RC Tank Warfare community hobby forum

tankme wrote: ↑Mon Oct 27, 2025 1:57 am

HERMAN BIX wrote: ↑Sun Oct 26, 2025 11:54 pm

Herr Dr. Professor wrote: ↑Sun Oct 26, 2025 1:34 pm tankme is in Texas, folks: that explains the size.

Annnnd HDP for the win

And if there was a decent set of STL files of an Abrams, I would be doing it in 1/6th. I've already told Armortek they can have my first born if they make one... She got married a couple of years ago so I guess I can't make that promise anymore since I no longer retain ownership of said first born...lol As an alerternative, there is a set of 1/10th Merkava MK III STLs that are begging to be upscaled to 1/6th.

What sort of issues do you run into if you try to upscale 1/16 to 1/6? Is it just separating the pieces into printable sizes, or engineering stuff due to the increased weight, lack of detail or something else?

Jib wrote: ↑Tue Nov 04, 2025 6:26 pm
What sort of issues do you run into if you try to upscale 1/16 to 1/6? Is it just separating the pieces into printable sizes, or engineering stuff due to the increased weight, lack of detail or something else?

First issue would be the size of the pieces, but most of my scaling was from 1/10 to 1/6. I'm not sure I would try scaling up from 1/16th files as that is a large change in scale. You do have to spend a bunch of time upsizing them in the slicer and then cutting them up to print on the printer. Once printed they all have to be joined back together and the seams filled. When scaling up, the tolerances between the parts also scale so sometimes the gaps in the parts are greater than if they were not scaled. I have had an issue where a WW2 US gas can was built in 1/35 scale and when I scaled it up to 1/6th, the pieces in the mesh no longer connected to each other. Basically when the designer made it in CAD they didn't actually mesh all the parts, they just left them touching. I was able to contact the designer and he did fix the model to allow scaling. So far, I haven't had that many issues with details not scaling well. Normally you just drag your STL file on to the build plate, print it, and then you can delete it afterward. I have kept all of my resized and resized cut files having to export them and save them in case I ever need to print it again. Little ripples in a CAD file in a small scale becomes a big ripple in an STL file at a large scale.

Second issue is that the fasteners don't always scale into a size that is readily available or convenient to use. Same goes for bearings and pins. You can use the slicer to fill the holes and bore new ones that are a common size. Or you can build new parts that adapt common sizes like I did with the bearings after the parts are printed. Depending on the size, the designer may take some artistic license on certain areas to get it to print correctly or be strong enough for the scale it's designed in. With the KV, it had it's own gearboxes included in the files, but the motors were directly attached to them. Since all the gears get bigger, the motors no longer fit and are probably too small to power the upscaled tank. So I had to find new motors and come up with a way for them to drive the tank. I didn't think the tensioning system would stand up to larger scale RC use so I did redesign it after printing the parts. Increased weight can be an issue, but you usually don't find that out until you print the parts. I will be manufacturing my own parts for stuff like the air deflector on the back out of brass because it just doesn't print well at all.

Third issue is time and material. When a small part doesn't print well, you may be out 50g of filament. When a big part fails, you could be out 400g of filament to do a reprint and 12 hours of print time.

Other issues are just around having such a big tank to work on when it's all printed that are common to 1/6th scale like it being heavy and unwieldly to move. I bought better tools to be able to sand into smaller spaces and sand bigger areas faster. Takes lots of paint and glue.

So it’s not totally undo able, you’re just going to have to do a lot more work besides just upscaling everything.

I’ve scaled up a few accessories from 1/48 and 1/16 to 1/8 with no issues, but I figured doing something like this for an entire vehicle would be different ball game. Just curious what those pitfalls may be.

Derek, your KV1 is amazing. All you need now is go a step further and scale it up to 1/3 scale since you have all the STL files already. Changing it from 1/6 to 1/3 is piece of cake...hahaha This way your grandchildren can ride in it
I used the same KV1 recoil system in my Dragon 1/6 scale RC Sherman 75mm to fire a toy gun cap. Quite spectacular with baby powder in the barrel. Here is a video of it firing its canon. Enjoys.

https://www.facebook.com/share/v/14KaKLF3QpU/

DragonSherman wrote: ↑Fri Nov 07, 2025 12:27 am Derek, your KV1 is amazing. All you need now is go a step further and scale it up to 1/3 scale since you have all the STL files already. Changing it from 1/6 to 1/3 is piece of cake...hahaha This way your grandchildren can ride in it
I used the same KV1 recoil system in my Dragon 1/6 scale RC Sherman 75mm to fire a toy gun cap. Quite spectacular with baby powder in the barrel. Here is a video of it firing its canon. Enjoys.

https://www.facebook.com/share/v/14KaKLF3QpU/

Thanks. Yeah well, seeing as my granddaughter is 2 and my grandson is still in the womb, I have some time to make a decision....

I have considered adding barrel smoke and smoke to the exhaust of the KV, but we shall see if that happens. Smokers are not something I tend to keep in my 1/16th tanks.

There’s plenty of space to get that in that’s for sure

Coleman Collector has the right idea! I vote for 78 RPM turret rotation and some 1/6 scale Russians jumping out of the turret to barf in the weeds.
Derek, you keep doing ingenious modeling and mechanicals and we'll keep you disgusted at our sick jokes.