. The older ones have issues.

The Verlinden T-62 and T-55 conversions are not accurate.

Miniarm and Model Point do many interesting conversions for Russian tanks.

Cromwell has a few conversions as does Accurate Armor.

Also check out historica books. they also carry SP Designs kits as well as many other manufacturer's.

HELLO MORTEN! AH,IT'S NICE TO KNOW THAT THERE ARE OTHER FOLKS THAT SHARE THE SAME NICHE THAT FASCINATES ME.I HAVE TRAVELED THE ROAD OF RUSSIAN ARMOR, TO GERMAN WW2 ARMOR,TO MODERN ARMOR, AND NOW I AM BACK TO MY FIRST LOVE OF POST WW2 SOVIET ARMOR, I HAVE THE TAMIYA T-55,T-72,T-62,ACCURATE ARMOR PT-76,A.E.F T-64.AND SOME OTHER ODD PIECES BUT WHAT I COULDN'T FIND IS A ONE-STOP WEB SITE OR HOBBY SHOP TO CHECK ON NEW GOODIES. THANKS FOR THE INFO , I HOPE TO HEAR MORE FROM YOU,THANKS AGAIN, GRROCK [JOHN]

A few more that haven't been mentioned yet.
Blast models does quite a comprehensive T-55 update set, and recently JS-models (Finnish firm specializing in aftermarket parts for FDF vehicles) released a small resin set that fixes IMO the one major lacking in the Tamiya kit, the absence of a T-55 style loader's hatch without an AA-MG mount. The set has the basic loader's hatch, new hubs for the first two roadwheels and the washing fluid container for the drivers periscope.

That blast set should be pretty widely available, but JS-models' set is probably much harder to find outside Finland.
Here's one Finnish model shop that ships internationally. http://www.kolumbus.fi/martti.kuivalainen/engindex.html
(the set's listed in the "/news/re-stock" section, not yet in the JS-models' own category.

I wouldn't spend a lot of $$ trying to fix up the Tamiya T-62, at least until we see what the rumoured Trumpeter one will be like. Hopefully it will be an all new kit and not rely on ANY of their old T-55 kit parts.
My $00.02 fwiw!
Jim

Not that I know anything more than you but I HIGHLY doubt that the Trumpeter T-62 will rely on any parts from either their own T-55 line or the Tamiya T-62. The Trumpeter T-55's were meant to be motorized which caused several of the problems with the kits, the new T-62's do not have motorization as a visible option. I have more faith than I have in the past...

...but those old Tamiya T-62's are going to go cheap and still need all the extra love they can get!

hello! thanks to all who took the time to give me a "heads up"on the company's that carry or make the post 1950 kits and conversions,on the subject of upgrades,if bill miley is still making 1/35 scale conversions he did some killer t-62 and t-62m turrets, to my knowledge they were the most accurate around.mb models did some kits of russian tanks,but i can' t remember if any of it was post 1950.if anybody has any conversions that they are not going to build please let me know.and thanks for the info. john