Im building a 1/35 ICM T-35 russian heavy tank, and the kit has some really cool supension, with tons of detailed wheels, idlers, drive sprocket and return roller detail, but on the finished model, its completely covered up by some shurtzen-type armor plates. So I was thinking it would look really cool If I made a shell hole in the side of one, plus it would let you see all the cool suspension and tracks/wheel underneath. How would you do this? Cut the rough shape with an exacto knife and somehow rough up/burn the edges? Thanks in advance, Ian
Well, armor piercing shot early in the war (when Germany would have encountered a T-35) was only solid shot-- no secondary explosive in the warhead. Hitting the side armor plates of the T-35, you’d get clean round entry holes. And they would have most likely been 3.7cm rounds. MAYBE a dual use Flak 18 8.8cm gun.
If you want something that would have catastropically ripped off the bolted armor, then you’d have to imagine a large calibre (15cm plus) artillery round or an aerial bomb. But then, a whole lot of damage would have happened.
Also, examine if the side armor aren’t actual sponsons versus extra plates. The design was archaic and there wasn’t a thought of spaced armor. More like something on a Churchill rather than later-schurzen. Punching through that armor meant punching into the fighting compartment. You aren’t just going to peel away or bend back a sheet of thin armor – it was the integrity of the fighting compartment you’re looking to break up.
That’s my thinking.
clean round holes meaning, not jagged edges or random shapes, jsut a cirle more or less? And yeah, its pretty much just an extra armor plate, not anything connected to the fighting plate, it just covers the suspension and stuff. Heres a picture:
EDIT by the way, roughly how big would the 3.7 and 8.8 cm holes mentioned be in this scale?
I stand corrected about the side armor. Yes, AP shot holes would be pretty circular. How large in 1/35? Divide 37mm and 88mm by 35.
Good luck to you on that beast.
Maybe you could look at having the plating peeled back as if its been scraped against an object like a building, tank etc, rather than shot off
Thanks guys, and yeah, I thought about the rippe doff idea, since it would make a cool ripped up look. However, for one it would be hard to make the plastic “peel back” although it would look cool. Also, you would need a realla, really strong force to rip through that kinda armor wouldn’t you? I think a shell hole might be more realistic. Any ideas on the making it part?
Before going that route, you need to consider how thick the armor was. I’ve seen 1" thick Sherman hull armor bent around but that was due to a catastrophic explosion of the internal ammo stores. The plate ripped at the weld seams. Depending on the T-35’s plates, a huge internal explosion would most likely rip apart various turrets and fittings before bursting out bolted armor plate. Even if the explosion was directed at the armor, the bolts would most likely give way before the armor (if it was of any significant thickness) would start to buckle or bend.
Same idea when I see modellers bend up Schurzen on late war German tanks. The flimsy brackets would rip and warp much sooner than bending the even relatively thin schurzen plates.
I always try to think of form and function when depicting damage or storage or other detail items.
HTH.
Looking at the positioning of these plates. pretty much flush with the track edges and fenders, you’d be hard pressed to lodge something in there or hook onto the side of a building to rip it off, much less peel it back.
Just for the record guys…Fenders and other “soft steel” appendages “bend” and tear. That is because they are low carbon material, not structured to repel a penetrator. Armor plate is a whole different dynamic. Rolled armor plate or cast armor is too hard to “bend” unless it is heated, or subjected to extreme pressure. The signature of a penetrator impacting on armor steel depends on its velocity at impact, and the composition of the ammunition (mass X velocity). Damage in the area specified would most likely appear at the attachment points, such as the riveted areas. Shearing would be more appropriate. I agree with Roy and his assessment that armor piercing shot would leave a fairly clean whole through this plate, probably penetrate the hull and exit the other side, depending on what size/type weapon fired the projectile. Just my 2 cents…
Steve
You could just modify the kit to take off these skirts. Sort of like a see through model.
“hey that’s a nice looking model”
“Why thank you. And (removes side) look at this suspension”
Something like that.
Grizz
Ya I thought of that as another possiblility. Thanks for the great detailed responses, you guys know so much about all this stuff. To tell you the truth I dont strive for absolute realism though. So maybe a story like this tanks armor got messed up really badly, so they scrounged a new piece from a broken tank, and even though that piece had some shell holes and damage in it, it was a lot better than what they had so they took. That could also explain why the rest of the tank is fine while that one skirt hadsome large damage to it. Besides, tons of T-35’s broke down, so its plausible that other tank crews scrounged parts to replace damaged ones on their own. Hope that makes sense, and any pictures of the real thing, or of models like that, are appreciated.
I guess I’ll throw my [2c] into the ring as well. Of the 61 T-35s produced, 48 of them were operational in the western Ukraine with the 34th Tank Division from the 8th Mechanized Corps. One of the regiments in this division, the 67th, commanded by M.D.Bolkhovitin, suffered heavy losses from air assaults on the very first day of Operation Barbarossa and was almost completely wiped out. After the first three in the column were damaged by Luftwaffe bombs and blocked the road, the rest that tried to escape were lost in just a few minutes due to mechanical breakdown or stuck in the roadside ditches.
Here is one which apparently did have a tangle with German ground troops. No less than 7 penetrations by 3.7cm anti-tank gun projectiles can be seen. Note the clean shot holes and general lack of visible damage produced;
Overall, most T-35 tanks saw very little, if any combat at all. Most were wiped out in the first weeks of the war. A few survived to be used as static defences during the battle for Moscow. Oddly enough, the Germans were impressed with this behemoth, and orders were given to send one serviceable vehicle back to Kummersdorf for testing. I wonder if it is this vehicle which now sits quietly at Kubinka?
Wow, great information, thanks! I guess im just gonna go for it, whether its very or at all realistic or not. I think It would look pretty cool, and I model mainly for enjoyment. So any ideas on the actual making of the hoel? I want t make it pretty big, as if it was salvaged from one that got hit pretty hard and blew the side apart, I know, probably not realistic, but hey, I think it could look good. I might mess up the pieces round it too, so it looks like the hit did more than just tear a hole.
What diferance does it matter how you make it. It wont be realistic either way. Cut it up however you want. Hack away.
Ian; If it would help, I have another photo of a T-35 literally blown in half from a direct hit of a large bomb. It looks more like the remains of a torpedoed battleship than a tank. Perhaps that is more the look you desire?
I guess Ill just try some stuff on old scraps. Thanks for helping.
Have you considered removing some of those side panels for matnence? The early soviet heavy tanks were know to break down very easly, and often. That would give you an excuse to show off the internal details you want, and you’d be able to see a lot more of it than through a small hole. Juat a thought i had while reading through this!
What a thought provoking thread. Very interesting. There has to be guys out there with pics of damaged tanks. I wonder at what angle of attack would cause a riccocet?
Hey, I think I may still have some 30:06 AP ammo, I could be a good fellow modeler and give your tank “real AP holes”
I might be able to shed some light on what happens when some ronds hit. My father was trained at the Anti-Tank school at Ft Hood Texas, I beleive early 1945. He trained on the 37mm, 57mm AT rifles and M-18 Hellcat. They did a demo on an old tank where they put a couple of live chickens in a target tank. When the projectile entered with the 37 or 57 it would riccocet around the inside of the tank and shred everything. The chickens were reduced to feathers.
On a related note I worked for a company that did military contract work before, during, and after, Desert Storm. My boss used to get lots of interesting photos. When the depleted Uranium hits it liquifies the tank armor. There are probably tons of pics out there of Iraqi tank kills. Sorry if I’m repeating info in old threads. When the turret blew off the tank and landed upside down back on the tank(in the same hole) it was called a perfect turtle. Extra bragging points! We were all so impressed with some of these pics we had them blown up into posters and hug them in our conference room. One had to be “altered” because some people were bothered by the boot with part of a leg in the foreground.
[(-D] You probably need some heavy ammunition to bring this thing down, even the model. In 1/35 scale its atleast a foot long. This version weighed i think 45 tons? And the prototype that was later cancelled was to weigh over 100 tons!! they were going to outfit it with a naval gun. That would send the germans running [:O]!..that is…until the early soviet engine inevitably gave out 2 weeks into field duty like they all did.
If I could find some nice soviet tankers in positions looking like they were fixing the wheels or something the maintenance idea would be very cool. The best diorama I ever say was of a tiger that had hit a mine and was being repaired. Check out the attention to detail in this diorama:
Actually for the maintaniance dio. all you need are some likely tools (hammers, spanner wrench, make a ladder out of popsicle sticks and toothpicks, toolbox) and a coupla guys getting told by the sgt. to fix the track. To make a AP shot hole heat up the tip of a compass (dividers) poke it thru ratherquickly. The outside of the hole will be round and smooth (sand it if you have to) and the inside of the hole will have all the jagged chunks. Use the melted plastic on the inside of the compass hole and carve it into jaggedness. The maintaniance dio. will show more of the suspension though…
G.L.