Model Armour

You all know that track links have a proper orientation. This is not the time to ask yourself "Are the tracks pointing in the right direction?" But it is exactly when I did... ran around like a madman then found the directions. I got lucky this time though...

I used the drive wheels (rear) from the Cyber-Hobby Factory 112 T-34 kit - Mark Rethoret pointed out to me that these were more common. Unfortunately, the Factory 112 kit is the only Dragon kit (to my knowledge) that includes these. I should have made a mould of the parts, and I will when I get another set. On this day I wasn't in the mood to take a 24 hour delay in finishing the tracks.

This is how I did it. Cemented together 18 link sections, allowed them to dry for 2 minutes then braced them into place with thin wooden cocktail sticks. I didn't glue any of the idlers, drive sprockets or roadwheels in place. Instead I took up the final slack with the idlers and then glued the tracks to each wheel. This makes the entire suspension removable as one unit for painting. The only trick to this is to use liquid cement as sparingly as possible so as not to ruin the beautiful detail.

It went well- and I love Magic Tracks- but they do not build themselves....and they sure take a toll on your enthusiasm for a build. Hopefully the result is worth it- I know I am happy with it.

Getting started...

Part way through the first side...

Part way through the second side...

You can and should use shorter sticks for bracing!

Front view. Note in the left of the pic the idler isn't in the correct position - it is still not cemented in place here...

Rear View...

The end result...

On the tank. Right side...

Left side....

Back to the turret! First note that the Formochka turret part is a nice piece! It has a nice texture which to my eyes doesn't need additional texturing. The Formochka turret was actually formed in a giant 5000 ton press out of 45mm thick plate.

I looked really closely and found one very faint mould parting line that had to be removed. Not in a place you would typically look. I marked the area with a red line here:

I scraped it off with a blade and then painted it with liquid cement to remove any trace. You can see I did the same on the periscope. Painted on some liquid cement, that's where the shine came from! When I got to this point I recognized that the armoured ventilator dome and the grab handles on the turret did not have locating points. I had to draw these on with a pencil. If you are doing one of these out of the box, mark these before you have anything fragile glued on.

Once I glued the ventilator dome in place I added the stretched sprue weld beads. The kit part had some weld texture, but I wanted a bit more.

Next up the hatches and the lifting eyes.

The hatches actually used small latches to hold them open- the kit has these but the instructions do not call for them? They are tiny but worth adding. Here is a close up of one...

The kit has some options with the turret- one periscope, two periscopes, one periscope and a dummy- I went with one. There is also an option with the rear of the turret. There is a plug, part number D5, in the kit. Looks like a pistol port? Depending on when the Formochka was made this could be there, be absent or there could be an antenna pot in the same location. The drawing I used didn't have the port, so part D5 stayed on the sprue.

Then onto the PE brass grab handle mounts. I used brass rod in place of the kit supplied plastic parts which had mould parting lines.

After the picture above, I grabbed the T-34 Mythical Weapon book, which I had been using as a guide. There is an error in the scale drawings in the book, and in the Dragon Kit. I have pictures of two surviving "stamped" turrets and now that I had found the mistake I was going to have to fix it. I looked at the pics I had of preserved "Formochka" turrets. Ignore the text: Check out the Dome and its vent arrangement.

T-34 Mythical weapon has some great shots of a "Formochka" turret on page 406. I looked especially close a second time and noticed that the "Formochka" has a unique ventilator dome design. It is smaller than the standard T-34 dome - the only part provided in the "Formochka" kit. Here is the fix - this is the kind of stuff I love to do.

Carefully cut off the kit ventilator dome...

Save the kit part...

Scrape, sand and paint the turret top with liquid cement to remove the sanding scratches...

Start on a new ventilator dome...

Plug the hole in the centre and texture with Mr. Surfacer 1200...

Glue it on and do the weld beads again...

Here is a comparison "old" vs. "new"...

That took 4 hours - but I felt a lot better afterwards! Only for a short while though, before somebody pointed out that had misaligned the new dome. Ah well....

I carefully removed the 'new' ventilator dome. Beneath it the turret top had taken a bit of a beating - so I also had to shave off the two lifting rings. They were salvageable as well. I sanded the area and had to fill the points of contact from the ventilator dome. I just textured the turret top with Mr. Surfacer 1200. I let that dry and looked ahead at what needed to be done with the hull details.

Turret detail removed...

Turret detail returned...

I also found some minor instruction issues. These caps shown below needed to be added to the upper hull. The instructions show them installed, but not how they got there? I found the parts numbered C16 on the T-34 40/41 sprue (There is more than one 'C' sprue.)