1941 StuG III Ausf B

[rayzzer-b]

HI""Painless ' dam good job ,, think i can feel another build coming if i can find a damaged or none runner then i will be doing this '' Love it '' the electronics whats in side ?? Regards 'Ray ,

[ALPHA]

Good Morning, Billpe, Alpha,
Every consideration is open at the moment. The pricing for the Mato parts I mentioned last night does not include the gearbox. I was thinking a set of the black steel gears but will look at the brass box if I get a Mato lower hull. Even with metal running gear, this StuG will never approach the weight of Michael's Maus or the 'Crackerbox Palace'. One thing that is making me lean towards the Taigen hull is that the molded pieces for the tow shackles in the front will need to be removed to make room for the unique early ones that this StuG uses. Easy to do with plastic over armor, not so much with cast metal. Also, this StuG does not have any additional armor plating up front. If that is cast on with the Mato hull, something else to remove.
regards,
Painless

Well on the Mato the front pieces are bolted on...so changing it over to the Stug armor is an easy two bolt removal...the tow mounts would need to be made from scratch or taken from the Tauch ...but that's a "need to do" on both hulls....The front of the Taigen is also flat...has a clipped on spare track thing on it ...the whole plate needs to be trimmed off...as bolting the proper armor plate would push the front profile forward a tad...but what I don't like about the Taigen is the suspension...the Mato looks much friendlier and easier to tune ...you know what I went through for that one Painless.... changed the rods out to blades...as that was the only way to get a consistent compression of the arms ...the only foreseeable problem with the Mato are the side escape hatches Sass spoke about ...those would need to be ground off... pretty easy though...a dremel with a drum sander should work fine

Anyway...whatever you decide...you can tell there is a bunch of us that share your enthusiasm and can't wait for you to start

ALPHA

[PainlessWolf]

Rayzzer,
StuGs are all over and the resin to make any different version is available from Profiline\Asiatam. All of the big manufacturers offer a StuG in plastic and metal, also parts, so there really ought to be more of these very capable machines driving around.
regards,
Painless

[PainlessWolf]

Alpha,
That's good info on the Mato front armor pieces. I have a set of the tow mounts in resin from Profiline. I have seen them in metal so may source those instead. Sassgrunt noted that some early StuGs were converted directly from Panzer IIIs so the side hatches could stay and be correct enough to get by. Thanks for the vote of confidence. I am ordering more parts today.
regards,
Painless

[rayzzer-b]

[quote="PainlessWolf"]Rayzzer,
StuGs are all over and the resin to make any different version is available from Profiline\Asiatam. All of the big manufacturers offer a StuG in plastic and metal, also parts, so there really ought to be more of these very capable machines driving around.
regards,
Painless[/quote Many thanks ..I will take on it.. Just find a none runner ..Ray.

[ALPHA]

The Panzer III upper that Forgebear has located for me came in last night. It had been a while due to weeks of very bad weather back East so I was very happy to see the box arrive. Now, I can do some actual work on this thing. With the upper deck's arrival, I need to get off the pot and decide if I am going to use a high end Taigen IR Stug for the lower and recoil mechanism\electronics or a HL type Stug with the different type of IR gear or just piece things together and buy the Taigen components I actually need. Decisions to come, Pics now:

Looking Good Painless....the Panzer III hull actually has less gadgets on it...but the rear deck is more important than cleaning that stuff off...Now to the choice of Taigen or Heng Long Hulls.... I went with the Taigen on mine...don't like it much...the axle locations aren't symmetrical on both sides...so you have one running about a half a bogie forward and one back...think it will be the same with the Mato...so I would avoid that choice as well....some might say it's unnoticeable but just from looking at it I can tell...it also sits funky

I can't tell you how much I like your upper ...asiatam did some work on the profiline molds....all your hatches are open...the profiline's are all molded shut ...not a big deal on the transmission cases as your gearboxes will be right there if you open them...so no switches can be hidden under them
I'm not sure you will run into the same problem I had with mine...if you go Heng Long probably not...but with the Taigen Hull...because of the suspension and that metal mounting plate for the gearboxes...the upper doesn't have enough clearance over the right side gear...you will have to raise the hull a little to finish the mod...I think the Heng Long will be better as the gearboxes sit on the hull floor

Good Luck Lieutenant

ALPHA

Alpha,
Good Morning and thanks for the head's up on the gearbox clearance issues using the Taigen lower. I need to go look and see how they fixed that on their metal StuG III. Height reduced gearboxes or different mount plate? I'll have to look. Taigen can't lower the standard boxes too much, the mount plate would bind up the front torsion bars. The stepped torsion bars and suspension on the Taigen and Mato would be something more than I would want to try to rectify. That alone may have me using the Taigen 'Pro' series StuG III with the HL lower just to have that corrected. The gearbox clearance would be a bonus as you say, using the HL lower.
regards,
Painless

No problem Painless....the part that hits the gear on the Taigen is the gun well... perhaps Asiatam improved that too ...but I wouldn't know...the one thing you won't be able to fix is the road wheel alignment
I have two heng longs to work with on mine....one is for the conversion to the same model you are doing ...the other to the F...will try to do a Mock up and see for sure on those if you will have problems

ALPHA

Alpha,
I did some looking around and the StuG\Panzer lower hull gear mount plates have a recess made into them now for the gearbox to set into . Hopefully this would resolve the lack of clearance? I'll be very interested to see your mockup. Tonight, I got a lot of the plastic cutting out of the way. I started out with the scribing blade and made cuts deep enough to guide my exacto saw and finished up with that. A few swipes of the file and the casemate section of the upper is ready to accept the resin. I did not remove the front upper hull plastic yet because I want to see how it will mount up with the lower hull. The resin piece looked a little shorter front to back and if I have to place it, I want some excess plastic left to cut into to do so. Pictures:

How deep is the recess Painless? ...I had to raise my hull a little under a 1/4 of an inch to clear the gear

Your cutting looks great...it's nice when the upper hull takes shape ...think you will have a lot of fun doing this ...you may not want to do the Tiger afterwards


Happy Tanking Lieutenant

ALPHA

Alpha,
If those blinking front hatches on the Tauchpanzer upper deck were the right way round, I wouldn't even have to use the resin front piece. *chuckles* Trying to decide if I want to open up any of the engine deck hatches or make the air intakes open.

regards,
Painless

LOL...I know what you mean...at least your resin piece is thin...both of my castings the hatches are shut...so there is a huge block of resin there in the center of the whole thing....the one for my F because it is lousy resin warped because of it and can't be used...the profiline's ...because it is made of the good resin...can be ground ...and heated and rebent if something goes wrong
I know I haven't posted photos yet...but what I'm did to mine is just cut the hinges off and re groove the hatch lines...will make my own hinges later..pretty easy because of the hinge type ...and it doesn't have to work

All my engine hatches are going to stay closed LOL...I did open up the air intakes ...but it was easier on the PanzerIII Hull that it would be on the Tauch...The Tauch has watertight covers on them...and there is supposed to be a snorkel somewhere ...but when I do do the A...I will probably remove the hatches as I already ordered some beautiful photo etch from Dave

Good Luck Buddy...this one is going to be really something

ALPHA

[rayzzer-b]

no pandora please no,, got enough going on looking forward to photos of the builds .. one thing i must say dont copy that silly chain ,,, it take too many guys to lift it have a good one .Ray

[PainlessWolf]

Rayzzer,
*chuckles* What's that, chain out of scale on the 1/35 version? No problem, Joe! I went and got some small chain at Hobby Lobby and will do a switch and put that chain on the 1/16 version and make up a smaller chain for the 1/35 one. What can I say, I like chain on my tanks. ;o)
regards,
Painless

[PainlessWolf]

Forgebear is back in town and the much anticipated Tauchpanzer upper is on the way. I wasn't sure why this was required to do this build other than that the rear engine deck is a solid match for the early StuG. Looking at the resin kit and the 1/35 scale Tamiya and at the fenders on Panzer IIIs, it became clear. A good part of the panzer upper needs to be removed for the resin casemate to sit down into the body. It works on a Panzer III since the body does not impinge on the fenders unlike the HL and Taigen StuG 'F'. Time to hit the books again. Thanks to Sassgrunt, I can. ;o)

[PainlessWolf]

The Panzer III upper that Forgebear has located for me came in last night. It had been a while due to weeks of very bad weather back East so I was very happy to see the box arrive. Now, I can do some actual work on this thing. With the upper deck's arrival, I need to get off the pot and decide if I am going to use a high end Taigen IR Stug for the lower and recoil mechanism\electronics or a HL type Stug with the different type of IR gear or just piece things together and buy the Taigen components I actually need. Decisions to come, Pics now: