Replacing lower hull

[wideseen]

Hi.
I'm offered a Henglong 99A PRO incl. 360 turret turn, which has a severe crack in the chassis and got it for inspection.






I will get - 1) a new empty spare chassis - 2) new load bearing wheel - 3) correct 99a replacement tracks - 4) 20% off the list price €310 ($340)





I have 4 other Henglong tanks and my only experience replacing inside parts is a shooting/barrel unit replacement on a Leopard-2.
I'm thus not an experienced repairman but meticulous ie. slow. My guess is it will take me 2-3 evenings to do the job.
So my question to more experience guys are:

1) Any advice if this is an OK offer?
2) Is it a "mission impossible" for me to replace the chassis? And is the 2-3 evening within plausible range? I'm mostly worried about all the wheels off/on.
3) There was an unidentified broken piece in the box, any idea what it is? Can't see anything broken off and can't find anything on the web for Henglong remotely looking like this piece.




Kind regards
wideseen

[Herr Dr. Professor]

Hello, wideseen: I have two suggestions that may help:
1) Please post an introduction as is customary on RCTW. (Please see: viewtopic.php?t=23936 .) You can refer others to this post, and doing so may help get your question more responses.
2) From what I can tell from the photos, all of the repairs are "do-able" without any special trouble.

[tankme]

Broken piece is a return roller assembly. Replacing the lower hull can be done in a few hours I would assume. As far as value goes...not sure. I think I could get a perfectly good, working ZTZ-99A for that price you said here in the US. Whether or not you can get one in Denmark for that price...I don't know.

[Meter rat]

I will respond more fully later.

[wideseen]

Thanks Herr Dr. Professor! Introduction, good idea - I just have to answer soon so I forged on from minut 1
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And thankyou tankme - I feel reassured that it's feasible even for slow old me now! Prices are generally much higher in EU, VAT is 25% for starters, and the price is the lowest I could search my way to. I'll try my luck with this!!
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Meter rat

[tankme]

It's not a complicated thing. Either take a picture of the electronic connections to the motherboard and/or label all the cables you remove. A little piece of masking tape with the port number works wonders for reassembly.

[Meter rat]

A small crack like that can be repaired easily enough with a metal epoxy. It looks messy, but it is solid. The same epoxy should repair the damaged return roller. I use JB weld.

IMG_5771.jpeg (299.39 KiB) Viewed 546 times

[wideseen]

Ah, yes Tankme, I found the socket where the roller was broken off from! Mystery solved

Thanks Meter rat. Yes, it's either epoxy or putting on a new hull as offered. The rollers are glued in the sockets if I remember a note somewhere, so if using an empty hull I would need a set of 8 rollers also.
My worry is if everything else is removable inside the hull or more parts are needed?

[tankme]

I think the return rollers may be press fit. Either that or they pass through the hull and have a screw on the inside. I'll have to look at mine when I get home, but mine is the older non-A version and highly modified. I actually lost one of the rollers during the last battle. One of the other battlers found it on the field and returned it to me, but I haven't reinstalled it yet. If I remember correctly my return rollers and mounts are metal from a metal upgrade kit I bought for it.

Mine is here: viewtopic.php?t=30889

As far as I know, everything can be transplanted from the two hulls unless Heng Long has made more changes than just that front idler mount. I have a custom adjustable mount that was made for a T72, but is no longer available. There were some quirks with the metal upgrades back in the day, but that old hull didn't look like yours. Yours has the newish T72 adjustable idler mounting system. Since the ZTZ is based on a lengthened T72 hull, it looks like that particular crack is the same type of failure some of the Heng Long T72s have had. If it were me, I think I would get some two part epoxy and pour it along that front angle armor to strengthen it on the new hull. A little hot glue and piece of styrene sheet could be used to create a dam to keep the resin pour in the exact location it's required. I like to overbuild stuff...

[wideseen]

I am so happy about the tips here as it made me confident to do the lower hull replacement. Thanks!!
I found out that a supposedly all-metal-pieces-available super PRO tank configuration was missing the all-metal rollers. The ones mounted are metal with a plastic rod. Spare pieces with metal rods are available ... so a little cheating on the scale.