Dragon 1/72 Challenger 2 - FINISHED! Photos Pg.2

Thanks Bish. I certainly see the allure of these modern tooling small scale armor kits. The quality is sure present.

Coming on very nicely Stik.

Today was a bit more progress. First up, Step 4, the upper hull detail parts. That went quick. The biggest speed bump was cleaning up the mold seam lines on rounded bits. They are more prominent than on any flat surfaces...

Then I deviated from the instructions. In the advice of Rob Gronovious, who has built this kit, I added the front plate and idler wheels so that I could add the tracks. The instructions have you add the tracks as one of the last steps. No thanks Dragon...

And tracks on! The DS plastic stretched a bit at the glue joint... 

I then started construction of the dozer blade, but ran out of time before work...

Thanks Rambo, I checked the tracks earlier today, and so far they are pretty pliable. 

The DS stuff does have nice crisp detail like resin, and looks good for things like mantlet dust covers and such. But I really wonder about its‘ durability and longevity.

Looking good stick, hope your tracks are still good I have a few kits in the stash with DS tracks and they are so stiff that they break when you try to bend them. One of my 251 kits came with some DS storage stuff (boots, coats and some tank mines) same way they break and disintegrate hope dragon moves away from the DS stuff.

Im keeping my fingers crossed on the tracks. I bought a set of DS tracks for a different kit project that sat sidelined for a long time... they disintegrated over that time...

This afternoon, I finished up the turret. The fit of the turret floor to the top was not the best, and of course there was a major mold seam line on the main gun tube needing clean up... plus a few holes to be drilled for the CIP panels... this was a bit longer of a bench session. 

Step 3 complete... next session, the upper hull.

stikpusher

Thanks for the heads up on the tracks Rob. This kit came with the DS tracks. But I was planning on adding the tracks before I added the upper hull and lower hull together. With those side skits and the add on side armor blocks, hiding any track fit problems will be best behind those!

 

You should be okay then. Some DS tracks on 1/72 scale kits have a bad habit of deteriorating in the box or the sealed bag before you get a chance to use them. The Sherman ones seemed to be from the "bad batch". If the ones you have now are good, you probably have a good set.

While Dragon's 1/72 scale kits are pretty good, they do have quite a few dogs in the line up. Their Abrams kits are based on battery controlled toys with holes for wires. Avoid any that advertise diecast metal hulls. The metal on many have started to crumble on completed kits as well as unassembled ones still in the box.

Their Panther hulls were notorious for this, but fortunately, the bargain basement old Lindberg, Hasegawa and Esci lower hulls fit perfectly to upgrade thes kits to an all plastic constructed.

So today’s update was step 2, adding detail parts to the turret top and front. Test fitting, needle file swipes, fit and glue... lots of little things that I thankfully did not lose...

Thanks for the heads up on the tracks Rob. This kit came with the DS tracks. But I was planning on adding the tracks before I added the upper hull and lower hull together. With those side skits and the add on side armor blocks, hiding any track fit problems will be best behind those!

I built the Iraq 2003 version way back in 2004. It was a pretty decent kit, but I remember the tracks being a little too short. The fixed the issue with the DS tracks (tan), but if you have an older one with black vinyl tracks, they will be slightly too short.

There's a couple ways to deal with this; first is if you can relocate the idler wheel and or sprocket inward to create enough slack to have the tracks fit properly.

Second way would be to let the gap in the track be hidden some place up under the side skirts. Connect with some string or staples.

Also if you have the black vinyl tracks, they were notorious for not taking paint well. My first Dragon armor kit with black vinyl tracks the enamel paint did not dry and remained tacky to the touch. I would use craft paint or acrylic paints.

Put the tracks on before adding the upper hull since once the side skirts are there it is tough to deal with the tracks.

The official colour for British army vehicles is a bit of a tricky one to pin down. Some say NATO green. I always use Deep Bronze green and then by the time i weather it down a bit its a pretty good match to me.

Thank you sir. The box top green and black scheme is what I’ll be going with most likely, Bish. Any suggestions of a paint color for the green used on those? All the faded/weathered Brit stuff that I used to see in Banja Luka used to look like Tamiya Khaki Drab to my eye...

Nice start Stik, look forward to seeing more. Which scheme are you going for.

bufflehead

Gotta luv the braille scale stuff!  Looking good stik!

 

Thank you sir. This new age Braille scale stuff is indeed impressive! A far cry from the stuff that I built long ago.

Gotta luv the braille scale stuff!  Looking good stik!

So basically this thing has about the same parts count as an early 70s 1/35 Tamiya kit like their M41 or T-34/76. But these parts are sure molded to modern detail standards. I see that 1/72 has come a long way since I last built one. But in typical Dragon fashion, the fit has some issues. I needed a few swipes on some of the road wheel holes with a needle file to make sure they would go on. These things fit tight! Anyways, in abou 20-25 minutes of snipping, sanding stick swipes, and gluing, I got the running gear on and Step 1 completed...

Step 2 tomorrow....