RC Tank Warfare community hobby forum

Good morning!
We are just getting back to normal up here in the Valley from a spectacular 108,000 acre Wildfire that had everything shut down and our tiny town cut off and on the verge of evacuation for over a week. I'm saving my shekels to afford the 3D printed exhaust boxes off of Shapeway that a kind fellow created for me. I was in Pueblo yesterday and looked for the Amaco copper or aluminum wire mesh in 1/4 and 1/8 to form the grills for those boxes but no luck. I will order it off of Ebay. On the side, I had a repair job on my 1/16 Capture KV-2 that turned into a major rebuild of the Lower including a new lower hull from Forgebear, steel gearboxes, etc. and matching 4 year old paint. That job was completed, finally, last night. Throw in a couple of the new 1/16 Heng Long style trucks to play with and whew! So it is onward with the Stuart as life returns to what passes for normal around here. ;o) I like that photo! It really shows how those Joes really packed their tanks up with everything that they could find and lash on while traveling from one battle to the next. Replacement motors that fit the original gearboxes are what occupy my thoughts the most lately as far as the Stuart goes...I am going to need a _lot_ of torque with those nylon tracks...
regards,
Painless

Glad to see the Stuart is back in-line for some attention, the KV2 was a massive tank and I like the build in German camo. I have gutted the inside of my Stuart and added some resin and white metal parts in addition to the weld lines. I have the resin parts for the bogies so will have to start on it now the panther is in a runable state.
Having an unusually hot dry spell at the moment but no fires near us to worry about.

I can't remember if we talked about this before, but the website Patches of Pride has about sixteen different decal sets for the Stuart, including captured Japanese and German machines. Also a lot of cool other decals, like for ammo cans. (I need to contact them and see if they can shrink them to work with 1/16 stuff). http://www.patchesofpride.com/pages/pop1.html

Mike!
Good to hear from you, Doc! I've got this in Bookmarks thanks to you! Still following along on your Porsche Tiger. ;o)
regards,
Painless

I've no 1/6 tanks in my possession, but thanks for sharing this website it's really nice. Very cool items.

I have looked at the site above for my Stuart, unfortunately out of all the decals offered they do not cover late war British armour. They do offer a custom service so I will email them and see what they say.
Also seen a 1/6 Dragon Sherman on eBay here in UK may put a bid in but would get in trouble with misses, would also just end up in storage.

While waiting for the wire mesh to come in for the exhaust boxes on the Stuart, I had come up with a better way to tighten up the return rollers and still leave them free to turn. Instead of sourcing the (admittedly odd diameter) bearing which these would require and cementing that in place ala' Sassgrunt, I wanted to make bushings for them. I had already used heavy steel washers to make bearing surfaces on the back of the rollers and on the axle stub on the lower hull. To the ones on the roller, I added a tiny lock washer which was filed to fit within the inner diameter on the back. On the self tappers themselves, I cemented fiber washers on the shaft. All three pieces together with the screw make a proper steel and fiber bushing. I was able to tighten the return rollers down and eliminate the loose floppiness I had noted yet they still roll with simple finger pressure. Of course, one of the rollers lost it's original washer during this process so it is setting up overnight to cure again. I used a new Loc-Tite adhesive for this job, a two part epoxy which dries even harder than the single tube stuff I had been using. It is designed to affix plastic to steel so it is perfect for this application. Also, I used graphite powder in a plastic tube to dry lube the steel bearing surfaces. I will use the powder in a hypo next time since the tube seems designed to only dispense the graphite at the moment when you would foolishly unscrew the top. Aside from that, no amount of tapping or squeezing would cause any to come out ;o) On to the exhaust boxes soon....
regards,
Painless

Hello all,
The AMACO copper and aluminum mesh came in so I've begun more work on the Stuart. Still recovering from expenses accrued during last months natural disaster so those pricey 3D print exhaust boxes are waiting til the Spouse gets their first payroll from the new career. I did find the metal shackles for the Stuart and primed and painted them last night. A little progress is still progress. Pics: ( click to enlarge )

Looking good Mr Painless. How do you like the Tamiya surface primer?

Carl!
It works very well and I like it! As you can see in one of the pics up above, it even smooths out my old and crusty cardboard paint area.
regards,
Painless