New M114 155mm howitzer

Honestly I was demoralized, I was so into the builds. I had pictures and extra parts everything laid out. So I started the builds and when I reached a certain point my brain clicked in said this doesn't look right. I had driven them in the Army. So I went to the pictures, something I should have done earlier, my ignorance and now I know better, I'm still somewhat of a neophyte.

The back of the M577 is completely wrong, almost every detail is wrong. The top of the M113 is wrong, from the way the drivers hatch closes and opens to the rear hatch being upside down. I didn't think they could make such glaring mistakes and sell them like that. But guess what, they do. The fix on the Tamiya M48A3 is an easy one, the M113 is not. You have to completely redo the drivers hatch, how do you do that? It's not worth the work when you have the much better but a little more expensive Academy kit available. The top of the Tamiya M106 fits the Acad kit almost perfectly, the M577 is a little harder but that doesn't matter as you have to sand down he whole back and rebuild it anyway. The M132 is from the Acad kit so those are the variants used by the US in Vietnam. And the M125 which was not used a lot and replaced or rebuilt. I even have the Verlinden conversion to the M something with the side firing ports.

I still have a bunch of barbed wire rolled up for those vehicles.

The M548 is a good kit from AFV and expensive, too bad they don't make variants of those or conversions that was used in Nam, as far as I know. I even have the quad 50 version but that was only tried and rejected by the troops, it looks cool but it was not used at all. I think there was one vehicle and it looked so cool they added it to the kit, I guess. In actuality the M548 had issues with carrying weight, the chassis was flimsy.

Also some people don't have the room in their living quarters to have so many projects unfinished.

You'd freak if ya saw my work area.. My War-Room is a 12 x 8-foot bedroom in the back of a 12 x 60 fott trailer, lol..  I build the dioramas, then I photograph them... Then I generally tear everything apart, trashing the hulks and keeping detail parts... 

I've got some shelving up in the living room, though, so some dioramas get displayed, as long as they can fit on a 12-inch wide shelf.  But eventually, everything gets torn down, because I get sick of looking at 'em after a year or so, with the exception of some dios featuring kits I can no longer aquire...Now that I've "discovered" digital photoagraphy, I don't really need to keep anything anymore...  That, and all I do is "action" dioramas, no display models... So I get plenty of work on figure conversion too, since nobody makes figures doing what I want them to do (with the exceptions of seated pilots and vehicle drivers, and even then I have to move arms and turn heads)... A LOT of my unifinished projects are atually kits that're at 99% completed, the just don't have the diorama ready yet, which is the real bottle-neck... 

For instance, converting the old Italeri kit to an M114A1 would probably take me only three or four extra hours (Suggestion, rather than nut-for-nut, bolt-for-bolt duplication, is the key to being a sucessful Gizmologist, ie; "Close enough is good enough"), but converting nine 1/35th figures into a 155mm gun-crew that's in the middle getting the gun laid, or in the middle of a hasty displacement, well..  Suffice to say that each figure would take around eight hours... That's about 72 hours just for the crew...  Can't take short-cuts with figures, unless you're doing shadow-boxes (With those, you need only to paint what faces the viewing window)...

My largest project at this time is the 1/48 Monogram B-29... It's going on the diorama that will depict the Enola Gay around 0300  6 August 45, as a Shep Paine "Tribute"... Once completed, the dio will measure 24 x 28 inches and be mounted directly to the wall in a corner, and in all likelyhood, will be torn down a year or so after that...

But I gotta say, BD... What you describe with accurizing that M113, sounds suspiciously the same as my scratch-building the detail and super-detail parts on those so-called "dog" kits, lol...

I may only have 2 -8 hours a week to be at the bench.

Ahh.. Check an' a Rog...

As for two years, that doesn't mean I spend every day of the last two years on anything... Just means that I got too many kits under construction, and not enough bench... I guess the anal part would be that I've started keeping track of actual build-time, punching in and out on a kit when I work on it, in order to track the actual number of hours spent on any one kit's construction, rather than days or dates...

Luckily, my job allows me to work anywhere from 1 to 50 hours a week...  I opt for the former more often than not in order to maximize bench-time, lol...  'Druther do 50 hours at the bench than 50 at work, lol...  'Course, that's why being on a salary sux...

Hans, no not commission....what I am saying, at least from my aspect is RL keeps me busy so I may only have 2 -8 hours a week to be at the bench. Thus time is precious and as such spending extra time fixing an old kit may  have less value then spending a few more bucks for a better kit.

This I realize is a personal thing and everyones situation is different. I love the hobby and love scratch building. When I get to the point where I can put in 56 hours a week at the bench, those thoughts may change.

Now.....2 years unfinshed....I'm tooooooo anal.....it is either going to end up on the shelf finished or in the paint booth a a paint cow!!!

Nontheless, it will be nice to see the new Pig kit hopefully soon.

Rounds Complete!!

About challenges, I have enough in my life I really don't want them with my hobby. There is enough of a challenge getting up and feeling well enough to do the model. I'm not expecting perfect models but if I spend $25 for a kit I expect a little accuracy. If I have to rebuild the whole model then to me it's not worth it. Unless like the 155mm towed it is the only game in town until now that is.

There are models that companies just do not make so if you want one then it's scratch time. So that is another story. One is the MSSC seal boat, a great little boat that nobody makes and I will attempt to scratch eventually. But that's a very square shape with very few features, just a very high coolness rating when added to the PBR and LSSC.

The other is the M37.

But while working on those M113 and variants the amount of just plain inaccurate details was driving me crazy. Just when I thought it was going good I saw 3 more details that were wrong or not there, then another 3 or 4, then another one. It was never ending until the model was taken down and rebuilt too many times and looked like crap. Now I know better and if doing one I can fix it. But you can't start it and keep on fixing it because you see more and more things. That's how I came up with the marriage of the Academy kit, they are different sizes, the acad kit is a bit wider but the same length. It's doable. Now that I have all the details it is much easier. Like anything else knowledge is the key and my lack of knowledge sunk me. Now I know the many deficiencies of the kits and can correct them from the start which is much easier.

I think certain kits are just dogs, the question of it being worth it to even do is up to the individual. I had a choice of buying the 1/32 scale M55 8" SPH reissue for $30 and doing a lot of work to it or the German made 1/35 which is on sale. I opted for the hopefully more accurate and expensive German made one. Simply because it was 1/35 scale and I want to keep to one scale.

I was amazed at one builders work with an old Renwal M55, it was amazing, of course he was a master builder and scratch built most of the kit replacing so much and building a whole interior. A work of art, his name eludes me but you can google it. A truly amazing build. I also found the builder who made the molds for the German M55 for them and the whole M55 was scratch built, it took him 2 years. I am a bit disappointed that the German kit for that money has no interior. But I am not really an interior guy.

Interior work amazes me because of the small details involved and I give people credit that do them. I'm just not into building things nobody will see since I prefer action scenes and figures. I have noticed many great builders avoid figures. Like all builders everybody has their own thing that they concentrate on, some avoid interiors and some avoid figures, some avoid being too accurate and just make the model from the kit without hardly any aftermarket stuff and they look great.

I think it would be great to have that $150 M55 being pulled by the $200 M51 in a dio. Both kits need zero add-ons and supposedly come with everything you need. I like that, they are hard builds as it is. I can see a cool dio with a bunch of figures hooking them up to tow the M55. I'm sure that happened plenty in Vietnam.

Also some people don't have the room in their living quarters to have so many projects unfinished. Were I live interior square footage is at a premium, you would be shocked at the prices of everything especially rent or the price of a home. I cannot make an assembly line so for me to have to do that much work has to be weighed carefully. Everybody has their limitations and beliefs so I really don't question them, everybody is different in that respect and I respect those differences, unless they are full of crap which is a different story.

there comes a point where the value of time out weighs the cost of the kit.

That one confuses me a bit, Redleg... You talking about a build deadline? I don't have any of those unless it's a commission-build, in which case the person wanting the model or diorama supplies the kit anyway...  The only other deadline I got is the "Final" one, lol...

I've got so many projects on the bench though, that some are in the "two-years and still not finished" category... 'Course, if it comes to actual build-hours, they don't have much time invested at all, some as little four or five hours...

I think the last Pig I built, which was S.O.B., took in the neighborhood of about 10 hours.. If I had to scratch-build the jack assy, I doubt that it add much, maybe another 3-5 hours build-time...  Where my bottlenecks are most prevailent is in the diorama construction and figure conversions...  I haven't built an M114A1/Prime Mover dio yet though, since the 5-ton kit is missing from that equation, lol..

I agree that some kits have been eclipsed by newer onew.  It doesn't make them junk though, just a bigger challenge to bring them up to standards. 

Though if the Academy kit actually does have details not found on the Tamiya Version then wouldn't that make the Tamiya kit the crude copy?

Nope, it just makes Academy's version an upgraded copy.

The Academy and Tamiya M113's should fit together just fine as they are basically the same mold same as the M2 Bradley and the Panzer IV Ausf.H/J. Though if the Academy kit actually does have details not found on the Tamiya Version then wouldn't that make the Tamiya kit the crude copy?

For those who are interested Philshobbyshop has the M1A1 version for $36.09 on ebay right now. I guess they should have the M114 version soon, I just have to wait.

That's what I had in mind a lot of work to make that M114. But it was the only way to do it until now.

I tried to fix a tamiya M113, it was not worth it. The Academy kit is much better. I am going to try and mate the 2 for the M577 and M106. I had to do so much work on th Tamiya kit it was just NOT worth it at all. Way too many inaccuracies for 2011-12, it was a good kit 20 years ago.

I bought the Tamiya before I knew about the Academy version as I hadn't been doing modeling for a while. So many missing details that had to be scratch built when they were already there in the Academy kit. The Eduard had them but that was very difficult to rebuild all those pieces. Has anybody seen the Eduard PE kit for the Tamiya ACAV? You have to rebuild every detail on the kit.

A little scratch work is good, a little fix this and that is good, a total overhaul is not unless it is the only game there is. Like the M37, no kit so I will attempt to use a Beep as a base kit. As does Real Model with the Italeri M923/925 into the M54 gun trucks.

The main difference is the jack assembly which you would have to scratch build to make the M114.

I agree with Gino....on the other hand, there comes a point where the value of time out weighs the cost of the kit. The new Bronco kit is light years ahead of the Peerless/UPC/LifeLike/Italeri/Testors kit and the M114 should be the same, thus worth the investment.....IMO

Rounds Complete!! 

There are real issues with those 155mm kits especially if you want to make it Vietnam and later versions.

Well, that's certainly your call, BD..  Myself, I crewed a Pig (M114A1) for a time, and all I really remember about it is that big silver tube and that everything else was painted green and heavy as hell..

Hans' point is that yes, there are issues with them.  These issues are fixable though, just as Tamiya's M113 issues are fixable.  Just because it is not a perfect kit (there never will be one), doesn't mean you can't put some work into it and make it a gem.  I have never seen a kit I couldn't fix either, and to my river-counting, standards.

I'm not arty expert but when there are glaring inaccuracies then you have issues IMO. I have had these issues with the M113 and variants from Tamiya, a horror. Maybe I am too critical and trying to hard to be realistic. But that's my goal to have everything as humanly possible be correct and as real as possible.

There are real issues with those 155mm kits especially if you want to make it Vietnam and later versions.

Thanks Mike.

I check it out on eBay....

I have a couple of the Italeri and one peerless kit, They are dogs.

Well, Dogs are man's best friends, lol.. I never met a "dog-kit" that I couldn't house-break either...

I'm not an "Accuracy-N azi" either... If it looks like what it it is representing, it's close enough..  There's no judging critiera for "accuracy of kit"  in either AMPS or IPMS rules...

That's the manufactures recommended retail list price. Everybody gives you a discount of some kind. Figure it's probably in the $35 price range.

I have a couple of the Italeri and one peerless kit, They are dogs. The Peerless metal barrel is useless. And the cost alone of finding the correct looking Vietnam era tires was like $50 until I finally found a set. Add the work to get them to fit and I still don't know if they look right since I haven't painted them yet.

This kit looks great. Even if it is 50 bucks I'd get 2. What price is an easier model to build that is correct. For me the price is not an issue if the build is easier and more authentic. I have found that the end game is what it's all about when it comes to cost. You some times will spend more to get things right as opposed to buying one that is out of the box which is rare. Just my opinion.

Hans - Picked mine up for $30 with shipping on ebay. Vendor in the orient.

Noah - I will look things up tonight, try to get back to you shortly

Rounds Complete!!

50.00? Yikes..

Think I'll just keep buying the Italeri kit of the Pig...

Were did you get that one? Did you see anything baout the barrel? the Peerless barrel is terrible.

I was going to buy one of the WWII versions and then I read about the M114 Vietnam and was excited, yeah models get me excited now, not the kind on Sports Illustrated, the ones made of plastic and resin...ha ha ha.

Hey man you can send those M108 pix now. If you can it would be cool. Message me if you don't have my email addy.

Noah - they officially just released the WWII version. I would guess the M114 will be out in a couple of months. Like you I have my eye open. The WWII version is great. Here is my in box review of that kit

http://www.armorama.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=Reviews&file=index&req=showcontent&id=7026

Rounds Complete!!