RC Tank Warfare community hobby forum

Personally I used the Aber tow cable attachment point that is included in the KV-1 set on my Armoured Models SU-152 build that is in progress.

Great pics thanks Mr Tankme.
I made mine the same looking.
What do your tanks and mounts go like ?

I used the tanks and mounts from the Armoured Models kit. Since they were 3D printed they were a royal PITA to get the print lines out of. I ended up gluing them together and putting them on my lathe to remove the lines and the bad not scale straps printed on them. I may still have to putty them a little. I'll know after priming. The brass straps are tapered and soldered to some 3/64" brass rod. I was able to actually thread an M1.2 steel nut onto the 3/64" brass rod. I also modified the mounts to be able to hang over the edge and thinned the mount where the nut/rod sits. It's not perfect, but it is close enough for me. On the real tank the nut/rod looks to be welded to the side skirts and not attached to the mount like the Armoured Models version. I had to move the position of all the skirt supports and remove all of the KV-1 locations. Even in the reference material I have they are not the same as the KV-1. I was going to leave the originals, but it made the tanks look like they weren't in the right place. The tanks are placed to the outer edge of the skirts to allow for the spare track holders to be mounted to the inside of them.

Great pics, thanks.
Ive made my mounts that attach to the guards, out of hand shaped left over sprue material off Aber Panther Schurzen!
Still to dress the recovered T34/85 tanks & make the straps to secure them like yours.
The handles on the ends will be made from brass too.
At least with the H/L fuel tanks I can heat them & create fairly ok looking dents. The Jukenburg resin was just no good to dress.
I tested one out by using a sanding drum on my Ryobi to give some surface irregularities, but it just didnt look right.

Nice detail work Herman,

I'm no fan of the tank itself but your doing a fantastic job on capturing the "Ugly Duckling"!

Barry

I might be getting a bit ahead of myself, but did a bit of mucking around with hull detail features to see how what I have to hand will work.
The principle of a rough lump of Soviet armour will work out close to how a want it, without getting exotic stuff in from overseas.
Nothing firm yet, and a lot of other things to get done, but hey, a little glimpse into the future does wonders for the motivation

Tarps and drum look a nice addition - a nice big dshk on the top and a couple of figures

It's starting to grow on me!

Barry

Very nice looks well abused, found a pic on britmodeller of one with a red circle on roof to to ID it as a russian tank. Did they do that?

Been getting on with the little stuff .
The fuel tanks and retaining brackets & straps took a lot more work than I though at the get-go.
As I like stuff rough looking, its harder to do that than leave things straight I reckon.
Gentle heating with a heat gun on the fuel tanks to allow 'denting' on the likely surfaces, and brass straps with soldered retaining bolts placed over the top of them.
The bases of each tank are made out of left over Aber Panther schurzen sprue which have worked well enough to pass for this build.
On the left side guard I've gone with a very modified 200L fuel drum(as in the period pic I found) that was in mint condition.
Far to mint for me !
Out with the heat gun again & hooked in big time.
Hey, a dirty old 200l drum thats not a real military asset by this stage cops a lot of misuse & lack of care I reckon so its dropped a lot & is deformed.
BUT, what colour to paint said drum ??
Ive googled my arse off & cant find any definitive direction of what a WW2 Russian fuel drum looks like paint wise.
Now the Americans under Lend-Lease sent over 2.9 Million tons of petroleum products to Russia, but Im certain not all of that was in the holds of tankers, and even if it was, the lucky Soviets still need to pump it into containers to send out to the front.
I'm going to take a huge risk here and presume that this specific machine has had the need and opportunity to get hold of a good sized drum to secure extra Diesel onto its deck, and grabbed an available container that happened to be one of the lend-lease products sent from The U.S. and as such has a U.S. recognised branded colour scheme................
But which one ??
Esso and several others were around at the time, as were Shell & several French brands, but I doubt that french products would have made it to Russia before things got tough.
I tell meself its just a fuel drum, but the other little voice in the head says " its a point of difference-get it right"
Please lads, any plausible suggestions ?