RC Tank Warfare community hobby forum

Well done Rob, it's a case of how deep is your pocket? Sounds being the same, I guess it's a case of , do you want to change the sound file in the future, I am one of those people who like to install a board just the once !!

I think I maybe old fashioned these days.

John

You can do either, yes, it is removing the microswitch from the circuit, so the airsoft doesn't activate.

The recoil takes a bit of work and careful cutting, plus it needs a Clark board, or any of the aftermarket pcb's. I will admit that I had my heart in my mouth when I cut the barrel as it was the point of no return, but it all worked out perfectly.

Just seen that Haya is selling the T90 with recoil & IR. But ad also suggested it was 27 MHz radio?!? Unless the new board can't handle the recoil & IR so he's using older ones?

And a battery that'll fit:

http://www.componentshop.co.uk/7-4v-130 ... -mini.html

When I ordered it was cheaper on Ebay due to the postage. The cut out for the HL supplied battery looks to about right for the charge warning buzzer.

And a book



So much for sticking the bits on and owning one that hasn't been altered.....

I had been wanting a modern Russian tank since i started the hobby. The Hooben T-55's been around a while but that price tag, ugh! When HL came with the T90 thought about it for months, then someone had a used one on ebay and I just couldn't make any more excuses. Cost me $135 shipped.

My main complaint with this tank, maybe the only one, that battery compartment. Perhaps the designers were really having a bad day or just out of sorts for a minute when they designed it since it's completely wrong. If you have one you already know, it's too small! It won't even hold the (lipo) battery that comes with it. By the way, now might be a good time to mention - it might have the Tamiya charger end, of course this does NOT mean you can use the HL nimh battery charger on it! I have had some experience with Lipos, from when I was doing R/C electric planes, and these batteries demand caution. If they get hot, while charging or any other time, take them off the charger or tank and put them somewhere 10-20 feet or more away from people, pets or anything you don't want potentially scorched. Because lipos can and do develop internal defects from rough shipping or handling and on occasion they will blow up. Not like a grenade blows up but more like a PFFT and the battery's toast. So try not to overcharge and use a temp sensor if your charger comes with one.

Anyway here's how i modded the tank to fit the battery. Nothing pretty here, I just hacked the corner open with a dremel. The angles of the relevant hull areas are steep so it's not all that easy to fit the blade in or else I would have made it neater (probably).


So I decided to go with a solid green color vs. the camo colors it comes with. The before:


After several stage of painting and a wash of the details with Vallejo black wash:




This model, I suppose, represents the sum total of everything I learned, and botched, in 40 years of modelling. I have my own theory of weathering that not everybody might like to do and that's fine. Some people go overboard and do a bit too much, and it's the easiest thing in the world to keep going when you have all your paints and airbrush out etc. And perhaps learning when enough is enough might have been the hardest lesson.

My thinking is this, less is more. A tank in wartime is, to the army that uses it, nothing more then another weapon. Another round in the magazine, another belt in the machine gun. Tanks get used and used up, and never is this more true then in war. World war 2 particularly, saw all combatant's tanks used up at incredible rates. This was no surprise to the Russians, or the Americans, who designed simpler tanks that were easier to manufacture in great numbers. For the Germans, less so, since their tanks were much more capable, more deadly, but much more complex. But here goes my theory on weathering.

Some people like to apply heavy weathering and this is fine. if someone is going for a battlefield wreck look, or heavily used, no doubt there were and are, tanks like this in almost every army. And there are inevitably periods of long battles when the crew is working desperately just to try and keep the tank running, never mind dented and missing fenders and dirt. But most of them were not really heavily weathered, even in the worst battlefield conditions. The lifetime of a tank in almost anyone's army was often measured in weeks or just days. So what this means is, probably a WW2 tank wasn't going to be around long enough to turn into a rolling wreck.

For tanks in garrison, or in between battles, most of them might look dirty but most will probably not be heavily rusted or damaged, at least not for long. The commander of the unit knows his superiors are going to come around and check things, he knows these officers have eyes, and he is not going to want a bad mark or a demotion for having a bunch of tanks that look like junk. Never mind that every single tank is ready to go off to battle and the damage is only cosmetic-he will have his guys (gals?) doing what tankers in garrison are constantly doing, keeping up with the maintenance of the tank. That's why I go with light weathering.

Marc780 wrote:
Anyway here's how i modded the tank to fit the battery. Nothing pretty here, I just hacked the corner open with a dremel. The angles of the relevant hull areas are steep so it's not all that easy to fit the blade in or else I would have made it neater (probably).


So I decided to go with a solid green color vs. the camo colors it comes with. The before:


After several stage of painting and a wash of the details with Vallejo black wash:

This post has done absolutely nothing to put me off buying one of these Tanks. If my Tank looks half as good as yours when I finish i'll be happy. Thanks for the idea of the battery compartment mod, my panzer 3 has a small battery compartment

There is something about some Russian tanks that just 'looks right', the T55 - T90 all look good to me. Their WW2 Tank Destroyers always appealed to me too.

I have nothing Russian newer than the T34/85 Torro metal edn. in my collection, as I'm not really drawn to modern tanks. That said, I do have the Chally 2, and reading this thread through has got me to the point of overriding my WW2-
only collecting brief. This tank really does catch the eye, though...over and over

Thanks rolling thunder, for the very nice complement.
I think it looks that way because I painted in stages. First light then dark, so it will show through the final coat. then I airbrushed each segment separetely with the final color. Gives it a segmented look more realistic to the eye, I think. Then the wash did the rest. I did not apply any of the wash in a coat! That would be far too dark an effect and, it's already too dark (I may drybrush some light green just to give it more emphasis on the curves and plain areas). For the wash, I just did spot details - the hinges, the handles, the raised lines-and wiped off the excess leaving more of a shadow line then anything else. Less is more. The hardest part is knowing when to stop before you put on too much! I think it took me 40 years to learn that trick.