I want to follow you if you post the build on here because I was going to order one soon myself.

"Another question for WWII Soviet Armour fans - in your opinion what Tamiya colour makes for a good Russian Green? If it looks green it will work I suppose with it being Russian!"

Dark green or Black green

The SU-85 was quickly found by the Soviets to be redundant to the T-34/85 in terms of firepower, so they opted to mount the 100mm in most of the production run of these muthas...If I were going for a BoB build I'd opt for the later gun but if you are asking me if a SU-85 ever laid tracks in Berlin, I'd say at some point one probably did...

As far as the shade of green, I always go loose and free with the Soviet stuff and whatever looks right is what  I use...some opt for a lighter shade but IMO the shade was probably much darker than you commonly see used...

It sounds like a lovely kit to build!

Like the idea of a SU 85 Beute-panzer. Here's a bunch of inspirational pics if you chose to travel down that road.

/Bultenibo

Another vote for WIP coverage of your build .  After oogling this kit at the LHS for the last couple weeks, I'll be picking it up this weekend.

Cheers

Sounds like a cool kit and a fun build...

but I have never heard a kit described as "Scrumptious" LOL

Hercmech

Sounds like a cool kit and a fun build...

but I have never heard a kit described as "Scrumptious" LOL

Well, I've heard of 'scrumptious models' but most of them were of the swimsuit variety...

Really nice kit, as I said before you're going to enjoy building this one.

Manstein's revenge

The SU-85 was quickly found by the Soviets to be redundant to the T-34/85 in terms of firepower, so they opted to mount the 100mm in most of the production run of these muthas...If I were going for a BoB build I'd opt for the later gun but if you are asking me if a SU-85 ever laid tracks in Berlin, I'd say at some point one probably did...

As far as the shade of green, I always go loose and free with the Soviet stuff and whatever looks right is what  I use...some opt for a lighter shade but IMO the shade was probably much darker than you commonly see used...

Unless I'm confusing the 122mm gun, I thought they went with the 85mm due to a lack of 100mm guns. I recall something along those lines.

Looking forward to it Ben,I got the same kit on order,I'm thinking about getting a metal barell and building it as a 100.so I will be following along.

Also thinking about trying out that AK modulation kit for Russian Armor

When I built my Jsu-152 I used the NATO green on someone's recommendation 

I used White Ensign's 4BO Green on my T-34/85...based off it I'd say Dark Green mixed with some Deep Green for "greenness" and perhaps some blue in there as well. If you have an iPhone, there's an app called iModelKit that's really handy for playing with color mixes.

tigerman

Manstein's revenge:

The SU-85 was quickly found by the Soviets to be redundant to the T-34/85 in terms of firepower, so they opted to mount the 100mm in most of the production run of these muthas...If I were going for a BoB build I'd opt for the later gun but if you are asking me if a SU-85 ever laid tracks in Berlin, I'd say at some point one probably did...

As far as the shade of green, I always go loose and free with the Soviet stuff and whatever looks right is what  I use...some opt for a lighter shade but IMO the shade was probably much darker than you commonly see used...

 

Unless I'm confusing the 122mm gun, I thought they went with the 85mm due to a lack of 100mm guns. I recall something along those lines.

Howdy!

There's a lot of confusion as for the Soviet SP guns - there were many "families" of them - one used the T-34 Chassis (SU-85 and SU-100 among them - I believe they ended up at SU-122) - and the gun was always "one number ahead" from the current T-34 model. Like when the then-current T-34 model used the 76mm gun, the SU used the 85mm gun. Then T-34 switched to 85mm gun, so they modified the SUs with 100 mm gun. Similarily, there was the ISU family, that uset the Stalin tank for chassis. They started with two types of 122mm guns, but switched to 152mm guns as soon as they were available (that took a little time, and then the ISU-122s were retrofitted, that's why it is so hard to find one now).

Hope it helps, have a nice day

Pawel

Chrisk-k

Dark green or Black green

 Whatever color you use, just remember that the weathering will most likely make it darker.

Hi guys,

There's obviously a lot of interest in this kit. Something about the box art just really catches the eye! The instructions look very simple (as Dragon instructions go) and the moulded detail is excellent.

As for calls for a blog, as some of you know I always blog my builds to some degree so I'll take some time on blogging this and do a real 'in-depth' blog.

The Tiger '100' will be another month on the bench imo so as soon as that is complete I'll be going Soviet!

Cheers guys and thanks for links etc

Take care,

Ben

No, not the assault guns, but the rifled guns. Because of the Panthers and Tigers, they wanted a more efficient gun to deal with them, but were low on 100mm's, so they opted for the more available 85mm gun. Makes sense, since the 85mm wasn't the great penetrator as say the German 75 Lang and 88mm, especially against the thicker German armor.

Looking forward to this even tho I don't build Russian stuff...

Man up and give  it the 100mm!

All joking aside this looks to be a smashing project.

Also my knowledge of Soviet tanks is somewhat lacking but I believe the original SU85 was just an attempt at mounting the 85mm gun into tank format. The SU85m came out of a result of a shortage of 100mm guns to mount into the SU100 and is essentially an up armored SU85. But I'm not positive.

That should build up nicely. I've got the Dragon Su-100 waiting in the wings to get done.