Tamiya Char B1 bis COMPLETED 03-04-07

Neat!

Gun Tech wrote:

vtrockin wrote: Great job on those tracks....they look terrific!   And thanks for the tutorial on how to get those results. Very nice Bill

I third the vote!

vtrockin wrote:

Great job on those tracks....they look terrific!   And thanks for the tutorial on how to get those results.

Very nice Bill

I applied the sealing coat of Future to the decals and put it off to the side. While that's curing up, attention turned to the tracks and getting them ready to go.

Yesterday I'd applied a basecoat of MM Non-buffing Metalizer Gunmetal using the AB since there's so many nooks and crannies, I wanted to get a good coverage of all the surfaces.

Throughout this process I did one track run and kept the other in the condition of the previous step so I could better demonstrate how the look changed from one step to the next. The first step involved drybrushing Steel with a 0 round brush to create a metallic foundation along with the Gunmental. The metalizer provides some nice "tooth" in its finish for drybrushing and it doesn't take much to achieve the desired look.

A little closer examination:

The next step involved applying a 90/10 thinner/paint wash of Rust with a  size 1 round sable brush. The purpose of the wash is two-fold...it blends in the drybrushed Steel and also provides the first stage of oxidized metal. If applied carefully, it will allow some of the Steel to still show through but not as stark as in the drybrushed step.

The Rust wash is allowed to air dry, which doesn't take that long to accomplish, but in the process the Rust wash in combination with the metalizer undercoat takes on a truer rust looking appearance vs. just the straight paint. Once confident that it's fully dried, I used the same 0 round brush as before to drybrush Burnt Umber over the Rust to deepen the color and look.

Last step involves going back over the raised surfaces very lightly with an old worn out 20/0 detail brush and drybrush Steel to restore the worn look to those surfaces only.

A test fit on the vehicle was in order to see how they looked. The Rust still shows up more prominent at this stage than I'd like, so I'll probably give some spot attention with some black artist pastels to the too-bright areas. Also,  since the final weathering with MIG pigments hasn't happened yet this isn't the true final look, but it's progressing the way I'd like so far.

crockett wrote:

She's a beauty Bill, looks like your on the downhill slide to complete the beast. I was wondering about exterior stowage and bric-a-brac on French armor?? I haven't looked real hard, but I don't recall seeing a lot of it on the photos I've seen. Are you planning to use the commander figure? Steve

Thanks crockett! Most of the pics that I've seen on the Char Francais site don't show anything in the way of stowage beyond the tools and chains...which makes sense given how the turret traverses, anything strapped to the back would interfere with the line of fire. It's also notable how relatively clean they look in the photos...most of them, especially those shown knocked out, are on roads or in towns, so that would make sense I guess in one regard. The Chars weren't exactly speed demons to begin with and the time period for the Battle of France would've seen dry roads/conditions for the most part.

Not planning to use the commander figure since I closed up the turret hatch. There's absolutely no interior, not even a representation of the 47mm gun breech, inside the turret, and while the figure would obscure most of it it anyhow, it would still look odd IMHO. As a rule I don't usually include figures with my builds just because of how they end up in the display case vs. a base, but I hear Blast Models has come out with a better TC figure that could also be used for those so inclined.

She's a beauty Bill, looks like your on the downhill slide to complete the beast. I was wondering about exterior stowage and bric-a-brac on French armor?? I haven't looked real hard, but I don't recall seeing a lot of it on the photos I've seen. Are you planning to use the commander figure?

Steve

Today's efforts began with the final touches needed before applying the Future coat. I painted the inside of the auxiliary headlamp on the front hull with Silver and scrounged around in the spares bin and found a clear lens originally intended for a Pzkpw I that fit perfectly, the lens will be fitted later after all the weathering is completed. I also "pre-weathered" the drive sprockets and mud scrapers by drybrushing some Steel followed by drybrushed Burnt Umber in selected areas and around the drive teeth. Once that was taken care of, the Future was applied and allowed to set up for a couple of hours before starting work with the markings.

The Echelon set contains markings for several vehicles, including some "extras/miscellaneous" markings which are there I assume to allow for other additional vehicles to be modelled, including "Fatasque" although no finishing guide is provided for it. I cut out the markings for "Marne" and was very pleased with the design of the decals. The larger decals did not have solid centers but instead had connecting carrier film only where absolutely necessary. This made some of them a little more delicate than others, but they all came off the sheet cleanly and applied very easily. Each decal was given a light coat of Solvaset, especially those for the turret and the hull sides where they passed over rivets or raised details, and they settled down nice and tight without any problems. They will be allowed to dry overnight and will be given another sealing coat of Future before the weathering process begins in earnest.

Made some progress today on the details in order to get everything squared away for the Future coat and decals.

First up were the rubber mud flaps/skirts on the bottom of the hull sponsons. These were hand painted using Model Master enamel Gunmetal as a base color prior to the final weathering. I like to use it instead of Flat Black for these types of things because it's got more of a bluish-gray look similar to synthetic rubber vs. the straight black color.

Next up was the antenna bellows and mast. I checked the references on "Marne" and it had one fitted, although not all pics of Chars show the mast in place even though the bellows are fitted. According to the Char Francais site, the bellows were leather and unpainted, so I painted it in a 50-50 mix of Leather and Military Brown and allowed some of the underlying tan styrene color to show through to provide some variation and the look of exposed/worn leather. I removed the molded on mast with sprue cutters and drilled out a hole in the top to take some brass rod which I lightly sanded, glued in place with CA gel, then painted with MM Metalizer Gunmetal.

Last but not least for the day's efforts, I dealt with the pioneer tools and painted the metal surfaces with metalizer Gunmetal followed by some lightly drybrushed Steel. The wood handles were painted with my own special mix of "wood" color and then lightly brushed with Burnt Umber pastels after they'd been glued in place to give it the varnished look. I also detailed the exhausts, painting them first with metalizer Gunmetal and following that up with a light wash of Rust and some drybrushing of Burnt Umber.

Tomorrow morning I'll give it the first coat of Future and start in on the numerous decal markings required for this vehicle.

Thanks for the welcome back tread! The dark brown was put down more as a primer coat than a pre-shade, but it does serve that purpose as well, at least for the lighter areas. Less so for the green.

Steve,

That's what I was after since I'm not 100% convinced that the 2-tone scheme was indeed a hard-edged camo...so I split the difference. Took about 2-3 passes alternating between the colors, so many nooks and crannies that some overspray crept in unnoticed from time to time.

Tigerman,

Thanks for the comments. I think it's interesting that the Echelon painting guide has a caveat that says to the effect that the two shades are so closely related in b/w photos that they could actually be reversed...such is life with period photos I guess.

Camo looks clean Bill. Nice feathering effect between colors, not a true hard edge but nicely defined and subtle. Great work.

Steve

Had the chance to put in quite a bit of time today with the AB. Efforts started off by putting down a primer coat of Italian Dark Brown. I didn't go with the usual Flat Black primer coat this time around because I 1) don't know what kind of primer color the French used and 2) didn't want the stark shadows that a Flat Black would produce for the two-tone camo. The Italian Dark Brown seemed like a good compromise, it was dark enough to insure none of the light-tan Tamiya plastic got overlooked and would provide some decent shadow/contrast for the camo so I ran with it. Just as I was finishing up, I managed to get a drop of thinner on the rear deck which produced a nice perfect round spot on the engine deck hatch. Thankfully, it was only the one drop and not a flood as it could've been!

One of the chief advantages of a primer coat, besides providing a surface for painting, is the opportunity it provides for checking seams and sanded areas to see if they really are as smooth as they looked before painting. This time around I found two areas that needed more attention. The first was the driver's hood, the putty and sanding that I'd done earlier wasn't quite even, so I stripped off the paint and sanded it back down again. I used a q-tip dampened with thinner to remove the paint vs. scraping it away so I had a nice large area to work with and not have to worry about fouling the sanding stick with paint in the process.

The second area that needed attention was the join on the turret on the right side. An ever so small step had been left behind and the paint showed it up crystal clear, so it too was stripped and sanded down.

Once those areas were taken care of, I laid down the first color of the 2-tone scheme. I chose MM's Khaki since they have it listed as the French armor "green" and applied it with the general purpose nozzle on my Aztek at about 20 psi. I used it to sketch out the pattern instead of an overall coat, using the finishing guide supplied with the Echelon decals as a template. I figured this would give me more freedom with the second coat in terms of visualizing the overall pattern and also conserve some paint in the process.

For the second color, I mixed up some Dunkelgelb with Light Gray in about an 80-20 ratio more or less in a spare mixing bottle. I wanted a lighter shade vs. the standard dunkelgelb and was trying for more of a "stone" color with the combination.

This was applied with the same nozzle and psi as the Khaki and the rest of the pattern was filled in and adjusted. I did have to go back a couple of times with both colors to correct for overspray and fine tune things a bit, but all of it was done freehand and after a couple of hours, the pattern was completed to my liking.

I'll let this set up overnight and work on the tracks and tools to round it out in terms of base finish tomorrow most likely.

Steve,

I agree 100% with buff.

Fingers,

Thanks as always! Mind's already working through the paint/finish/weathering approaches.

SteveM wrote:

wbill76 wrote: Thanks, going to be hard knowing that I won't be able to do any work until I return on Thurs/Fri. When my wife suggests a trip, vacation or even a long weekend to the coast, my brain starts calculating time missed at the bench. She knows it, I know it. The blank expression on my face reads like 72 point print. Am I wrong for this? Steve

Not a chance.  Just try convincing her of that.