RC Tank Warfare community hobby forum

Hi,

Thank you very much for your encouragements. Continuing with the build but at a slower pace.

This is what is left of the Henntec Panther Idler adjuster before installation on the M113. The brace had to be reduced significantly in order to fit below the M113 floor.
The M113 metal idler wheels sold by TankModellbau are of great quality and worth the extra cost. The 4mm pins were purchased from China on ebay at minimal cost and just needed to be cut at the right length.
I managed to install the Henntec adjuster with the screw pins properly positioned this time so that they can be easily adjusted, specially with the external fuel cells. It needs to be planned before cutting the metal parts.
These are the ludwigs parts for the M113 external fuel tanks. They are advertised by Ludwigs under the M113 AS4 kit, not the other ones. The larger parts have bolt holes on the sides. There is no photographic evidence of such bolts found on the web so these holes were put facing the interior so that the exterior side is smooth as per reference.
The Verlinden rear panel is installed instead of the Ludwigs parts. Although some minor adjustment are required, it is more accurate and it saves a lot of time. The area where the external cells will be located are sanded smooth by removing all molded in features.
The Ludwigs inter-locking grooves have been removed and a plasticard strip put in place to replace them. The armor plate is then sanded smooth.
A metal strip is added on the interior top of the upper rear panel in order to reinforce the resin part. I found that I have a bad tendency to always grab the model at this place and I was afraid that I would one day damage the part as the model grow heavier. It also serves as a base for the top part.
The fuel cells are pre-wired and tail lights installed before gluing them to the hull. All the other smaller details like the tail light guards and handles will be added at the end of the build because they will likely be damaged on the way.
The external fuel cells are installed. As per reference pic further below, they were not totally aligned with the hull. Although it does not show too much, its about 1/3mm inside. The US metal front and tail lights sold by AFV-Model are of superb quality. They are advertised under the MLRS/Mars kit parts and fit perfectly.
Regards, Louis

Hi,

Starting the interior. First floor section is cut. Notice that a push rod is located under the floor and reaching the rear ramp area. It will be used to open/close the ramp with a strong servo from the front, nothing should show. That's the plan.
The placement of the motors and electronic needs to be figured out. The limited area allocated at the front does not make it easy. It will be an un-usual arrangement for sure and purists will not like it. Shown here is a TK-60, a small battery, Flysky receiver, a big servo for the ramp and 2 motors/gearbox with drive shaft, but these are not likely the ones I will use. Still room for a small speaker and a couple of switch... I think. Yeah, crazy, but it should work. The M113 is to drive around and look cute.
Dry fitting the interior bulkheads. Because the Verlinden armor plates were thicker, minor adjustments are required.
This is promising. Showing the driver area too is something I could not do with the M113A1 Acav that I hope to achieve here on the M113A2 with a much different integration.
The model as it stands today. Roof and front panels are not yet made to fit properly. Still need some more planning and findings before that happens in order to avoid surprises. Potential mistakes are lurking at every corner with such build.
Regards,
Louis

I too am lurking...........in stunned admiration........

Do you and Mr Ludwig exchange info on the various technical details of one of his kits ?

HERMAN BIX wrote:Do you and Mr Ludwig exchange info on the various technical details of one of his kits ?

It seems I am only building his kits now... My discovery of his range of basic kits opened a new chapter in my modelling career. I like the facts that whatever the results, there is only one exactly like it. We do exchange a couple of emails.

M113A2 bulkhead assembly; Although the previous owner of the Verlinden M113 did a good job building his kit, I can see he struggled with the positioning of the bulkheads and roof parts, which is a critical step because it is the junction of the front grille, top roof and interior below. I reworked the arrangement.

The floor in in place, minus the diamond tread plates that will be added when the interior detailing will happen.
Next step is to install the rear ramp and mechanism, hopefully its going to work.

Regards, Louis

Hi,

This is the rear ramp.

The Verlinden ramp is great and well detailed but the resin hinges have been removed and replaced by Ludwigs parts for more solidity. The fine resin hinges would not have lasted long with the opening mechanism. Other missing parts were scratch built to replace them because they were lost in transit.
A working handle was made in brass for the small door. As this door will open only manually and carefully, the resin hinges were kept but made functional.
Here is the push rod mechanism. Having hidden it under the floor required some bending of the metal tube that holds the push rod, creating more friction than if the push rod had been kept above the floor like on the Acav model. It is therefore not as smooth as I expected, but it works ok. The link with the servo will require more fine tuning.
The Verlinden part is reused to hide the push rob coming out of the floor. The wire should be going above the pulley for a totally realistic opening mechanism but can't ask for too much for this simple arrangement.
I am missing a good servo push rod connector so I temporarily made this servo arrangement so that I can do some tests and see how the ramp behaves, and see how thigs could be optimized, such as the placement of the servo in relation to the push rod.
That's it for now. I will be leaving on a 2 weeks summer vacations. See you again mid July.

Regards, Louis

Interesting looking. Is the servo actually glued in place?

Soeren wrote:Interesting looking. Is the servo actually glued in place?

With a few superglue drops for testing different positions for the servo.

Stellar work so far Louis (did we ever expect anything less?), I'm particularly impressed with your marriage of Verlinden and Ludwig parts. I know logically that different models at the same scale should be easy to match, but they never are. I'm looking forward to seeing how you continue to improve it!

Hi,

Trying to interpret old pictures instead of seeing the real thing in person shows its limits.

While on vacation in the Canadian Rockies, I was able to visit the Military Museum in Calgary, Alberta. They have quite a nice collection of M113 variants and other vehicles. While doing a photographic walk around of key areas of the M113, I was able to observe that my attachment of the rear external fuel tank to the hull was totally wrong, at least for the way the Canadian Army put them on. I will therefore un-snap them and redo the integration accurately. The fuel tanks are aligned with the hull but there is a trench line feature between the two. Missing info issue about the other details of the fuel tanks are now resolved as well.
I was also happy to take pictures of the Churchill Mk VII, which will be useful soon enough.
So, next step is to redo the fuel tanks attachments, and as I am not happy with my rear ramp opening mechanism, I might need to go back to the drawing board on that one as well.

Regards, Louis

Hi,

Here is the M113A2 motorization, with 2 YouTube videos of the field trial at the end of this post.

First task was to create two 4mm chafts to connect the Traxxas drive chafts to the sprockets. They were made from M4 25mm long "stainless Lock Cotter Clevis Pins with flat Head Hole Cotter-Pins" bought on ebay from China for a few pennies. Original on top left.
Then I created basic motor mounts in plasticard
The mounting of the motors is quite unorthodox for an RC tank. Not sure you and I have ever seen something like this. Positioning trials were critical so that the drive shaft is placed with the least friction, then once the optimal position is found, the mounts are reinforced in place.

I wanted to free up as much space a possible in the driver's compartment. The arrangement mostly fit the allocated space for the engine and gearbox areas of the real M113. Use of Traxxas metal drive shafts provide a easy way to link the motors to the sprocket shaft. It runs quite smoothly. This motor arrangement is for a "crawler", so this model is not a "runner" like my M113A1 ACAV that was mounted with a Heng Long gearbox and Ludwigs Sprocket. This one is slow. The motors could take 12V if I wanted to.
Here are the M113 Sprockets and tracks bought from Tank Modellbau, minus the rubber pads that will be installed much later. You can see the M4 shaft on the sprocket, so forget about mounting these on a Heng Long gearbox. Every sharp edges on the sprocket teeth needed to be sanded smooth for proper operation. The tracks were easy to assemble once you develop a system to handle them. They links easily locks when the track is folded, which is annoying. Once installed through, they run smoothly.
The idlers are good but I noticed in the field trials that they do not freely roll despite the ball bearings, so I will need to look into it.
I removed 1mm from the length of the Panther suspension arms so that the road wheels are better aligned with the sprockets and idlers. The Verlinden road wheels are performing well.
The model as it stand today, with the Verlinden top and front temporarily in place on the bottom pic, just for the look. I have corrected the installation of the rear fuel cells, as per M113s seen in Calgary.
Here are 2 YouTube Videos of the motorization and running trials.

Motorization trials

https://youtu.be/APwVeTgIrpo

Running trials

https://youtu.be/JpoN0mcdx0E

Next step is to redo the rear ramp mechanism. The one I have created before my vacation had a failure, too much friction.

Regards, Louis