WOW, mikael, that progress is really rapid everything looks great so far and those headlights are stunning work. I wasn't expecting to seeing you having made so much progress after all the delays caused so early on in the project.

Terry. 

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Okay here's my update, would have had it up yesterday but I went to Cabela's thus that took a bit of time. I did however pick up a new Gerber pocketknife so I'm happy about that. Then when I did try to get some pics up, my computer was so damn slow. I finally figured out it was the new anti-virus software that made my computer a snail. Thankfully I solved the problem, got the pics uploaded, and now here's the long delayed update.

The .50 cal is permanently in place along with the box and scratch ammo tray. The ammo belt itself will go in at a later time(already painted). The antenna is in place, along with all four wheels. Also put down some future on the hull sides so I can get the decals on soon.

The antenna base is the kit supplied one, just a little bit of sanding is necessary. As for the top antenna wire, I used some copper wire. The kits instructions say to use stretch sprue(no kit supplied part), but its entirely your choice of what material you want to use.

The .50 cal is in place, painted a base color of Testor's Steel mixed w/Black. Then some drybrushing of a lighter shade of Testor's steel also darkened w/black. I drilled out the cooling holes a bit just to give some depth, along with the barrel.

The wheels are all on......finally. Put down a burnt umber wash then sealed them with some Krylon Matte acrylic finish from a rattle can. I also sealed the wheel wells, so I could move onto the pastels with worrying about them dissapering. I then rolled the wheels in a mixture of pastel colors like sepia, burnt umber, and vandyke brown. Yes the hull sides are super shiny but that's the Future.

Yeah, I know this pic is sorta bad so I'm sorry about that. All the tools and guns have got their wooden parts finished off. Used Testor's wood for the base coat, then applied some Tamiya acrylic clear orange, and finally some washes of burnt umber(to darken the color and to get the wood grain.)

All comments, questions, and suggestions welcome as always.

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"There's nothing funny about a clown in the moonlight."- Lon Chaney

   Hey Michael these Z-kits are a real blast huh? Yours is really coming out great though.

  It amazes me that they add extra stuff like engines and rubber tire's with lettering but leave off hull details no clear lenses for headlights and fit issues that will give you fits.

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"Happiness is a belt fed weapon"

I hate Z-Kits....:)

But you are working very fine...It'll be amazing...:)

wbill76 wrote:

Making some great progress with this one Michael! The tires in particular are looking good and the little bits here and there are dressing this one up nicely.

Thanks for checkin' in on the WIP and for the comments, wbill76! Glad you like all the little detail parts I'm throwin' in......that said I got the .30 cal installed and the ammo feeding in. Should have a another update up in a day or so.

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"There's nothing funny about a clown in the moonlight."- Lon Chaney

Nice going MgM. Looking good.

Julian

This build is finally starting to near completion.....believe it or not. I'll get up only one more  update after this one. Soooooo, finished pics should be up on Saturday or so.

As for this update, the decals are on. The red star and numbers are from the Zvezda kit. They were actually quite nice, but they kept curling in the corners. Thus one must be carfull not to put down the decal with the corners stuck underneath. The flag/wreath decal on the door was from a Revell kit spare. It went on nicely with just a little bit of vinegar to help it go over some raised detail.(Gotta thank Hans von Hammer for the great tip about using vinegar in place of Micro-Sol!) The instructions did say one more decal of a red star in white circle goes on the hood, but I felt it subtracted from the builds appearance so I let that one off.

Another view of the decals. Also I put the axe permanently in place inside the scratch axe sheath.

Yep the .50 cal has finally got it's ammo belt feedin' in. This belt of bullets came from Tamiya's US Infantry Weapons set. I put half the belt inside the can, with the other half of the belt feedin' in. Just some slight cutting was neccessary to get the ammo belt to curve. Note: the guns are not yet finished more weathering will be coming soon.

The .30 cal is now also permanetly in place. This ammo belt also came from Tamiya's US Infantry Weapons set. Placement was straightforward(just some shortening), since this belt didn't have to curve at all.

Finally the tarps and bags that will be along the hull. I decided to replace all the kit supplied one's with much better detailed ones from Tamiya's Allied Vehicles Acessory Set. The kit supplied ones are okay in front, but as soon as you look to the side of them their completley void of any detail. (I guess you could scribe in fabric folds, but that would take a while, and I was a bit lazy to do all that .) The dark green tarps are Zvezdas and the very light green ones are Tamiyas. I think this pics says it all in just a simple comparison.

The bags and all will be getting more texture ala tissue paper, so I gotta get workin' on that soon.

All comments and questions welcome!

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"There's nothing funny about a clown in the moonlight."- Lon Chaney

Hey Mike,

I really like how all the details add to the overall presentation and the paint job is phenomenal,

Great Job Sir!!  You make plain green look cool!

This is a first for me.......back to back updates.

As for those tarps and bags I gave them the tissue-treatment inorder to improve texture and creases. Scratched straps will be made very soon.

After that was on and dry, I applied a mixture of paints(black, tan, brown) to make a dirty kahki color. I will be going back though, to lighten up the color on one or two bags to make them have contrast(that whey their not all the same color.)

Some of the goodies I'll be throwin' inside the cabin, will include scratch maps and a one page document. For the maps I just size down some regular maps(nothing to fancy) of major cities I find on the web(one is of Paris and the other of Kiev) As for the document (I just took some russian writing and sized that down to size#2 font.) Then I take the maps and document and simply weather them with coffee. I personally use some regular brewed coffee and that's it. I find it makes the perfect effect on paper to make something look old and used.

All comments and questions welcome!! Finished pics will more then likely be up sometime this weekend.

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"There's nothing funny about a clown in the moonlight."- Lon Chaney