Palepainter's Century M48A3, HL Pershing mashup.

[palepainter]

That went smoother than I had anticipated. I made up a motor plate and added structural reinforcement to it. I mocked the motor plate in the hull then screwed down the motors and checked again for clearance. All good. I made that last little plate in the rear lower hull to mount lights and towing hook. Thanks again for the help Michael C. Really, all the real dirty work is done at this point. I will let it set up for an hour or so before messing around with it some more.

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[PainlessWolf]

Pale,
Masterful. You and Micheal have cooked up a way for some of us like minded folk to expand into the Vietnam era armor series. This tank along with the 21st Century M13 open up a lot of doors.
regards and Happy New years, my friend,
Painless

[palepainter]

Pale,
Masterful. You and Micheal have cooked up a way for some of us like minded folk to expand into the Vietnam era armor series. This tank along with the 21st Century M13 open up a lot of doors.
regards and Happy New years, my friend,
Painless

Thanks Painless.

It really is a the best way to get a Patton rolling down the lawn. Besides, after being out of the loop for a while, I really wanted to do something a bit out there. MichaelC showed me the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel.

I am going to look at some more of their 1/18th scale stuff to see what can be done. The quality of the Century isn't that bad. I honestly was expecting much worse. More of a kid's toy is what I was thinking. So far so good.

Pale

[MichaelC]

pale, just to give you some ideas, I did the M113 but it was a little more painful as it is quite small, and also the Sdkfz 251/9 half track which actually work out quite nicely. Lastly there is also the Bradley M2 which was very similar to the M48A3 conversion using a PzIII lower but you do have to slice it lengthwise though.

[palepainter]

Home for the New Year day, with out a hangover. Happy New Year everyone. I got a few hours in today, taking care of the loose ends on the M48. Mostly, the rear and front end of the lower hull. Tying these two separate entities so it looks relatively seamless and still retains that authentic M48 look.

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The rear was relatively simple. I could not duplicate the real tank in regards to the angle of the last portion of rear lower hull. Just not enough room with the motors in place. But still pulls it off with some sense of accomplishment. The front was a bit trickier. I designed the front end so that the upper hull basically hooks around the lower and is centered nicely.

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I also added a section of split box channel to create the details at the edge of the track "fenders" on upper hull. I will be drilling and adding bolt details on this section soon. I also took a bit of liberty to add some damage here and there.

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[palepainter]

If you see this MichaelC, what glue did you find that worked with the 21 Century plastic? The red label Testors is not really hot enough for it.

[MichaelC]

Pale, I used these for all my build and it work alright with the M48:

http://m.homedepot.com/p/Loctite-4g-Con ... /100371839

You need superglue for it. Anything that melts the plastic won't work.

[Ad Lav]

Coming along nicely.

Found a couple on eBay lol

[palepainter]

I found mine on ebay used for about 30 plus shipping. Some of them are priced a bit high IMO. Especially when you are going to only use portions of it.

[MichaelC]

I paid $40 USD for mine, $20 USD shipping + $15 USD import charge. It was quite reasonable I thought. It was used, turret MG was missing and mount was broken, missing the exhaust extension also.