1/35 Dragon M-103A2

M. Brindos

Member since
January 2015
From: Tumwater, WA.

1/35 Dragon M-103A2

Posted by M. Brindos on Friday, February 6, 2015 3:58 PM

I finally dug into this build and holy cow, what a load of work! I'm nearly finished with the suspension. I have one side finished and i haven't even started the road wheels yet. There are 16 of those to build and the outer rims and tires are separate from the inner hubs. Yikes!

Okay, so here's the pics. So far the searchlight has taken me the longest to get built up. It comes in 9 10 separate pieces and the assembly is a bit tricky. Two parts, J26 and J27, are not actually shown in the directions and if you leave them out there will be nothing to attach it to the tank with. Unlike the Tamiya searchlight with fewer pieces this bit of mini kit does build up to a rather accurate replica of the real thing. I could only find ONE photo for reference that showed the light without the cover on it. So that's what I used to paint it with. The instructions do not include a detailed paint guide for this part, in fact there is no painting guide for it at all. Just assemble with missing parts and continue to the next step.

They only mention painting the entire tank Olive Drab, but it's actually painted in Marine Corps Green, which is closer to German Black-Green.

^ These are the correct three slotted drive sprockets that no kit ever includes but were present on all of these series of tanks, from the M-48A1 to the M-60A3. These are made by Def-Models and they are a perfect fit after the resin flash is removed.

^ The plastic on the upper and lower hull of this kit are thick. Probably the heaviest chunk of plastic I've ever assembled lol. To get a good match of texture on the join between the upper and lower hull I used a very simple trick here. I softened the join with extra glue, let it cure for a few minutes,
and then pressed the surface of my rough sanding stick into the plastic and mushed it about a bit.

^ There is no casting texture on the upper part of the hull above the Bogie Wheel line so I added some with Bondo. Yeah it's meant for cars, but it works very well. You can even soften it up with liquid cement and mush it around. Its actually one of the best putties I've ever used lol.

^ Its not bad. I didn't need a lot of this texture here and I don't need it to be accurate either. Unless you go looking in here with a flashlight after I'm done you really won't be seeing this.

^ Here is one of the very few areas where the EP marks were actually exposed. I ran some Bondo in there and filled in the depressions. This is one of the best representations of an actual tow hook I've ever seen modeled. I've seen these in real life on actual military vehicles and this is almost perfect.

^ Bogie Wheel factory. I glued them together first so that when I sanded them down they would come out even and have the wear in the same places on each side. I left the texture rough as they should be.

Edit for clarification:

^ I began the searchlight by removing the EP marks and assembling the back end of the housing. Look closely if you need this for reference for parts J26 and J27.

(First attempt)

^ My first attempt with the Bare Metal Foil was less than satisfactory, leaving what looked like cracks in the mirrored surface of my reflector. I tried painting this piece, but it just would not reflect correctly. So stripped the BMF off and had another go at it and was much more successful the second time.

According to the reference photo the center of the reflector should look similar to this. Light grey-silver around the outside with black in the middle. I painted an eyeball on the back of the bulb as you see here. I was hoping that it would lend a bit of blue cast to the reflection, but you can't even tell it's there. I know this bulb should be painted silver, but the white gave a better reflection when viewed from the front. The silver didn't really work and was much more dull in reflecting the light.

^ The unfortunate side of having some many parts in the assembly of this piece. Lots of filling to do.

^ A good reflection. Not the best reflection, but this is the ambient room lighting bouncing off the reflector and return reflecting the light off of the white painted bulb. If you catch it just right (this isn't the best picture as the camera was getting in the way for the shot) it looks like it glows from within the searchlight.

^ No seams and the correct Marine Corps Green. Looking good so far.

So there is still a ton of stuff to do with this kit. I've finally made it to page 3 in the instructions lol.

Thanks for looking guys. Any questions? Ask me.

Build Log update!

^ I've gotten past the tedious suspension assembly. Make sure you get the friction snubbers (shock absorbers) located properly with the control arm attachment placed on the back of the control arm. The directions don't specifically tell you to do that and if you don't get them placed right they will interfere with the road wheels... and look dumb as well.

^ This is how the friction snubbers should be placed. It is also somewhat critical when placing the control arms to align them on the model before you glue them on. I noticed when I had them all on the one side that just pressing them on did not guarantee that they had proper alignment. The second side went easier after knowing that would be an issue. So be sure to align them properly before gluing them in position. There will be a bit of play in the fit so the alignment is really simple.

^ Upper hull assembly completed. Watch out for the Barrel Travel Lock, it can be a bit fiddly and if the alignment is not quite right it will look broken.

^ After I sorted out the suspension I started the even more tedious task of assembling the 4 part road wheels. Fortunately they are somewhat self aligning as long as the glue is evenly applied around the rims. If you get a spot where the glue did not get into the liquid tension of the glue will pull the rim off center. It's not a major misalignment, but if you're picky then it will bother you like it did me. At this point I will mention that the Bogie Wheels and the Idler Tension Wheels do not get rock chips or scratches like the road wheels do because they're not "in the dirt" like the road wheels are. For those of us who like to add such small details to our builds that is important to note at this stage of the build. Also the tires keep most of their seam lines as they do on the real tank so it is okay to leave some of the seams showing on the wheels if you're interested in such accuracy.

So far I'm still working on the wheels and I have the tiny nubs that the wheels attach to masked along with the Drive Sprocket spindles in preparation for primer which I hope to be able to get sprayed on this weekend.

Thanks for checking in!
Update complete. :P

Edit:

I glued the turret together this morning. Happy Valentines Day.

Here are a couple of good test fits with the ginormous 120mm AA gun they put in this thing;

My Dad shared a story about this gun the last time he was over for a visit. "That gun was a monster. It was so powerful that the recoil system took up half of the front of the turret. That's why it's so huge. (to see if they could make the turret smaller) They had a test where the gun was solid mounted in the turret. The Commander said, "I'm not sitting in that thing to fire it", so they rigged up an external firing cord. When they fired that thing it blew strait out of the back of the turret and left a hole in it." LOL

Dragon, in their infinite wisdom, has molded the barrel in one piece, which may not seem like a terrible idea until you realize they molded the end of the barrel crooked. You can't see it in the pictures, but the extractor is warped and curves slightly to the right. I bent it back mostly into the right shape, but the extractor is out of round because of the molding process. I can fix it, but I shouldn't have to

Thanks Dragon.

Edit:

I've fixed the crooked barrel and you can still slightly see it if you know it's there. There's not much more I can do about it. It looks straight if you aren't looking for the curve so that will have to do. After fixing that I went about the task of fixing the seam lines on the turret and adding the casting texture back to the seam lines. I think I've done a fairly good job of making it convincing lol.

After all that I decided to tackle the gun mantlet. I first added the casting texture to the sides of the mantlet and then the hollowness of the mantlet got to me. You can't even see this but if the gun is in full depression you can see down inside the mantlet. Raising my personal bar of attention to detail significantly for this build I could not let this escape my notice.

^ First thing I had to do was to fill the space (18cm x 6cm) with sheet styrene.

^ Next came the Bondo. This was roughly applied and then softened with liquid cement before I stippled the surface with a hard bristled brush.

^ After that was done then I went over it with a fine sanding stick. You just want to bring down the texture enough to get an uneven surface. You don't want to sand it all flat and smooth. I then brushed some primer over the area to check how it turned out.

^ I could still see some of the gaps left over so I ran more Bondo over it with my finger and then ran my finger over that once it dried and ran more primer over it.

^ Here is where I had to add some texture to the front of the turret. I didn't like the way it looked and this picture was taken after a tad bit more sanding and just before I applied more primer.

^ After jumping ahead in the instructions I noticed that there were more steps for adding things to the hull. Dragon doesn't seem to have any rime or reason to the steps in their instructions. I think I really do have the hull complete now.

Anyways, I was working on the mantlet and adding the searchlight brackets and lifting rings. The picture washed out and so I will have to take it over again later. Dragon did not provide any solid means of attaching the center searchlight bracket and I decided to drill it out and shore it up with some stiff wire. I don't want the searchlight falling off later with a light bump so this I deemed a necessity.

So that's where I'm at right now.

Update;

^ That .50 has a lot of detail.

^ Here are some of the welds I made. Look just around this loader's hatch retaining hook. This is so simple you'll wonder how you didn't think of it yourself.

You'll need some stretched sprue and cut lengths to fit your weld area. Next you wet the area with liquid cement that you want to drop these into and let it sit for a few minutes to soften up. If it needs more after a few minutes then slop more glue on there. Then all you do is press into the softened sprue with your hobby knife, or toothpick, or anything you think will simulate a good weld line. Just press into the weld and shape it. It's that easy. (credit to Disastermaster)

^ Wheels on!

^ Here you can see the weld I added to the MG mounting bracket. There were feint gaps here where the part didn't fill the hole completely. Making weld seams for areas like this is just perfect!

^ A few more welds around the TC's hatch latch. lol

^ Sourcing out the correct size for this power cable was a little troublesome. But in the end I found the right gauge.

^ Hull is ready for more work later.

^ See what I mean? It's starting to look like a huge heavy monster. It just looks like it has a lot of weight, doesn't it?

So far that .50 cal was the most fun of all the fiddly crap I've had to build. It moves freely and stays where you aim it without any trouble. Dragon inexplicably managed to get the weight balanced out really well and although it's not stiff it stays put quite well. I thought I was going to have to glue it together to make it stay, but nope. A nice happy accident from Dragon for once.

Update;

SO I ran into a snag. The Searchlight storage mount ended up being too far to the left and wouldn't be functional as it would interfere with the turret basket. Not something I can just let go.

^ You wouldn't be able to store the searchlight here if you just trust Dragon on this one. :(

^ So off it came and I started to retexture.

^ Moved and mounted where it should be.

^ Welds added.

^ and fixed.

So yeah... those tracks... I don't like them. They cracked and almost were an unrecoverable mess until I clamped them. That worked on one set, but then the other set was squished out of form and I had to cut parts out. Fortunately you can't see where all this damage happened and I'd like to think it has a lot to do with my skills, but man these tracks suck. I'm still preferring the single link tracks to this rubbery mess.

- Mike Brindos "Lost Boy"

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disastermaster

Member since
July 2003
From: On my kitchen counter top somewhere in North Carolina.

Posted by disastermaster on Saturday, February 7, 2015 5:44 AM

Lookin' good.

Looks like you've got this big boyunder control.

Sherman-Jumbo-1945

"I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now"

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the doog

Member since
January 2007

Posted by the doog on Saturday, February 7, 2015 9:08 AM

Great work and a nice WIP, Mike. I'm going to update my own WIP soon when I get a few minutes regarding my experiences with this "Black Label" series soon. Hope you're having a better experience in certain regards than I am, particularly involving the attachment points for the sprockets and idlers, which are woefully inadequate. I am also finding the directions to be less than clearly-illustrated as far as positioning of certain elements.

That light looks killer. Great ob on the texturing too. :)

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M. Brindos

Member since
January 2015
From: Tumwater, WA.

Posted by M. Brindos on Saturday, February 7, 2015 10:13 AM

Yeah I am scratching my head over the attachment points for the bogies and idler wheels. They don't seem very substantial at all. As far as the instructions go I've found the J26/27 problem but I'm hoping that's it.

Thank you guys, but there is a long way to go still. :)

- Mike Brindos "Lost Boy"

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SprueOne

Member since
January 2006
From: California

Posted by SprueOne on Saturday, February 7, 2015 12:14 PM

I like your detailed SBS style of WIP BLog. Very informative. As DM mentioned, "You Got This"

Anyone with a good car don't need to be justified - Hazel Motes

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stikpusher

Member since
July 2004
From: Sonora Desert

Posted by stikpusher on Saturday, February 7, 2015 12:31 PM

Very nice work so far. If you have access to the Model Master line of colors, they have Marine Corps Green, FS# 34052 in their line up.

F is for FIRE, That burns down the whole town!

U is for URANIUM... BOMBS!

N is for NO SURVIVORS...

- Plankton

LSM

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M. Brindos

Member since
January 2015
From: Tumwater, WA.

Posted by M. Brindos on Saturday, February 7, 2015 12:58 PM

Thanks Sprue! I used to very carefully design diagrams in Ps when I documented the mods I made on my Airsoft guns years ago. Its a habit I'm getting back into.

Yep. I have that MM color. It came with the build along with the Slotted drive sprockets. :)

It's a dark color, but after modulation it will lighten up a bit. Since this is a relatively clean build I will be relying more on the color modulation then on the weathering this time to bring out the details. My dry brushing skills will be truly tested again, to be sure lol.

- Mike Brindos "Lost Boy"

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M. Brindos

Member since
January 2015
From: Tumwater, WA.

Posted by M. Brindos on Friday, February 13, 2015 2:14 PM

Update Inserted into the first post. :) Bump. ;)

- Mike Brindos "Lost Boy"

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SprueOne

Member since
January 2006
From: California

Posted by SprueOne on Saturday, February 14, 2015 6:58 PM

Straight through the back of the turret?!? Wise TC !

Anyone with a good car don't need to be justified - Hazel Motes

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M. Brindos

Member since
January 2015
From: Tumwater, WA.

Posted by M. Brindos on Tuesday, February 17, 2015 6:59 PM

First Post updated. Bump :)

- Mike Brindos "Lost Boy"

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stikpusher

Member since
July 2004
From: Sonora Desert

Posted by stikpusher on Tuesday, February 17, 2015 9:09 PM

Those things were such big beasts!!! That turret is massive when seen in person. Nice progress there MB.

F is for FIRE, That burns down the whole town!

U is for URANIUM... BOMBS!

N is for NO SURVIVORS...

- Plankton

LSM

Reply

stikpusher

Member since
July 2004
From: Sonora Desert

Posted by stikpusher on Tuesday, February 17, 2015 9:17 PM

One small suggestion (literally)... since you are putting all that weld seam work in place, why not detail up the rear sight on the .50 to match the rest of the stuff you are putting on...

F is for FIRE, That burns down the whole town!

U is for URANIUM... BOMBS!

N is for NO SURVIVORS...

- Plankton

LSM

Reply

M. Brindos

Member since
January 2015
From: Tumwater, WA.

Posted by M. Brindos on Wednesday, February 18, 2015 10:14 AM

I was thinking about that!

- Mike Brindos "Lost Boy"

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the doog

Member since
January 2007

Posted by the doog on Wednesday, February 18, 2015 7:09 PM

Wow, that IS impressive to see that built up, Mike! It looks like you have it well-in-hand. Coming along very nicely!

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M. Brindos

Member since
January 2015
From: Tumwater, WA.

Posted by M. Brindos on Wednesday, February 18, 2015 8:16 PM

Thanks Karl. :)

I did run into a small problem today. As I was adding the turret basket I found that Dragon has you mount the searchlight storage bracket too far to the left and it doesn't line up with the gap in the turret basket as it should.

I had to rip it off, retexture the turret, and mount the bracket back correctly. It wasn't hard to fix, but its something to note. I have pictures and I'll update later.

Also the tracks did crack after I glued them. I fixed that too, but I was expecting better. :/

- Mike Brindos "Lost Boy"

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M. Brindos

Member since
January 2015
From: Tumwater, WA.

Posted by M. Brindos on Thursday, February 19, 2015 2:43 PM

Updated first post.

- Mike Brindos "Lost Boy"

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M. Brindos

Member since
January 2015
From: Tumwater, WA.

Posted by M. Brindos on Sunday, February 22, 2015 9:24 PM

Starting on the Mantlet cover. In an effort to make this functional as well as looking like it actually is like the real cover I'm using a material that most of us would probably NEVER think to use. It's plastic, elastic, and adheres to super glue with reckless abandon. Are you ready for this? Plastic SHOWER CURTAIN. Yep. Who would have thunk it?

img.photobucket.com/.../DSCN0468.jpg

img.photobucket.com/.../DSCN0467.jpg

img.photobucket.com/.../DSCN0470.jpg

So far this material is working up to my expectations. It has the right texture and it complies with what I need it to do. Once I have this part ironed out I'm then going to work on getting the rest of it attached to the turret. But before I can do that, apparently there is a new Gun tube in the mail I have to wait for lol.

Too bad, as I just glued in the plastic one last week lol.

- Mike Brindos "Lost Boy"

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Gamera

Member since
November 2009
From: SW Virginia

Posted by Gamera on Monday, February 23, 2015 11:17 AM

Pretty neat idea- I'd never have thought of shower curtain plastic!

"I dream in fire but work in clay." -Arthur Machen

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M. Brindos

Member since
January 2015
From: Tumwater, WA.

Posted by M. Brindos on Monday, February 23, 2015 3:07 PM

We were throwing out an old cheap plastic shower curtain and for some reason I thought, "That's actually a good texture. Maybe I can use that for something" and then I cut a big piece of it off and stuck it in my junk drawer lol.

When my Dad insisted that I put the Mantlet cover on the model I was not wanting to use paper/tissue as it would be too stiff to keep the function of the gun tube, and aluminum foil would eventually crack or fold up weird. I had to think of something that would simulate the rubberized canvas of the real thing while still being flexible and able to take paint without chipping.

Then I remembered that shower curtain. And so far this stuff is brilliant. It will curl if you use liquid cement, but it loves Super Glue. All I need to do is shoot it with some of the Rustoleum Primer that "bonds with plastic" and see how it reacts to being bent and moved around. I'll let you guys know how that works out.

A little more progress;

img.photobucket.com/.../DSCN0471.jpg

- Mike Brindos "Lost Boy"

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M. Brindos

Member since
January 2015
From: Tumwater, WA.

Posted by M. Brindos on Wednesday, March 25, 2015 3:55 PM

New gun tube came in over this last weekend.

I really wish I hadn't glued in the plastic gun tube. It was a bit of a PITA to get the leftover stub out of the mantle.

Its a pretty heavy piece of hardware. It forced me to glue the gun tube in place or it wouldn't stay up anymore. Its too heavy lol.

It comes in three parts; gun tube, bore evacuator, and the evacuator lug. Excellent detail! Its about 147 mm long from the mantlet and 3mm larger in diameter. I had to bore out the mantlet to get it over the gun tube lol.

The old gun tube is 127mm from the mantlet. This gun tube really makes this monster even more imposing! It even has rifling in the tip of the tube!

Back on track! (Pun intended)

- Mike Brindos "Lost Boy"

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GMorrison

Member since
September 2012

Posted by GMorrison on Wednesday, March 25, 2015 4:49 PM

Very impressive. Who makes the barrel, Aber?

Modeling is an excuse to buy books.

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M. Brindos

Member since
January 2015
From: Tumwater, WA.

Posted by M. Brindos on Wednesday, March 25, 2015 7:15 PM

My Dad ordered it from www.akkuramodels.com on eBay. He didn't realize they are in Poland. It took 3 weeks to arrive, but for $18 with shipping that's not bad. Lol

Aside from modifying the mantlet it fit like a glove. Makes the stock gun tube look puny.

- Mike Brindos "Lost Boy"

Reply

Gamera

Member since
November 2009
From: SW Virginia

Posted by Gamera on Thursday, March 26, 2015 8:07 AM

Wow, I can imagine it would be heavy! I'm tempted now to order one for my kit.

"I dream in fire but work in clay." -Arthur Machen

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M. Brindos

Member since
January 2015
From: Tumwater, WA.

Posted by M. Brindos on Thursday, March 26, 2015 12:17 PM

Yeah it balances the turret nicely. The thing turns like it on ball bearings now. Solid turned aluminum with the brass bore evacuator and lug. Its 20mm longer and 3mm larger in diameter

- Mike Brindos "Lost Boy"

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M. Brindos

Member since
January 2015
From: Tumwater, WA.

Posted by M. Brindos on Thursday, March 26, 2015 12:22 PM

I didn't realize the stock plastic gin tube looked so puny and small till I set them beside each other. The new gun tube fits the with the turret much better for the "huge monster beast " look.

I don't know if its true to scale, but it seriously looks the business of a large AA gun stuffed into a tank.

Anyone familiar with Kenneth W. Estes?

- Mike Brindos "Lost Boy"

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RBaer

Member since
September 2006
From: Dripping Springs, TX, USA

Posted by RBaer on Thursday, March 26, 2015 1:36 PM

Nice work on the beastie, Mike.

There's a guy over on the Big A doing a serious re-build of this same kit, thread's called "Polishing a [rhymes with word]" and it's pretty good. I keep thinking I'd like to have one of these things on the shelf, but every time I poke into somebody's blog, I think maybe not.

Apprentice rivet counter.

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M. Brindos

Member since
January 2015
From: Tumwater, WA.

Posted by M. Brindos on Thursday, March 26, 2015 4:44 PM

Link please. Google didn't find it for me. lol

If I were building this thing for myself I would be adding a lot more to it for sure. There are some small things I'd like to make happen. One of them being that loader's hatch being molded closed.

It really needs some crew with it too. But the dio I'm building has them all closed up on a firing range.

The next big armor project I build has to have crew and all the attention I'm giving this build. ;)

- Mike Brindos "Lost Boy"

Reply

RBaer

Member since
September 2006
From: Dripping Springs, TX, USA

Posted by RBaer on Thursday, March 26, 2015 4:55 PM

Try this:

www.armorama.com/modules.php

Apprentice rivet counter.

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M. Brindos

Member since
January 2015
From: Tumwater, WA.

Posted by M. Brindos on Thursday, March 26, 2015 7:04 PM

I read the entire thing. Thank you! I won't be doing anything like that with this build. I was only commissioned to build the kit. But wow, Dragon really didn't get this kit right in a lot of ways.

- Mike Brindos "Lost Boy"

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garzonh

Member since
March 2013
From: Puebla, Mexico

Posted by garzonh on Friday, March 27, 2015 11:56 AM

Very interesting WIP, I didnt realize how big this tank is, seems the turret is bigger than the body...just weird.

So much details and the casting is looking real good.

Way to go.

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"I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now"