Tamiya 1/25 Tiger 1 to HL gear IR battle Tank

[modler]

Hello fellow Tankers
I got this Tank in 1977 as a gift from my Dad during a time after an accident when I was laid up for a good while. This 1969 Vintage Tiger with dual motor wired remote control started my journey into the model Tank world. This Tiger 1 has went through several upgrades over the years starting with a radio control upgrade in the 80's. The original all metal drive line that had dual drive shafts and was very elaborate and worked with a full interior finally wore completely out and of course there are no spare parts available separately. I tinkered around with a hand built unit using some of the original parts but it never worked very long and was breaking down most every time I tried to operate the Tank.

So around 2000, I parted out a Tamiya 1/35 scale motorized remote control Sherman and used the gearbox from that model to retrofit this Tiger 1 and that worked very good but before long that gearbox got very loose and was on the verge of breakdown and needed replacement. These Tamiya 1/35 scale metal gearboxes are rare and expensive so I decided to find something else to work in this Tank. The 1/25 Tiger has wide tracks and puts a serious load on the transmission so It has to be something durable

OK when I get some more time I will continue this post but for now off to work. Here are a few pictures of the newest configuration into a IR battle Tank.

[Herr Dr. Professor]

Oh, this in interesting. Having been away from modeling from the mid- '70s to about 2006, I never saw all these Tamiya kits in various scales. What nifty work!

(By the way, hello to Lakewood. In the mid-70s, I was completing an M.A. at Kent State, "higher" education and subsequent two decades of more over-education and struggle for career being the demise of my modeling time. I once heard Kent described this way by the owner of an ice cream shop I frequented as an undergraduate in Wisconsin: "Cleveland is the armpit of the world and Kent is out on one of the little hairs." )

[modler]

Oh, this in interesting. Having been away from modeling from the mid- '70s to about 2006, I never saw all these Tamiya kits in various scales. What nifty work!

(By the way, hello to Lakewood. In the mid-70s, I was completing an M.A. at Kent State, "higher" education and subsequent two decades of more over-education and struggle for career being the demise of my modeling time. I once heard Kent described this way by the owner of an ice cream shop I frequented as an undergraduate in Wisconsin: "Cleveland is the armpit of the world and Kent is out on one of the little hairs." )

Herr DR, I also went to Kent state. Stark branch in North Canton in the late 80's. Bachelor degree in "Industrial Technology" Should have went for "Internet Technology" lol.

Anyway, Cleveland is a much maligned city and at one time around here was called "Mistake on the lake"

Ok back in topic, I finally got this Tiger 1 running without constant breakdown using the gearbox from this Tamiya Bulldozer. It is a very strong gearbox and is more than enough for this 1/25 Tank.

I have seen these gearboxes sold separately on ebay for around $15 or so.

[Herr Dr. Professor]

You seem to have a penchant for the smaller RC AFVs. It's refreshing to see them. Do you have more 1/25 AFVs? I have a few, including a KV-2 that is just a display model, no innards, what the Germans call a "Standmodel," a model that stands still.

(Yep, I visited the Stark Campus before I started teaching at KSU. I was a "Teaching Assistant," assisting absolutely no-one and no one assisting me, either. Yet I do hope that each semester I taught fifty students something, such as "don't take him again next semester." If those students averaged 18 years old, they are now average age 63. )

[modler]

You seem to have a penchant for the smaller RC AFVs. It's refreshing to see them. Do you have more 1/25 AFVs? I have a few, including a KV-2 that is just a display model, no innards, what the Germans call a "Standmodel," a model that stands still.

(Yep, I visited the Stark Campus before I started teaching at KSU. I was a "Teaching Assistant," assisting absolutely no-one and no one assisting me, either. Yet I do hope that each semester I taught fifty students something, such as "don't take him again next semester." If those students averaged 18 years old, they are now average age 63. )

Yes Herr Doctor, Time is quickly departing from the good old days methinks.. I only have one 1/25 scale models at this time. I have recently taken an interest in 1/30th scale as it is still a bit small but have room for things like main gun elevation and barrel diameter that allows IR LED internal barrel placement which requires more accurate aiming to score a hit on a IR receiver thus making the IR battle more realistic in the gunnery aspect

I have owned 1/16 scale Tanks in the past and they were great fun but now I like more variety and numerical diversity in my collection so the smaller scale(s) works for me as a collector of WW2 military models. I lived in Heilbronn Germany in the sixties and had a nice toy army of infantry and tanks, trucks, artillery guns that I used to put up against my German friends toy army's and use "lady finger" fireworks for our munitions in our mock WW2 battles. My friend Wolfgang would always ask the same question at the start of hostilities, Are you afraid? I would reply,"Nuts"

[modler]

Well the Heng long radio upgrade was a total success in the !/25 scale Tamiya Tiger 1. This tank can now IR battle any 2.4G HL tank. I already had a IR battle with a HL 1/30 M4 Sherman. The HL radio gear used is very easy to work with. Only downside is the "Mode 1 throttle" which I have remedied with a TX Mode 2 conversion.

Update cinco de mayo
This 1/25 Tiger is now perfected with the HD Tamiya Bulldozer gearbox and Heng Long circuit board.
Features:
Main gun up\down with digital proportional speed control.
Main gun left\right with digital proportional speed control.
1 stick forward\reverse with digital proportional speed control.
1 stick neutral turn with digital proportional speed control.
Heng long IR battle system with tank recoil\hit shudder and 4 LED hit indicators.
volume control is via a button on the TX that allows 4 volume levels including a mute funtion.
Tank can be put into standby via Tx control.
Has L\R track tuning function so that tank tracks strait.
Machine gun and main gun firing.
Main gun 1 button firing is limited to 10 shots but can be overridden by 2 button firing.