M-12 GMC WIP (update 9/21 suggested tweaks completed)

Welcome back to the bench and forums Stephen! Been a while but looks like you've got just the cure lined up.

Great subject!  May I offer a suggestion (from a die hard Shermanaholic)?

The front face of the VVS bogie had four bolt holes, not four bolts.  Can you scrape those off and instead, drill holes instead? 

Well thats good info. I'm sure i can fix that easily enough.

Stephen

Glad to have you back and understand exactly how you feel.

Looks very good. Nice job on the breech block. You may want to look at the AFV 155mm/8inch ammunition kit for projectiles and powder cans....depending on how you are going to display it.

Keep up the good work....I am watching from my bunker!

Rounds Complete!! 

Its coming along really nicely.  I will second the AFV Club ammo set.  It is very nice.  Its always good to see another artillery piece here.  Keep up the good work.

Redleg and HeavyArty,

   Thanks for looking in, appreciate any insight you guys may give me. Already have the ammo set. Will use some of it with this and the Long Tom I have in stash.

Stephen

The M-12 is one of the more interesting Academy kit I've made. Good detail, good fit. Thedecals are little too thick to my liking though.

Well taking T26e4's advice I removed the bogies and scraped the bolts off. Drilled some holes where they were. Then figured while they were off might as well do some weathering. This is what I ended up with:

And where the bogies go:

Then everything back together:

Still have the idler and drive sprocket to work on. then I'll see about adding the tracks. BTW the tracks are the T49 steel type, is this accurate for this type of vehicle.

Again, Thanks for the help and tips, it's much appreciated.

-Stephen

Okay I think I've finished the suspension, drive sprockets, and idlers.

Next I'll be working on the lower hull weathering.

-Stephen

Making good progress with this one Stephen!

Keep it up Stephen i've got one of these to build too.

Tony lee

Thanks for looking in guys, this one's going slow. That's okay though, working in the garage and 100+ weather does not make for good modeling times. Right now I get about two to three hours Sat. and Sun. to work on this.

-Stephen

Stephen - Nice work...good job with Roy's advice. moving along nicely

Rounds Complete!!

Steven - she is looking great.  The weathering is coming along nicely.  This one is going to look great.  Good job.

Redleg and Heavyarty,

    Once again thanks for taking a look. Not where I wanted to be progress wise but I am liking the results so far. Was grateful for Roy's advice and glad it was simple enough to fix. Looking forward to getting some work done on the hull,just have to wait for the weekend.

-Stephen

Alright, got some work done on the upper hull weathering. I am not happy with the way the decal edges have been bhighlighted by the filters and pigments, but don't know what to do about it. Also still trying to find out if the T49 steel treads are accurate for this vehicle. Anybody know?

Well on to the pics only four this time.

I Still have the top of the hull, fighting compartment, and the spade. Then just need to load it up.

-Stephen

Stephen,

Sorry to see/hear about the decals showing up under the pigments. This can happen when the decals don't snug down tight to the vehicle surface and get integrated with the paint work. Did you seal in the decals prior to the pigments? When you applied the decals, did you do it directly onto the painted vehicle surface or over a layer of Future? If not, then the pigments may have permeated the exposed decal surface and thus highlighted the edges. I'm not certain you can correct it at this stage...applying a sealing coat (such as Future) over the decals so that you have a uniform surface and re-applying the pigments might work but I can't guarantee the outcome.  

....well you know what I mean Bill !!!

I have found it is always better to set the decals on a smooth future surface then seal with future. The seal coat is also a good gcoat to put on your washes. I use future mixed with Tamiya flat base for my flat coat and then pigments!!

Rounds Complete!!

Thnx guys. I normally do that but I have heard some talk that it isn't necessary to do all of that. Live and learn. I think I may remove the deals altogether, anyone know where i might get some dry transfers kind of quick. BTW still looking on confirmation on the tracks. Can't find anything on the web and my limited reasources only indicate that they weren't used on shermans and that the british favored them.

-Stephen

Okay, well, I corrected my silvering issue with the decals. Basically just removed them and put on a different set. Came out pretty good but the paint is still "fresh" where the decal was removed, this is even after weathering it again. I'm at a loss for what to do about it. One side is worse than the other, here are the pics.

Even with that problem, I think it looks a whole lot better.

Was actually pretty cool this morning, so I got in about four hours modeling time today. A total of six this weekend. It aloud me to get pretty far even with the decal problem. Here's where I'm at with it.

Used AFV Club's ammo. Nice little pieces. The decals I think are a little think which made them hard to wrap around the ammo. Used plenty of squadron's decal solution to help them settle.

Attached the cannon.

Really starting to come together for me. Here's a question for you arty guys. What is the difference between a howitzer, cannon and/or gun? The AFV package shows different artillery pieces and they use this different wording. I thought one had rifeling while the other did not, but then they threw in this third option now I don't know for sure.

Anyway thanks for looking and any critique is always welcome

-Stephen

Replacement decals are an improvement for sure Stephen. The added details for the gun and ammo are making this one come alive. She sure is a big one!

  Decals look alot better now.  Looking great especially the interior!

Bill, I Think it's finally comming together. With the long weekend and hopefully cooler weather I may finally get it done. It does look pretty big.

Deafpanzer, How's it going? Yeah, I couldn't leave those decals like that, it just wouldn't be right. Still going to put other equipment in the fighting compartment to make it look more homey.

Another question comes to mind tho. I've got the rounds in there, but shouldn't there be some kind of propellent charges? And where do they go? I was thinking the open compartments under the seat.

Thanks again for checking it out.

-Stephen

Decals are much better. Looking good.

Rounds Complete!!

I'm sure Mike and Gino (RedLeg12 and HeavyArty) respectively can  correct me if I'm wrong; but it's my understanding that whether something is classified as a "gun" or a "howitzer" depends on the angle of trajectory that the round takes.

A field gun has a relatively flat trajectory.  A howitzer is steeper up to say 45 degrees and a mortar up above 45.  I'm totally guessing on 45 degrees.  I'll leave that to the subject matter experts!  Just thought I'd throw in my

They wouldn't let me be in Artillery when I was in the Army.  My parents were married before I was born!! 

Redleg, thanks for checking in. It's getting there.

RESlusher, appreciate the artillery lesson sure helps out. Thanks for stopping by.

-Stephen

A book I saw in the library said they came with T-51 tracks which must be the same that the Ft Sill's musem example uses, I'm guessing.  I have an M-12 in the stash which I want to do as the one that the 740th Tank Battalion used at the Chateau de Froid-Cour firing on La Gleize.

Hi Richs26, Thanks for checking in and the info. I've heard that most M-12s had the t-51s, but; that a few had the t-49s. I found a pic of one that I think has t-49s on. I'll admit it's hard to tell with all the mud on the vehicle though. In the end since I'm not a big am kind of guy I went with the provided tracks. That being said, since there are not to many rubber band affecionados out there, I'd like to show how I did these tracks. If you will indulge me.

First off clean the tracks with a good degreasing agent, I used Simple Green. Then I used an enamel grey primer for my base. If you want a more rusty appearance then use an orange-ish base. Once the enamel was dry I covered it with a grimy black pigment from Doc O'Brien's pigments. I use pigments only after the primer. This keeps the paint from building  up and cracking or flakng.

I then used a Rusty Brown on the "teeth".

This was followed by a Rusty Red in the same areas.

Then I put in some Grungy Grey to tone it down.                                                                                       

This was followed by a light dusting of Dirty Brown.

And that is it. I hope someone finds this helpful and that the pics came out well enough to see what was going on. I think I really need to make a Photo booth.

Well I'm off to muddy this bad boy up. This will be my first attempt at making and appling mud. Hope it comes out well. I'll get those pics up as son as I'm done.

-Stephen

Hi gang. I don't think I'll be to much longer with this old girl. Here's what I got accomplished this weekend. (Thankfully a long and cooler weekend)

Started mudding her up.

Then alot of the small tidbits went on. Don't think you'll really see them in these next photos.

Like I said not to much more and I've already started on the base. Hope you like it so far

-Stephen