Sherman M4A1 with cast in appliqué armor using photogrammetry

[tomhugill]

Witchcraft indeed! Very impressive

[MonsieurTox]

Mr. Tox, your English is great, far better than mine at times.

Thanks Eric, I've learnt by reading US and english boards, unfortunatly I was not that interested in listening to my english teachers back in the days.

The Grizzly Groove! Yes, I noticed its absence, but I'm not enough of a Shermaniac to say whether all small hatch cast hulls had one. Anyways, I was too busy drooling over the small hatch configuration up front! Plus the fact your hull has "The Look".
I have a Mato M4A1 hull with nice thick plastic (and the General [Grizzly] shield upfront--more Sherman Minutia fun there), so the groove is no problem to carve in. The large hatches to small hatches? Not so easy!
You've got mad skillz my man, mad skillz!

Mike.

Hey Mike ! Thank you. I've been considering doing a Grizzly but I will do a regular M4A1 because my hull has no groove and I won't be able to get the accurate tracks and sprockets, even if the Grizzly left the factory with the regular US sprockets and tracks.
I have some more about the small hatchs to show you later
It's very hard to convert a cast large hatch hull to a small hatch because the hulls dont get excatly the same shape (not only around the hatches).

Witchcraft indeed! Very impressive

Thank you Tom !

Here are some progress. I've started the rear engine doors, the hinges were meant to be movable but I changed my mind, I did not want to cut a large opening in the back of the hull to keep strength.

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You can notice I made a new portion of the hull above the doors, it's a casting on the real sherman (like the angled portion of the hull btw), I will add texture later.

Now the big part of this new update, the turret !

First I want to warn I won't be totally acurate regarding the hull/turret. Indeed the turret I'm doing was no longer produced when this hull was used. The low bustle turret changed a lot during its last moments, in the span of a few months, it has these config :

- pistol port, no loader hatch, armor appliqué (the one Im doing)

-no pistol port, no loader hatch, cast in armor appliqué (the one that should match my hull)

-pistol port, loader hatch and cast in armor appliqué (last config of the low bustle turret)

I thought it was easier to start from the Heng Long turret. How wrong I was !

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First, lots of things to cut off, grind etc :

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Cutting the high bustle to convert it into a low bustle

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Capping the top with styrene :

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The lower ring is also cut in two parts. The bottom of the bustle will be reused and lowered

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[MonsieurTox]

Here are some pics once everything is reattached together and sanded :

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On the hull :

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I glued the loader hatch in place, puttied it and sanded it smooth.

I'll had the foundry mark (part number, steel quality etc) later :

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[MonsieurTox]

The surrounding area of the non rotating periscope is the wrong proportion and too large on the HL turret. Plus it's not flush with the top of the turret in real life.

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In place, you can see the size difference

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I used milliput to make a smooth transition. (you can see it finished in the last pics).

Another thing Heng Long got wrong : The front opening for the rotor shield ! Width is about right, height is not by 2 mm or so !! It should be bigger. The opening on the real turret is 38" by 23" which is about 60.3215mm by 36,5mm in 1/16 scale.

Heng Long opening need to be enlarged on the top.

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Another issue is that the corner radius of the opening are too tight. They have a radius of about 6mm on the Heng Long turret while the radius should be 9,525mm. (6" radius on the real turret). The corner radius will be adressed later.

Some pics of the turret at the moment, I have a lot more to do !

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And a pic of the small hatches I designed and 3D printed They can be in the open position.

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[ColemanCollector]

You're a better man than I am Gunga Din!
Great turret work and that small hatch work--stellar!

Mike.

[ColemanCollector]

You're a better man than I am Gunga Din!
Great turret work and that small hatch work--stellar!

Mike.

[Herr Dr. Professor]

This is my dream Sherman. I wish I had the facilities and skills to create such a remarkable cast hull/cast turret M4. And look how those periscopes will be moveable in the small hatches! Wow!

[MonsieurTox]

Thank you guys !

This is my dream Sherman. I wish I had the facilities and skills to create such a remarkable cast hull/cast turret M4. And look how those periscopes will be moveable in the small hatches! Wow!

You have an eagle eye, the periscope can indeed rotate ! At least the hull ones, I made the turret ones static ! I'm a lazzy boy

[Ecam]

I've done a few low bustles, never thought to remove the rear lower part of the bustle. I've always added a couple layers of card to the bottom of the bustle and then do some shaping.

Terrific work on the turret, love to get new ideas from guys who know what they are doing!

[Ad Lav]

Really nice work, love a good Sherman