1:35 LEP Up Armoured Scimitar CVR(T)

[Centurion3RTR]

Tell you what Andrew, i'll give it a go and if it goes pear shaped i'll not post. Then you'll get a pm to send me some lol.

Have fun, John

[Guest]

That's determination, patience and great work.

Your effort is a lesson for me.

I don't know how to say ... just I'm with Tony, today it's a 5 stars work!!!

Congratulations and don't give up mate, I think all are waiting for this brillant work!

Cheers.

[Guest]

Thanks Polux, thats praise indeed from you Its good to make progress and see a light at the end of the tunnel that isn't the oncoming train!

I've redrawn the plans a couple of times since I last posted so here is the latest and I reckon probably the final version.

(Click here for the full size version)

I've been making the corner pieces and found that the 45 degree angle made assembly a lot more complicated! One thing I found of course is that the sides are thicker since they are on the angle and the 1.5 mm plastic strip didn't fit, so it was a quick dash into Reading yesterday to visit Modelzone and pick up some 2mm wide strips. These worked well but when I tried to assemble them the same way I had done the others I got into a right mess!

Up to now I was joining a side, top and bottom together and sticking this down into the plan which has been coated with spray mount to hold them in place and then attached the internal bars one at a time butting them up against the fixed side before finally trimming to fit and adding the second side as the last step. However this didn't work witht he 45 degree angle as there was just too much "play" trying to fix the internal bars to the sloping side.

In the end I built the frames first yesterday evening and left them to dry overnight, then this evening I started chopping the bars up to fit into the frames. I could then drop these into the frame and glue the sloping ends. I'll post a photo tomorrow, I've had enough for this evening

[Guest]

Wooo hoo!! Guess what?

Yup we have a complete set of bar armour!!! Bloody hell that was hard work!

Now to resume work on the vehicle itself and look at the figures I've got. I went overboard on the figures a bit - getting two Blackdog British Modern Tanker figures plus the Accurate Armour Modern UK AFV Crew (Desert/Gulf) crew set, so it'll be a case of mixing and matching - the AA set has some nice heads with goggles and scarves, but the Blackdog figures have the correct body armour for the modern crews ( see here Firefly Models - mail order military modelling and military figure models-Blackdog Models-1/35 Figures-F35030 - British modern tank crew 1 ) but the arms may need some work to get good poses appropriate for being in the vehicle.

Onwards and upwards!

[Guest]

That illusion and pride ,will be, to see your work put in the vehicle!!

I'm eager to see it!!

Cheers

[Guest]

Its been nice getting back to "normal" building having got the bar armour out of the way, well if you can call fiddling around with tiny bits of PE and resin "normal"!! Terry from CastOff models came up trumps and sent me the pieces that were missing from the original package so the plasan armour has been added and the turret has had most of its fittings added, including the replacement barrel trough which means you need to cut the metal barrel down to 37mm which is a very tricky thing to do without bending it... ask me how I know this... go on I dare you... :|

As Terry says in the instructions: "I know tit looks odd but this is what it looks like, the only time you see a Scimitar, Sabre or Fox without this on is when the gun is being cleaned, it protects the trunion bearings from all the much that is thrown up. So I do not what to see any more Scimitars without the cover or someone will be on a charge." Yessir!

Wheels have been primed and will get a coat of green before overpainting with sand - leaving a few patches of green of course where the paint has chipped off.

So at this point I decided to try a test and see how well the bar armour fitted, since this is the first time I've had a chance since I did the paper version all those weeks ago. Well it was good news and um, bad news...

So whats the bad news I hear you ask? Well its too sodding big innit!

The turret looks okay but thats because I've left one of the single column pieces out - the back should the the 6 column piece with a single column either side, but if I do that its so wide it looks ridiculous and outsized. From various photos I've seen from the front, the bar armour sizes where the corner comes round should be in line with the side of the plasan armour as you see here. Put another single column in and its waaay out!

So what about the hull? well this doesn't look wuite so bar but its still too big, but there is precious little I can do about it - I can't do the same as I did with the turret as the front and rear panels would look totally wrong. Oh and speakign of the back, I've found some more photos that seem to show just the three 2 column panels at the back but the width is enough to cover the whole of the back of the vehicle. This leads me to suspect that the 3 panels at the back are wider than the rest.

What this confirms is that my trip down to Bovington was a total waste of time - at least as far as measuring this bugger is concerned. I still had a fun trip, but the mock up in the Afghan section is just that, a mock up and that has lead me down a garden path. I really need to get my tape measure onto an example of the real thing... anyone got one available?

Anyway, I'm pressing on as I can't bear the thought of building the bar armour all over again - at least at this time. I have a feeling I will be doing it again sometime in the future...

Here's another photo showing the bar armour mocked up

This WILL get built!!

[Guest]

some real nice workmanship going on there andrew,keep this up and people will get a new bar to get to,as you`re setting it quite high there lol

mobear

[geegad]

its going to be a cracker outstanding work on the scratch building..

[Guest]

So after that minor psychological setback I started designing the ECM add-ons such as the "pods" at the front and the turret "spoiler". I had one really nice discovery when I chopped the supports from the back of the smoke dischargers to attach to the photo-etch brackets. The ejector pin mark on the back of the bracket is perfetly shaped and sized for the concave despression you see on the pods that are attached to the front of the hull

So that was a fortunate discovery! Swings and roudabouts I guess! However, on further consideration I've decided to back away from the ECM additions to the most modern versions of the Scimitar - I just don't have enough detailed photos of the "spoiler"at the rear of the turret to be abel to accurately model it, especailly since it also appears the the stowage box on the rear of the trurret in these examples is taller than the non-ECM equipped ones. As a result, I don't have any confidence I could get it looking right so what would be the point of doing it wrong?

As a consequence I will be happy with the earlier bar-armoured Scimitar from a couple of years back which isn't ECM equipped, like the photo I included in the very first post of this thread.

So this morning I've been working on the brackets to attach the turret bar armour and I think I will be putting ALL the bar armour that I built on it rather than using the slimmed down version. Look at this photo:

Notice how the ends of the bar armour are just outside the plassan armour plates - I mocked up my bar rmour in the same way and with the 6 column panel and 2 single column panels, it matched! If I removed one of the single panels, it wasn't very different so my concerns about it being too big are not as great as before. Yes it is a little too big, but not badly enough to warrant ditiching panels.

As an aside, look at how the sand coloured camo has worn and peeled off this vehicle, that would be a fanstatic effect to achieve! Also interesting how they've wrapped hessian around the red fire extinguishers...

Shame I won't be doing the ECM now, was looking forward to adding the wire cutters Maybe another time (omg what am I saying!!)

[Guest]

Continuing with the build, its time to see how to attach the turret bar armour. Essentially, the bar armour attaches to the lifting eyes around the turret, but it was only until I saw some photos of the rear that I realised that the rear brackets come out at an angle. My first attempt had then attaching straight on which was a bit of a trial as they plainly don't fit!

This, then was the result:

I'v only glued the front brackets to the bar rmour, nothing else is glued as I wanted to test fit everything first. One important feature of many fittings appears to be a dogleg of the front left bracket to get over the smoke dischargers. I've seen this in many photos from the earlier bar armour fittings. Interestingly, the newer ones, with ECM fitted seem to have used straight brackets.

Anyway, this is what I was able to do:

The bracket legs are made from laminated strips of 2mm x 0.5mm strips to give them a bit of strength to support the weight of the bar armour. The front brackets are 2 laminated strips but the rear ones are 3 strips. As you can see there is still some trimming needed but I an very happy with how this goes together!

Real progress at last!

[Guest]

Last thing I did this evening was update the plans with the altered back panels so here is the updated plan:







(Click here for the full A4 size plan )



One additional thing I have discovered when I was sent a picture I had never seen before, 3 extra panels under the stowage box at the rear - see here:







So it looks like I've got 3 new wider double column back panels plus 3 extra single column panels to build... no problem guv, proper job!

[Guest]

Well I've had some holiday days from work this week and this has allowed me to roar ahead with the progress so that.. .well let the photos speak for themselves:

Turret:

The rear supports are a little thicker than reality, but that was done to provide proper support for the bar armour. It is only connected to the turret by 4 brackets which attach to the lifting points. There appears to be some variation in the front left bracket - I've seen photos of it with that hook over the top of the smoke dischargers, but I've also seen photos where the bracket is straight. It must be said I think the more modern fittings are straight, but then I've decried to build a version that would have been around in 2006 rather than the most recent version with the ECM gear and upgraded gunner's sight.

Hull:

Again some compromises have had to be made as far as the brackets are concerned. I've tried to be reasonably accurate ie positioning and structure, but the size and thickness has been compromised on some to provide the support required. I have been able to replicate the interstitial brackets in some places where the bar armour can be lifted up for maintenance:

I will be adding the spring bolts out of wire later.

So all together we now have:

which is beginning to look the business!!!

There were a couple of fit issues - in fact the rear is slightly wider than it should be but I was able to slim the joints down enough so that is isn't as obvious as it was.

Now I just have to work out how to paint the bugger!

[Guest]

i`m kinda speechless mate,really nice work

mobear

[Guest]

Wow this is great looking,,,,and BIG!

Just as an aside,,,,I love how on a tank there is a big yellow notice that tells you DANGER Keep Clear of This Door....thought common sense would tell you to keep pretty much clear of anything on the outside of an armoured vehicle.

[Guest]

Great work on the base, painted and weathering this tank will be amazing,sure!!

Regards