1/6th Tiger : project log

Modeling Subjects Armor
1

HI guys here is my project. A field of Armor Tiger 1 Ausf.E in BIG 1/6th scale…

contents

check this out

it’s been sitting on a warehouse shelve since 2004…

I am about six months into the build and have hundreds of pictures to share with you. My plan is to come up with a " reasonably accurate" late war Sherman-killer. I will be taking some poetic license, at the end of the day I have to make myself happy… Besides the Field of Armor kit I will be using countless after market parts from

East Coast Armory

Steel Dragons

6th Scale Icons

The big three. Be sure to checkout the East Coast Armory website, great stuff… With tons of helpful pictures.

I can not count how many times I have went back there to “double check” some detail or another. Thanks John.

Some basic construction. The kits hull and turret come in flat panel (5mm thick) laser cut pieces, lots of fitting and gluing and messing around

turret:

that’s it for today. much-much more to come…

2

Welcome to the Forum

Welcome to the Forum

Looking forward to this.

Big toys for big boys!

!http://i20.photobucket.com/albums/b232/gluetank/Decorated%20images/th_T1-4-copy.jpg

3

Thanks for the welcome DM.

Ya the the thing is huge. It’s measures about 40" long 25" wide and 22" high. I did not know what I was getting myself into. It looked much smaller in the picture when I clicked on purchase button from Toy chest and collectibles, another great big-scale web-store… The project is a major undertaking in time and money. I have collected just about every after market (resin) part I want/need. Including paint, the final cost will be $1500 plus (US)… BUT, I am having a blast building it. And I am looking forward to sharing the pictures with you.

I will update again tomorrow night…

CG (aka hustler)…

4

That thing is gonna be HUGE!! I can hardly find enough room on my bench for the 1/35 KV-1B I’m working on. Looks like alot of work but hey, if we all wanted it easy we could just cheat and buy those die cast thingees eh? Keep us posted CG, can’t wait to see more. Oh yeah, welcome to the forums as well.

5

Oh man, I would love to have that thing! Unfortunately, I can’t get my hands on any 1/6 scale kit (other than machine-gun kits) for a reasonable price. That would look great in my garage (or out in my front yard, on the prowl for that neghborhood cat that keeps beating-up my cats!)

6

Cool kitty!

One question:

Are you going to motorize it?

Either way I am looking forward to this one built![H]

7

WOW! 1/6 scale. That is a beast.

Bob

8

New definition of the term “Big Cat” for sure! Welcome to the forums! [B]

9

Thanks one and all, @ SF at this point in time I do not plan on motorizing the tank. A kit is available for full running and turret rotation as well as gun elevation. It’s expensive and would also require another kit to upgrade the suspension the price tag would be like $700 plus radio, batteries and servos. BIG MONEY. The cool thing is the way the kit is designed it can be done later. So, perhaps I will not say never…

The update. The turret needs some TLC.

gaps to bondo and the storage bin is less than great. It’s molded to the turret instead of a separate unit like the real ones. Also the bins top doors and hinges are out of scale (over sized).

So, I spent a good amount of time working the above

a new thinner bin top door

the above picture is with the stock over sized doors

a new one

the pair, then body work in that area.

getting better

getting really close

now hatches. the loaders hatch and escape hatch that came with the kit where (IMHO) less than great. The answer, new ones from East Coast Armory.

the hatches are resin by the way

assembled and primered

I did use the stock commanders copula, with a few mods

sanded assembled primed and painted with a few coats of Model Masters afrika mustard. The MM mustard is my base coat, the top coat will be Tamyia TS-3 dark yellow, which I think is pretty close to dunkelgelb…

test fit

back to the bin

scale rivets

another slow process

hinges and mounting tabs

now hatches installed and “weld” beads added

also small detail in front of air filter ( the air filter itself is also an after market part from panzerwerk.com)

spare track hangers ( from 6th scale icons)

installed

that is it for today. The turret will get it’s zimmerit next…

Until next time

CG.

10

This is already looking awesome CG.

“no body told me I had to schlep this 30 cal all over the place”

Sorry, favorite movie and now you got me started again, guess Ill be watching it again tomorrow…LOL

Bob

11

Before I forget, do you hapen to have any sources for 1/6 scale stuff? I know about Monkey Depot, and some of the top links in a Bing search, but I have not found what I truely want : a website that teaches you to scratch-build 1/6 scale wepons and equipment. I know there was a website called Bean’s Customs (or something like that) but I don’t know if the web site is still functioning (at last check, almost all .pdf files would take you to the google “Failure to find page” page) If you can help, please respond.

12

It’s always nice to see more 1/6th scale armor. I can’t wait to see it finished. John

13

Hi Railfan, here are a few

eastcoastarmory.com (this is armorguys website)

steeldragons.net ( cool site, but not sure about ordering. He has been keeping me waiting for over two months for some parts I need.

panzerwerk.com

armortek.co.uk/ this is good stuff with a great forum. But, there kits are all metal and will cost you like $7000 $8000 that is correct not a type o…

CG

14

Here is the next update zimmerit . This is mind numbing stuff to apply. Hours and hours of work. I used Milliput two part epoxy putty and a tool made from a butter knife…

turret lift bolts and armored visors installed

primered

the model master mustard

topcoat

that is it… Tracks next

15

One more update before I go to sleep, and last of the week. I will be doing some real-world stuff the next few days.

Tracks. The kit comes with combat tracks. My research into the Tiger has taught me that there were two different sets of tracks for the Tiger. One set for rail transport and another wider set for combat.

a good picture showing both sets of tracks

On any tank model, weathering it’s tracks is a key-point (IMHO).

The field of armor kit’s tracks come assembled (thank god) molded in black plastic, they measure over 5" wide and over 6 feet long. A major part of this project.

The first step was primer (red oxide)

fritz is in the picture to show you the scale of the tracks, a “stack of two” is almost as tall as a man…

Richard from steeldragons.net turned me on to this stuff. It is world class.

Two part deal. First apply the gun metal colored surfacer (which has super-small iron fillings in it)…

like so… then the antiquing solution… What you end up with is rust, real rust on plastic !!

it’s cool as hell, drink a beer and watch rust appear…

I will most-likely tone the rust down with some gun metal or soot black using Tamiya’s pastel weathering sets…

This was the most fun I have had so far in this project. It looks and great and it’s application is close to fool proof.

Have a great weekend

CG. (this could be the perfect crime)…

16

Great looking tracks!

The antiquing solution worked perfect! Have you considered just rubbing the bare metal surfaces with a wide carpenters lead pencil? It always looks better than dry brushed paint.[Y]

One more question:

What unit and paint scheme have you decided upon? The cool camouflage applied to Tigers is what attracts so many modelers to build them. My personal favorite is the 12th Panzer SS in France, 1944. Also ANY eastern front whitewash scheme. [H]

Jason

17

Thanks for the websites. I knew about Armortech, which is a U.K. company (that explains the high prices) but I thought that was just about it.

With the Zimmerit, I have a sugestion, if you also apply it to the hull, How about Bondo, or some other kind of putty you can buy (and apply) in relitive bulk? If I know right, Miliput is a small-scale model product, and not shipped in huge quantities. I think it would work. Also, think about using wood putty. I have used it before on car models, because it looks a lot like scale Bondo, and it still sticks to the plastic realitively good. I’m not exactly sure how good it will be as Zimmerit, but it’s worth an opinion. You may also like to buy a cheep ($0.88) plastic scraper (I’m drawing a blank, it’s the same thing used to apply plaster to a hole in the wall) and filing some noches into it, if the butter-knife tool you made doesn’t work, or if you want to find something more efficent (I don’t know, mabe your butter-knife tool is the most efficent means at applying Zemmerit in this scale).

The tracks look real good. I knew they used two kinds on the Tiger, but I never saw any photos of them in use. Thanks. The model track looks great too. I may try the technique you used on an armor project someday.

18

Schwere SS-Panzer-Abteilung 101,

or

2.SS-Panzer-Division Das Reich

with three color camouflage. Late war France. I have stencils for both, well on order anyway. I have a more than a few items I have been waiting on for over two months. One of the items the Tigers exhaust shields, this going to force a work stoppage if I don’t get them soon. The hole back side of the Tiger is tied around the exhaust. You know, the exhaust tubes then the armored covers then the outer exhaust shields. Without those back ordered shields I can’t drill and mount the exhaust, and in turn can’t do the zimmerit around them. The back side of the Tiger is just a flat sheet of 5mm plastic. Everything has to be mocked up measured, bolt holes drilled ect. So, I need all the parts that will end up back there to get to the paint stage. Speaking of paint, I did get a big shipment of (10 cans) Tamiya TS-3 dark yellow which was also back ordered. This model is soaking up paint like a sponge, but that has to be enough paint to finish it.

I have enough milliput to finish the zimmerit on the tank. The stuff is very nice. Sets up time is over an hour and ends up hard as a rock. It also works great for weld-beads (the model needs lots of them). I have seen people use a hacksaw blade on small scale models to be able to do rows of zimm at a time. BUT, on a model this big I think it is better two do one “trowel” notch at a time. The way it was applied on the real tanks back in the day. I think it is coming out well, looking very much like the real thing – only very boring and time consuming to apply. That has me thinking, I wonder how long it took to do a real tiger’s zimmerit. If it was done by one man, I would guess a eight hour day. All for something that was unnecessary. No one (except the Germans) used magnetic anti tank mines during the war.

thanks for following along guys

CG

19

Great camouflage schemes! The SS always had the coolest paint jobs on their vehicles.

[I]For your next monster build do consider Krylon paint. They make plastic compatible full size spray cans that lays down like glass. They have recently introduced ‘military’ colors, the 'olive drab’ is more brown than green and looks spot on for late war allied armor. 1 full size can is the same price as a smaller hobby sized can.[2cnts]

Keep up the excellent work, just think you will qualify to stucco a house after all that trowel work applying zimmerit!

20

I never knew that about the mines. Then again, a magnetic mine is like any other, it can be captured and re-deployed by the enemy, or the tankers could get mis-information, which would place them right in the middle of a mine-field (Or, some german soldiers could get drunk, and think it would be great fun to play an explosive joke with the Tiger heding up the road to the front.)

Mabe the Germans were thinking about preventing the above sinarios from happening. It makes perfict sence now[sml…]