Well, here’s Dragon’s ‘Black Label’ kit of the US M6 heavy tank. The M6 was only built in limited numbers (I’ve seen 30-45 on different websites). None ever left the States and none ever saw combat. They were used for test trials and one did take part in a war bonds parade. The closest they ever got to action is it seems one drove over a car in a propaganda film. [:D]
From the reviews I’ve heard there are a number of issues with the accurate nature of the kit but frankly it went together for me without any real fit issues. I didn’t try to fix anything but just slapped her together. I found the provided insignia for the test vehicles dull so I rooted up some spare stars and numbers and marked her for an operational tank. Thanks Stikpusher for helping me with the vehicle codes!
I did use her for a test bed for preshading and weathering. Probably I shouldn’t have taken the photos outside because that did wash out a lot of the detail. I may take a few more inside under better lighting. And I did create some ruts for the treads but I didn’t notice that the model is sitting on top of them instead of down in them. Looks like I need to drive a screw though the model and fix her down into the base… [:$]
The thing has 36 friggin’ road wheels and I wasn’t going to paint the rubber areas of all of them so I just hosed them with ‘mud’. Then I looked at photos of French tanks with the same track guards and noticed mud and dirt tended to spatter up the sides so I tried to get something like that. It was a bit of an experiment, I sprayed the sides with hairspray, sprayed on Tamiya buff in an irregular pattern up and down, and then scrubbed from the top down to remove some to give a patchy rain-streaked look. Not sure it’s totally correct but I liked it so I left it.
The commander came from MiniArt’s US tank crew with cold weather gear. The artist who did the box art gave the commander a 'stache so I just had to give him one too. Maybe I over did it! One of my friends called him Gomez Adams… [:|]
No glasses, I guess the pop-eyed look I get with figures gives that impression.
It looks good, I’ve heard bad (accuracy wise) things about the M6 and M6A1 kits, not to mention the bad words about the entire Black Label series. Your kit looks just fine and the tank has an interesting look to it. Reminds me of the Tamiya Char B1 Bis; giant hull with big turret.
Great job on the M6! I really like how you did the weathering. And as many, I’ve heard a lot of bad things about these kits. I don’t know, your’s looks fantastic!
Rob & Bruce: Yeah, despite the bad rap the ‘Black Label’ gets I had no issues with the kit. I have their M103 about half built and yeah it’s got some problems. And the Doog’s T54 and the horrid turret. But this one built up nicely. I fact I think it was one of the better Dragon kits I’ve done.
Only real issue is something that wasn’t Dragon’s fault but the real thing. Whereas a M3 or M4 had three suspension bogies on each side the M6 is longer so it has four. And instead of coming up with a new suspension since the M6 is almost twice as heavy as the mediums the engineers just doubled up the bogies on each side- aka two sets of bogies on each side. Or- B for bogie here:
M3 or M4:
B B
B B
B B
The M6:
BB BB
BB BB
BB BB
BB BB
So in the end there are 16 bogies compared to the M4’s 6. Almost like building three Shermans at once! A kind friend donated a M10 to me and I had to tell him sorry it’s going to be sometime before I can build anything with a VVSS suspension- that M6 burnt me out!!! [:XX]
Griffin: Lol, when I finished the thing it just looked like it needed something but I wasn’t sure what. So I added the leaves as a touch of colour!
That finish is what grabs my attention the most. I absolutely love the very subtle modulation I think I see. That looks so natural that the natural light plays beautifully on it.
Your figure does look a bit like he’s shat himself proper like lol. Wonder what he just saw through those binoculars? Simple fix, give him some eye lids. That’ll take that googly eyes look away without having to repaint the entire face.
The leaves are a fantastic touch! Looks like he’s been parked under tree somewhere. Adds a splash of color as you said and gives you an impression that it’s part of the environment.
Lol, thanks Mike for a good laugh. Maybe he saw Karl’s Jadgpanzer pointing it’s gun at him? [;)]
And good advice, the commander isn’t cemented into the turret so I can still pull him out and fiddle with the paint.
The paint is AK Interactive’s set for US olive drab. It’s easy as falling off a log, just follow the instructions on the back of the box. I’ve used the same set on about a half-dozen subjects so far.
The leaves were just luck, I guess even a blind crow finds a worm every now and again. …
It looks to be a pain to assemble the suspension, that’s for sure. The only black label kit I own is the MBT70. It has gotten criticism because while it is the German version, they used details from one surviving example and details from the second surviving example and created a kit that does not accurately depict either one. It would be even more difficult to depict one of the US ones since there are several and no two are alike.
I’m happy to have a quality kit that I can use as a base to create a “what if” version of the tank in service as opposed to a pre-production prototype that doesn’t even have real armor steel. I’ve thought about arming it with the 120 from the M103 or a 105 from the M60 series. Not sure though.
Rob: I’ve looked at the MBT70 but haven’t pulled the trigger on it for pretty much the same reasons. I picked up this M6 kit on sale for about thirty-five bucks. I paid full price for my M103 and felt it wasn’t worth it considering the issues. At thirty-five I can swallow a lot more problems in a kit. If I can find the MBT70 around the same price I’ll probably pick one up.
After finishing this one I did kick around the idea if I can find another M6 at a decent price of ‘updating’ it. Adding a commander cupola, a turret hatch for the gunner and loader, rebuilding the front glacis plate with a ball mount for the MG and adding periscopes for the driver and bow gunner and getting rid of the direct vision ports for example. We’ll see in the fullness of time if I ever get around to it.
