Rare Medium Tank M3 variant, from a MiniArt kit

[Lee W]

Initial thoughts were...
M2A1
BARV

If its none of these... I havent a scooby!

Lee

[Guest]

I’ve not been making too much progress lately, though I did put together the suspension bogies and drive sprockets (again replaced by Asuka ones, as they’re better than MiniArt’s) and have cleaned up one sprue worth of AFV Club track links:

[ATTACH]422236[/ATTACH]

The track links are the usual nuisance to clean up, but at least they have 25% fewer parts than the ones that came with the kit On the other hand, these need filing off of an ejector pin mark. As this is on the inside face, I have no choice but to do it on all links — had it been on the outside, I would have done just a few more than what would be visible and saved myself a lot of work. The real saving will be in the putting these together, which is (or at least, should be …) rather less fiddly than the MiniArt tracks.

[Guest]

Though I haven’t managed to make myself make the actual rivets yet, I have been marking out where they are to go, which is a chore in itself:

[ATTACH]422721[/ATTACH]

Because it’s just about impossible to do this with a regular ruler, I made my own. The ladder shapes on the paper are rulers, each of which has a line spacing 0.1 mm more than the previous. So, if I find that one side of this needs 15 rivets in 41 mm, I use the one with a spacing of 2.9 mm (41 divided by (15 – 1)), while for a length of 43 mm with 17 rivets, I also have a ruler with 2.7 mm spacing (43 divided by (17 – 1)), etc.

[Guest]

I’ve managed to make myself start adding the rivets now:

[ATTACH]423329[/ATTACH]

You can tell how much fun this job is by me alternating it with assembling track links

The rivets are all punched from 0.25 mm plastic card using an RP Toolz punch-and-die set, with an 0.7 mm punch designed for making domed rivets. You don’t need to buy a separate set for this if you already have a “flat” punch-and-die set — just order spare punches in the sizes you want. You need the ones that say “for Rivet maker”.

Some years ago, I reviewed AFV Club’s T48 track and wasn’t too impressed. Their main failing was that the track kept falling apart because the pins were too narrow for the holes in the end connectors. Somewhat unexpectedly, this T51 set is far better. The pins are, if anything, often a little oversize rather than under-. That is, the connectors sometimes won’t fit, but I’ve solved that every time so far by trying a different one. At least this track doesn’t fall apart when I pick it up.

[Jim R]

Hi Jakko
No idea what you're building. If much more knowledgeable guys can't work it out then I'll just enjoy the build and wait to be told :tongue-out3:

Rivets and tracks - not the most enjoyable of jobs. Rivets look neat and the measuring rulers are a clever idea. Glad the AFV tracks are working OK
Jim

[Guest]

With rivets and tracks, it’s really just a matter of starting and doing a bunch until you’ve had enough, then going away and doing it again later on … The AFV Club tracks are certainly better to build than the MiniArt ones that came with the kit — I think I said it before, but one set of those per lifetime feels about enough to me

[Guest]

More rivets:

[ATTACH]423552[/ATTACH]

This is pretty much the whole front done. Now I can get on with building the rest of what needs adding, and of course putting plenty more rivets on there too …

[adt70hk]

Jakko,

Rather you than me with all those rivets
...that may take some patience.

just had a thought, it's not the Canal Defence Light variant your doing?

Andrew

[scottie3158]

Jakko,
Nice work on the rivets

[Guest]

Rather you than me with all those rivets
...that may take some patience.

It’s not as bad as I had imagined. Just punch out a bunch of rivets, then stick them on the model, and either repeat or call it a day for now Though I’m glad I’ve got this part done so I can continue with the rest of the model — I really didn’t want to build everything that needs rivets before adding them. Better to split these kinds of things up so I don’t go crazy.

just had a thought, it's not the Canal Defence Light variant your doing?

I might be … or I might not Stay tuned for more …

Nice work on the rivets

I’ve been making them with the punches I bought after you told me about the RP Toolz rivet punch, so I have to thank you for showing me a simple and relatively cheap way to get domed rivets of regular size

[Guest]

This vehicle needs an extension built between the superstructure and the left rear stowage bin:

[ATTACH]424144[/ATTACH]

This is just four bits of plastic card, cut to size after measuring the model. I deliberately made the top too large:

[ATTACH]424145[/ATTACH]

This is so I can trim it to size after the glue dries, which is easier than trying to make all plates the right size before assembly.

[Guest]

By now I’ve made a start on the super-superstructure this tank has. First two pieces of 1 mm plastic card to act as internal bracing and to make sure I get the shape right:

[ATTACH]424221[/ATTACH]

After that I cut an 0.5 mm plate for the roof:

[ATTACH]424222[/ATTACH]

I’ll add walls around this after, because it’ll be easier to get everything to line up with the roof in place, rather than put the roof on at the end.

[Guest]

After the roof, I built corners from 5 mm plastic tube, because they need to be rounded, and then added side, front and rear plates from 0.5 mm plastic card. I bevelled the edges that go against the tubes, so they fit better, but I’ll have to fill the seams with putty later.

[ATTACH]424249[/ATTACH]

Like before, the side plates stick out above the roof, so I can trim them to size once the glue is good and dry.

[Graeme C.]

Looks like a rather different version of the M3 Jakko, I've no idea what it actually is!

[Tim Marlow]

I’ve been stumped for ages. I’m starting to think it’s the Army Surplus special from wacky races.....