Meng FT-17 French Light Tank Riveted Turret

WBill....I like your logical steps and the way you attack the small problems you've found.

Additionally - one thing that often really lets down a WIP build is the pics.

The use of the that wooden mount, and your care with taking the pics is excellent - possibly running only a close second to ChukW.

Keep up the great work, mate - I'm looking forward (a great deal) to seeing this one progress.

Thanks for your efforts to edumacate us all as you move forward.  Good deal!

This is what this website is all about - people like you sharing.  Awesome.

Thanks Lee! Glad to have you along and good to hear you find the blogs helpful. Always happy to share the good, bad, or ugly when it comes to a build.

Made some great progress on this little guy in the turret department. Steps 16 and 17 cover the assembly and it's important to note that the base of the turret is an octagonal ring with notches for tabs at the bottoms of each of the plates. You can start wherever you want, but once you commit to the position of the front plate with the gun, you need to place all the other plates as the instructions point out. In anticipation of that, I removed each of the panels from the sprue, cleaned them up, and marked their part number on the inside face so I didn't accidentally place a plate in the wrong spot.

I opted for regular glue on the bases of the plates so they had a good grip, placed the front plate and gun first, then added the plates to either side, and so on until I had all the plates in position. I deliberately did not apply any glue to the areas where the plates met each other though until I was ready to install the turret roof plate. This made it possible for me to use the roof plate to help ensure all the side plates leaned in at the right angle and matched up as needed. I was impressed with the fit/engineering of all these parts...they all lined up nicely and only needed some slight finger pressure in a couple of spots to help the liquid glue grip and seal up the plate joins.

With all the plates in place, I added the rear turret hatches in the closed position. Then the three part cupola came next to round out things for the turret.

The turret base ring fits snugly into the hull roof opening, a nice friction fit that still allows the turret to rotate, so I'll have to be mindful of that when painting to ensure it stays that way.

Next up will be tackling the suspension components, lots of small parts there so will take my time there as well.

Looks like its coming together nicely Bill.

Looking really nice Bill. And a great idea to mark those turret panels, that would be so easy to get wrong if your not careful. A great tip.

Thanks Mustang!

Bish

Made some more progress on the little FT-17, this time in the suspension department. I decided to build up the suspension units one side at a time since the elements that you construct in Step 8 are 'handed' between the left and right side and I didn't want to cause any confusion there. I started with the A and B components needed for the left side and also assembled the return roller frame. Lots of care is needed when gluing the frame halves together so that the rollers remain free to rotate. Adding the metal pin and frame supports at the front is also a little challenging but works out in the end with a little patience. When assembling the road wheel elements, I found it easiest to assemble the frame halves and wheels together first, then add the top support arm portion before the glue had set up. This way you could flex the tops open to accept the pins without having the whole thing come apart in the process. The biggest time-consuming element in this step is cleaning up the two sprue connection points per road wheel and return roller as they have very delicate rims that intersect with the connection points.

Step 9 assembles the full suspension unit using the components from the previous step. It's possible to assemble it and leave the suspension fully workable if you use the top part of the unit to help hold the sides together. Again, a very tricky assembly process that will leave you wishing you had another hand to help out but the end result produces a very nicely detailed assembly. Once the top and sides were firmly together, I added the support base for the return roller frame and used the kit-supplied steel spring and some CA glue to ensure it sat at the right height and angle to match up with the large idler.

Once I'd figured out the little tricks and traps by doing the first unit, the second one for the right side took only half as long to pull it together.

Given how complex this all is and how the suspension relates to the hull, I'm seriously considering leaving them separate for painting to make it easier to get everything covered and also make life simpler in terms of applying a camo pattern. Next up are the exterior details for the hull!

Well, this should be interesting.......

This is great stuff, I'm planning mine for December and this is my "GoTo" tutorial for sure. Again this is a great little vehicle and maybe the coolest suspension ever. I still love those large rivets.

Bill do you think it may be better to paint ahead the suspension parts, at least a primer, or would it make it troublesome for assembly?

Terry

Steve

Terry

I am thinking that it will be better to paint the suspension as separate 'modules' from the hull and then attach simply because of all the tight corners and spaces. The suspension attaches to the hull at the rear via some solid connection points but at the front only has the struts for the main suspension spring to hold it in place, so those would probably have to be masked off so they have a clean attachment point since the struts are metal.

Now that's some in depth suspension parts Bill. Cant wait to see em painted up and weathered!

Hi Mr. Bill,

Never thought that I would want to build a French AFV until now :)

Interesting trick with the live springs, I think Bronco has done something similar on their SdKfz. 221.

Happy Modelling!

Zack

Thanks Mustang! There's 45 different parts that go into each side of those suspension elements, so a lot going on with them for sure.

Sackgasse

Hi Mr. Bill,

Never thought that I would want to build a French AFV until now :)

Interesting trick with the live springs, I think Bronco has done something similar on their SdKfz. 221.

Happy Modelling!

Zack

I agree with you on painting them separate and masking off those connection points is always a good thing. Thats really going to be a nice model, Meng goes way beyond the norm with their detail, I've just found their plastic a little "soft" but I plan on building more of them, maybe their D9R. Thanks Bill.

Terry

Returning to the hull details, I went all the way back to Step 3 and added the details required for the left side of the hull. The kit includes a metal strut and spring for the front part of the suspension and the key to getting this in at the right height is the spring itself and the 'cap' styrene part that sits on top, D11. D11 doesn't sit snugly on top of the strut, so I glued the strut and spring into the housing with CA first and then added D11 to the top after to ensure it lined up correctly with the suspension module and wouldn't cause any fit issues along the way. Tow hooks and large box and rack were also added to round things out.

Process was repeated for the right side in Step 5 but I left off the exhaust muffler for the time being as that will be detailed and installed after painting.

And just to be sure that 'stumpy' here would sit properly with the suspension modules in place, a dry-fit was in order! The test fit shows that when the time comes to glue the modules in place I'm going to have to be a little careful that they sit level as there's a slight tendency for the top to want to bow in slightly since there really isn't anything on the top side to prevent that by way of connection points.

The next item of interest were the tracks which are dealt with in Step 12. The kit provides click-able individual tracks that will produce workable tracks of 32 links per side. I found in the assembly process though that I had to keep a sharp eye out for tiny amounts of flash around the hinge points as if those weren't caught the links would fit together almost rigidly or require too much force that could snap off the small pins. Fortunately the kit provides plenty of extra links so it wasn't a huge deal when a couple got sacrificed in this learning step.

A quick test fit with the suspension modules showed everything playing nice and 32 links working out perfectly. Connecting up the ends of the runs once the tracks have been painted and weathered may be a little challenging...I may just remove one or both of the pins on those final links and just rely on gluing the links together to secure the runs, have to see when the time comes.

The last remaining area needing attention was the rear hull and the un-ditching tail covered in Step 11. I'm not 100% sure, but I think the PE placards (parts W5) should be placed only if you're doing the American WW1 version of this kit so be mindful of that as the instructions don't make any kind of distinction there.  Since I am doing the American version, these were installed with Gator Grip glue so I could have some work time to get them properly positioned/straight relative to the areas they install into. The folded up tarp that installs over the X brace on the tail is left off for now and will be added after painting.

Just to satisfy my curiosity, I did a full mock-up with the suspension elements and tracks and I'm now 100% convinced that painting the suspension separately and installing after is the right way to go on this little guy.

DANG you can just hear the clank-ity, clank, Good work nice to see it coming together .

This is coming together fast Bill. Looks good from here.

Wow nice Bill, I thought those track pieces may have been a bit of a problem, it looks like they lay in there real nice. Unlike others, you surely couldn't go 31 or 33. As usual, nice and clean.

Duster

Mustang

Really coming to life now Bill, looking great.

Thanks Bish! Now the fun begins in the painting department.

This and the weathering is what separates the men from the boyz here. Looking forward to this part.

Progress flowing together nicely. The suspension sub-assemblies looked a little gnarly but handled well 

Thanks Sprue! I'm very impressed with what Meng came up with in terms of both fit/engineering and quality of detail on this kit.

.

Sorry to tempt you Rob! I applaud you for your discipline in sticking with the RPM kit...maybe for Christmas you can get yourself a little treat...these Riveted Turret kits often go for substantially less than the full interior kits if you catch a sale just right. Thanks for the comments and support on this build.

I've started in on the painting process and the first order of business was laying down a primer coat of Testors Model Master enamel Italian Dark Brown via airbrush.

I let that set up overnight and then, since I'm applying a three tone camo and the yellow part of the pattern seems to be the most dominant, I applied the yellow portion as a base coat to work off of. I used a 50-50 mix of MM enamel Dunkelgelb/Light Gray as it will not doubt darken during the weathering process.

This will get the chance to set up just like the primer as I don't want to take any chances with paint lifting when I mask off the areas for the brown and green areas of the scheme. In the meantime, I decided to give the kit-included base a try. It assembles pretty easily and has a nice cross brace at the bottom that helps hold everything together and give it some rigidity. I did have to employ small amounts of putty in a couple of spots on some of the joins and of course sanding was called for to smooth everything down on all four sides but nothing major.

Since I had the airbrush out, I decided to also paint the base. A primer coat of Italian Dark Brown came first, then some highlights using MM enamel Afrikabraun, and an overall filter/mist coat of MM enamel Raw Sienna. It's a little hard for the camera to pick up all the subtleties but it produced a nice starting point to work from that will get further refinement with pigments and dry brushing later on. I will admit to a sudden craving for chocolate cake though...can't imagine why!

That's where things stand at the moment, next up of course will be getting that camo pattern on the vehicle and then finalizing the suspension installation.

As always it is great to watch a master at work. Still.....strange its not German.....but looks great

Rounds Complete!!

Thanks Mike! I agree it feels a little odd not working on a German tank but it's just a momentary diversion!