Thanks guys! No problem Bish. And yes, used the AK US Green modultion set on the M3, M21 WC54 and Water Tank trucks.

Bish - I PM'ed you. Thanks

Thanks Ken, got that. And just so its official, its in. Can you just confirm kit and scale.

And I am looking forward to see what nose art you come up with.

The kit is the 48 scale Tamiya Jug. I've been worling on the nose art, but I don't have it perfected yet. I have the pic I want, but I'm having trouble getting the right lettering for it.

well, you got plenty of time to work on it. I haven't made my own decals yet, but I would like to give it a try at some point.

Bish

well, you got plenty of time to work on it. I haven't made my own decals yet, but I would like to give it a try at some point.

My Jug will be part of the 368th FG. I found some fasinating information on them. They raised a lot of hell in Normandy.

Making your own decals is very very very and extremely easy. LOL I use Microsoft Word (but you can use any program like MS Works, MS Publisher, etc etc) and copy a picture into it and just print it out on decal paper. Then just follow the directions with the spray, let it dry over night, then cut it out. I've been making decals almost since I got back into the hobby 4 years ago.

Gamera - My Firefly Vc got here today.  Lots of parts.  Have to assemble the tracks link by link, photoetching . . . never done this stuff before.  *passes out* 

Nah, it'll be an adventure!  I'll make stickpusher help me! 

Oh, and a thank you for the tip! 

Bitbite: Cool! Was it the Orange Box kit? The M4A4 I just built came with modern rubber band tracks and only a tiny bit of PE for the mesh on the air intakes.

I hope at least they're not the old style link tracks with three parts for every track link... last one of those I put together I came out cross-eyed and a little crazy...

Sounds like an awesome kit! I have one of their M4A3s with the 105mm gun in my stash. It has a working (!) HVSS suspension consisting of heaps of small parts. It has all the rubber "tires" for the road wheels as extra parts to make painting easier. I gotta love building that kit!

Yes, Orange Box.  PE parts are very few. Unfortuantely, the tracks appear almost exactly as you described.  Except I count four parts for every link.  

Wonder if it's possible to get other tracks for it.  I don't want to go crazy or be cross-eyed!

You can get AM tracks for most vehicles. I am a big fan of Fruils, but they are a bit pricey. I know there are other options.

Clemons: Nice! I've got the M4A3E8 with the same suspension but of course this one has the later turret and the 76mm. I'd like to build it sometime soon but not sure if I'd go with a WW2 or Korean War vehicle.

Bitbite: Ouch! You might try building a jig to hold them while you assemble, I think The Doog has a tutorial on that on the armour forum if you'd run a search. Or as Bish said just replace them, I've heard nothing but good about Fruils but the price has always put me off. I have used the AFV Club replacement tracks- they're are annoying but better than the old Dragon ones.

You might as well try the Dragon ones though, I'd just put together an inch or two each day rather than trying to do an entire side run. At least with American style tracks there is little to no sag, so you can do the curved parts around the front drive sprocket and the rear return roller. Then all you have left is two flat pieces to go on top and bottom.

Friul tracks are a huge improvement, but the tracks for the Shermans are not as good as the other tracks they produce:

The tracks on almost every Sherman (except those with HVSS I think) are held together by 2 brackets on the sides. The friul tracks have 2 kinds of track links: The majority of them have the brackets in line with the track links, the rest is molded with "bent" brackets. That makes it really hard to assemble the tracks, because you need the right amount of bent and straight links per track in the right places... I'd get some Model-Kasten tracks (I think they are a tad easier to assemble).

Just my 2 cents...

Cheers, Clemens

Cliff: Nice! I have an "Easy 8" as well! Is it the kit where you have to replace the entire suspention without any locating help other than a small diagram in the instructions?

Jsut a small update:

I got the gear bays painted and the wings are now glued together. I'll finish sanding the seams on the wings tomorrow and the wings and stabilizers should be glued on untill tomorrow evening.

Wow, lots of options.  Maybe a stupid question, but after looking at some of these they say, "Workable" or "Non-Workable."  What's the difference?

The workable ones are not glued, so if you want you can push the tank around and have the tracks move.

I thought it might be that easy of an answer.  Thanks!  

Clemons: My 'Easy Eight' is the newer kit with the decals for General Abram's tank. I'll have to look at the instructions but I think they fixed that issue- though knowing Dragon it's hard to tell!

Hmmmm, I tried some of the 'workable' track links from Mirage on a Type 97 and they kept coming apart. I found that since they snap together it's best to assemble and then run a weak cement like the red bottle of Testor's over it then to lock them in place. You mileage of course may vary.

Cliff: Yep, they fixed it. I have one of the old kits (bought it as a second-hand kit). The 105mm Sherman has a new, working suspension which seems to be a lot easier to assemble and it looks much better as well.

I have good news and bad news:

Good news first:

The wings are glued in place and evey joint is sanded smooth.

Now the bad news:

I managed to snap the gun sight off and I can't find it anymore. I looked literally everywhere, but there is no way I can find them... But there is still hope! I looked at the clear parts of my Razorback kit and found a gunsight which looks exactly the same, but with a shorter mounting arm. This is no problem however, because the bubbletop kit has 2 gun sights supplied (The 2nd one looks completely different). I'll just cut both sights apart and glue the upper half of the Razorback sight to the lower half of the 2nd Bubbletop sight. I just hope this ends well, as cutting clear parts without destroying them is a bit tricky...

I'd love to post some pics, but I can't. I managed to get a really nasty virus on my PC: It basically lets you start your computer like you normally would, but after some time, your screen just displays a warning that you have illegal data on your hard drive and that you wrote emails to terrorists using it. (I can assure you that nothing of that is true ) And now comes the really bad part: You have to pay 100€ to get your PC unlocked again. The virus pretends to be a message from the Police. with some fancy icons to "prove" it. I had to re-install Windows and everything is fine again. I just have to download all the drivers before I can upload pics again (I should be able to do that untill Sunday (I have no time tomorrow).

Here's a pic of such a virus (mine looked a bit different):

I hope I can sort my problems out soon. If you have any tips for cutting those clear parts, please let me know (I have to get a perfectly straight cut on both parts)

Cheers, Clemens

I would like to get hold of the people that do this and wring their damn necks. I have had something similar with symbols very like the ones used by Microsoft. A real pain to get rid of.

Yeah, me too, mate... I just hope this never happens again...

Bish

I would like to get hold of the people that do this and wring their damn necks. I have had something similar with symbols very like the ones used by Microsoft. A real pain to get rid of.

I agree Bish, but wringing their necks is too good for them.

bitbite

Gamera - My Firefly Vc got here today.  Lots of parts.  Have to assemble the tracks link by link, photoetching . . . never done this stuff before.  *passes out* 

Nah, it'll be an adventure!  I'll make stickpusher help me! 

Oh, and a thank you for the tip! 

sure... for a six pack of a fermented beverage or bottle of certain distilled spirits... 

Done.  Vodka?  Rum?  Scotch?

Hopefully he says, vodka or rum.  Scotch is so damn expensive. 

In the warm weather, I am kinda partial to Gin & Tonic. After all it was something from the tropics for health and refreshment.

Oooh!  Excellent choice and one of my favorites as well .  .  .

So Pabst Blue Ribbon it is!!  

How about some mango juice with lots of rum? 50% each. That's what I am drinking all the time when I need to sand something for more than an hour...

Woof, thank God I've never had a virus. Been running a system scan every week or so and I've never had one show up. Cross your fingers.

Good luck with getting that mess cleaned out.