I've been working on some of the additional details in preparation for painting the interior this weekend and after studying some of the photos in Nuts & Bolts 14 I decided to configure mine as a command vehicle. This meant adding the missing radio transmitter and receiver sets which I scrounged from an older Skdfz 251/23 build that had gotten damaged and was now a source for parts which is why they look partially painted/detailed. They had the added bonus in the form of a headset that I had already wired into them so that saved me some work this time around.
The radios were originally molded together in a rack so I had to cut them apart and patch the top and bottom with sheet styrene since they were hollow on the inside. Due to the way the space on the loader's ammo bin is designed, the two sets don't sit perfectly in parallel with each other but instead are slightly staggered to accommodate the angled side wall. The DML PE fret included a single standard radio rack holder but it was too small so I scratchbuilt some frames using strips of left over brass from an old PE fret bent to shape and glued in place with CA gel. I used small amounts of poster blue-tack putty to test fit their configuration.
I also added the DML provided PE rain guard and the instruction diagram isn't as clear as it should be on how it needs to be installed. It actually has to be inserted under the folded-up doors on the ammo bin in order to be the right length and not just glued to the side of the bin like the diagram suggests. The top part also shouldn't be straight, it needs a slight angle to it in order to meet up properly with the rear compartment plate.
In test fitting this with the side and rear plate I realized that I had the stowed antenna rack in the incorrect position. This error came about due to the picture in the instructions showing it lower than it actually needs to be, so I popped it off and repositioned it at the correct height and angle. I also added the mount for the power transformer that goes under the radio sets, this was also salvaged from the previous build and the transformer itself is still loose so I won't have to repaint it after the interior is painted. I had to move the lower half of the set up just a bit for it to clear but everything still plays nice together in the end.
Since the rack has the command antenna set stowed, I decided to leave it that way but still needed to add the base of the antenna itself onto the rain guard. The kit doesn't provide these parts so I scrounged in the spares bin and found an unused antenna rubber base and mount, assembled them, and then installed it to the rain guard with Gator Grip glue so I could get it in the right position. A test fit with the rear plate shows everything is working well together. The ammo bin is also just dry fit and will be painted separately to facilitate loading the ammo and adding the remaining details to the holders before it gets permanently added to the fighting compartment.
The last remaining piece of the fighting compartment interior were the small angled portions at the front. These are called out in the final step of the instructions in Step 25 and they need to receive the curved inner splash guards before they are ready for install. The instruction diagrams contain an error though in that the parts that need to be added to the plates have their numbers reversed...so parts C7 and C17 need to actually go on part C15 and not C14.
I also decided to add the small optics container to the inside of the main curved splinter shield. Some Nashorns had it while others didn't based on the two surviving vehicles in Kubinka and Aberdeen and the parts are available on the D sprue but marked as not for use. Since the Kubinka vehicle only has one and not two fitted, I only fitted the one to the gunner's side and left the other off.
Everything is now ready to paint this weekend as these were the last things I needed to square away before firing up the compressor.