Panther (Juli)

[Panzerman]

Panzerman is taking on a Panther man, can't believe it got a birthday coming up asked for this and she said yes,
have been working hard so I deserve it don't I! Always loved the Panther, sloped armour, good gun and after the
T34 probably the best tank of WW II. If the Germans had only made Panthers it probably would have been the best
tank of the era.

Been off the models for a bit, other projects, work, the resulting sleep associated with too much of the before
mentioned, yep enough of that boy I'm back big time! Now time by the way is of the essence as I want to take
this baby to the July MBRCTC meet in Brisbane (Australia) hence I have called her "Juli" (German for July) nothing
like a deadline enough talk lets go!

Going to try and build this one pretty much out of the box, well with a few extra goodies. Have built Tamiya's,
Tiger I and II love these kits and plenty of stuff on the net for help. Thought I would make this a fairly descriptive
build and point out a few of the problems then mine and hopefully others solutions, here we go! Feel free to get
stuck in give me a hard time, criticism is constructive I think!

First is there anything for a model builder like opening a new kit especially a full option rc Tamiya tank,
love that feeling!


I don't know if anyone else does this but I often jump around and don't always build in the order the instructions state.
First up axle brackets in the shiny alloy tub.


The track tensioners are the same as the Tiger I but not the Tiger II why did Tamiya not use these tensioners on the
Tiger II way better idea, should have stuck with it? One area you could get slightly wrong if you tighten the holding
bolt without checking the outer sections are lined up, pretty hard to do but I did so it could happen.


Torsion bar brackets in then the bars in, one trick here they go in way better if you line the axle slot up perfectly
with the bar, don't know how anyone else has gone but they are pretty hard to get in, remember this was the same
with the Tigers as well.


All shiny and nice.

[Panzerman]

Did a bit more this morning, day off so a bit of modeling hopefully.

Got some after market stuff, not too much not much funds left after the kit purchase,
pe grills, some metal bits, opening front hatches and crew to go in them.


Now Tamiya want us to use a thin bit of sticky alloy for the front lower hull, looks too
thin and doesn't cover everything, bit of cut to size plasticard instead.


Fits nice looks way better too.


Now have a dilemma for all you hot shot tank builders, to grease or not to grease.
The bearings with the kit are not serviceable as in they are inside the wheels which
are glued together sealing the bearings. Now while there is little if any chance of
dust or dirt getting in there grease would attract such nasties. Thinking about no
grease, my rc tanks are used more as scale runners than the ir combat jobs.I know
a lot will say fit after market sealed bearings thought about this but the $ stopped
that thought. How do you all think not greasing these bearings would go?

[r32]

Very nice, I was at your stage a month or so back.

[r32]

Ball bearings are so cheap on eBay that you might as well get it done right so that you won't have to break them open again! I bought mine from Stellamodels. It has to be said though, if you run the bushings dry, they'll probably squeak in a tank-realistic manner...

[Panzerman]

Now for the road wheels, decided to go with the Tamiya grease on the stock bearings, when made up if you look at it pretty
slim chance of dirt getting in there, pretty repetitive job.


One little section I could see a small slip up the inner road wheels can be miss-a-lined, you can see this in the pic's below
see how they are flush in the first shot and off set in the second.

(In the RH pic you can just see the high line down the middle section of the wheel)

Now never one to make things easy for myself chucked in another small mod, towards the end of the war the Germans
where running out of rubber and came up with the steel wheeled option for their tanks. Some Panthers had all steal
wheels but I also found out they did a few with just the rear wheels in steal. Thought this would make my Panther look
a bit different so I have a Tamiya static Porsche turret King Tiger which has these. Problem is the KT had inter leaved
double sets(see pic) the Panther has skinny then wide inter leaved wheels, therefore bit of modification involved.

Panther wheels finished and King Tiger wheel arrangement.


So to get the width I needed I cut the middle axle housing section out of the Panther wheels and glued it to the KT wheels.
Bit of measuring to get it right and a bit messy I used epoxy for strength and you can't see inside the wheels. Little bonus
here too, some of you would have seen spare road wheels mounted on Panthers, cleaned up the outers and drilled out stud
holes, will get used these later.


The road wheels including the steal wheel mod took around 3 hours, phew!

After market hatches, always a bit stressy when you start cutting holes in an expensive model kit!
First step cut off the molded hinge, used some of the ultra thin/fexible Tasca saw blades. Bit tricky because you need to
leave the middle lugs untouched as they are part of the hinge.


Next gang drilled the hole around the hatch aimed to be just inside the opening then clean up to the line accurately with
a blade, so far so good .


Hole drilled through hinge for pin and then a small section of plasti-card inside for hatches to sit on.

This section took a bit longer than you would think as I took my time cutting the old hinge off and getting
the hatch hole just right was time consuming also, 2.5 hours approx.

[DRAGONWAGON]

Great progress so far!! Those Tasca saw-blades look like the thing, can you tell me where to get them?
I will follow your build closely and use all the tips and techniques on my soon-to-start tamiya M4(105) sherman build.

Grtz, John "McSherman"

[maxmekker]

So many good build treads pooping up now, always new and cool tips and tricks.

[Panzerman]

Great progress so far!! Those Tasca saw-blades look like the thing, can you tell me where to get them?
I will follow your build closely and use all the tips and techniques on my soon-to-start tamiya M4(105) sherman build.

Grtz, John "McSherman"

Woops given you a bum steer there the blades are actually by Techstar, I live
downunder and got them from a local supplier, see link below, mine are slightly
different to these but have had them for a while, maybe mine are an older version?

Techstar link to saw blades........
http://www.firestormmodels.com/store/pr ... =47&page=1

Verlinden also do something similar, link below.........
http://www.firestormmodels.com/store/pr ... =42&page=1

Hope this is of help, one thing about these blades they a fairly flimsy, easily bent so
don't think you will get a lot of cuts out of them!

[DRAGONWAGON]

Thanks a lot for the links, I'll order some....A man can never have enough utensils. LOL.

Grtz, John.

[ruben2005]

good looking build so far mate, hatches pain in the a##e took me 8 hours to do all on my king look forward to next section of build