Project Bulldog - Start to Finish
Posted: Tue Jan 06, 2009 10:49 pm
After completing my Tiger I decided that I wanted another tank, but having spent a huge amount of cash on the first one, I was wanted to see how cheaply I could create a nice looking IR ready tank, without spending money on it. First task was to source a Bulldog as that was what I really wanted. I sold some spare bits on Ebay and dropped a hint that I was selling these to finance my next project...a Bulldog (not allowed to mention 'wants/exchanges' on Ebay but doing it this way gets around the rule.
Sure enough one of the well known suppliers emailed me, and told me that he had a Bulldog, it had a fault, but it was equipped with brand new metal tracks, metal gearboxes and metal sprockets. It would come in the box with all the usual bits, and he would throw in an RX14 set of boards. This was exactly what I was looking for, so we did the deal.
As soon as I got it I pulled it apart and fitted the new boards. I also removed the smoke unit. It ran perfectly.
Righty, cooking on gas!
I then carefully removed all of the plastic tools. I had purchased metal ones for the Tiger, and then painted them..but what was the point? Nicely painted plastic looks just the same. I also cut the front tool rack off as the real thing has it set much lower. The rear mg mount was removed, as was the gunsight(??) in front of the turret. Out with the filler, and sanded flat.
I removed the metal sprockets and tracks, and was then ready to paint. I decided on a desert style paint job, just to be different, and also decided to try Valleja acrylics. I checked Antics online to see if the colours I wanted were in stock in Bristol, and it said they were, so I drove into central Bristol, paid £4.20 for 10 minutes parking...and found that the website was lying!! I therefore purchased the closest matches I could find instead.
Everything was given a dilute washover with desert yellow, and the wheels brushed with several coats to bring up the colour. Hmmm...desert yellow is a bit bright! I then applied burnt umber to the rims and hubs to give them that dirty look..which made them a little better, and brought out the detail.
The tracks were bright silver, so they had to change. Humbrol matt black enamel watered down with B & Q brush cleaner was washed all over and sure enough they turned black. I then applied burnt umber to the outside edges to give that muddy desert appearance.
The tools were all handpainted so that the metal bits looked metal and the wooden bits looked wooden. The jerry cans were done in a kahki colour, achieved with Dark Sand and a washover with Flat Earth.
The lower hull was given a coat of Humbrol beige enamel. It's more durable than acrylic and goes on with a brush in a 'one coat' application. There is no way that I could get around the wheels and suspension with my airbrush, and I didn't want to risk breaking anything by pulling it all apart.
Next up was the top hull. This was given a couple of coats of Dark Sand, until it was all a uniform colour. It was much better than the Desert Sand colour!
Next was very dilute Dark Grey, this was painstakingly fed into all of the seams and hinges to bring out the detail.
I then ran around rivets and other detail with Burnt Umber to get a bit of rust.
It still looked a bit boring, so I gave the whole thing a blow over with dilute Neutral Grey to dull it down, and then applied diluted Earth Brown in an attempt to give it a weathered desert look. Unfortunately, my ancient digital camera does not like indoor flash photography so the pics aren't quite natural, I will get an outside pic and post it up when I get the chance. I also have a Darkith IR unit on it's way.
Only things left to do are paint in the vision slits, and it's done.
So, what did a Tamiya compatible tank cost, including 'hit' and 'fire' sounds?
Tank £70
Paint £13
IR £61
Total £144
It can be done, and probably even cheaper if you pick up a bargain somewhere?
Cheers
Rob G
Here's the first 10 pics, next post will have the rest.....
Sure enough one of the well known suppliers emailed me, and told me that he had a Bulldog, it had a fault, but it was equipped with brand new metal tracks, metal gearboxes and metal sprockets. It would come in the box with all the usual bits, and he would throw in an RX14 set of boards. This was exactly what I was looking for, so we did the deal.
As soon as I got it I pulled it apart and fitted the new boards. I also removed the smoke unit. It ran perfectly.
Righty, cooking on gas!
I then carefully removed all of the plastic tools. I had purchased metal ones for the Tiger, and then painted them..but what was the point? Nicely painted plastic looks just the same. I also cut the front tool rack off as the real thing has it set much lower. The rear mg mount was removed, as was the gunsight(??) in front of the turret. Out with the filler, and sanded flat.
I removed the metal sprockets and tracks, and was then ready to paint. I decided on a desert style paint job, just to be different, and also decided to try Valleja acrylics. I checked Antics online to see if the colours I wanted were in stock in Bristol, and it said they were, so I drove into central Bristol, paid £4.20 for 10 minutes parking...and found that the website was lying!! I therefore purchased the closest matches I could find instead.
Everything was given a dilute washover with desert yellow, and the wheels brushed with several coats to bring up the colour. Hmmm...desert yellow is a bit bright! I then applied burnt umber to the rims and hubs to give them that dirty look..which made them a little better, and brought out the detail.
The tracks were bright silver, so they had to change. Humbrol matt black enamel watered down with B & Q brush cleaner was washed all over and sure enough they turned black. I then applied burnt umber to the outside edges to give that muddy desert appearance.
The tools were all handpainted so that the metal bits looked metal and the wooden bits looked wooden. The jerry cans were done in a kahki colour, achieved with Dark Sand and a washover with Flat Earth.
The lower hull was given a coat of Humbrol beige enamel. It's more durable than acrylic and goes on with a brush in a 'one coat' application. There is no way that I could get around the wheels and suspension with my airbrush, and I didn't want to risk breaking anything by pulling it all apart.
Next up was the top hull. This was given a couple of coats of Dark Sand, until it was all a uniform colour. It was much better than the Desert Sand colour!
Next was very dilute Dark Grey, this was painstakingly fed into all of the seams and hinges to bring out the detail.
I then ran around rivets and other detail with Burnt Umber to get a bit of rust.
It still looked a bit boring, so I gave the whole thing a blow over with dilute Neutral Grey to dull it down, and then applied diluted Earth Brown in an attempt to give it a weathered desert look. Unfortunately, my ancient digital camera does not like indoor flash photography so the pics aren't quite natural, I will get an outside pic and post it up when I get the chance. I also have a Darkith IR unit on it's way.
Only things left to do are paint in the vision slits, and it's done.
So, what did a Tamiya compatible tank cost, including 'hit' and 'fire' sounds?
Tank £70
Paint £13
IR £61
Total £144
It can be done, and probably even cheaper if you pick up a bargain somewhere?
Cheers
Rob G
Here's the first 10 pics, next post will have the rest.....
