Construction, detailing and painting

Photo showing the rear plate out of the box 

A few minutes with a shard blade makes the railings look much more realistic. They could have been replaced with w doire but I didn't want to cut all new parts for this section. 

The front and middle benches need modifying. The middle one has had the back removed and some styrene strip is prepared to fill the gap in the back. 

The bench with the styrene strip glued in. 

A new seat back is made with styrene strip and fuse wire. 

The chassis is starting to come together nicely. I underestimated how satisfying this build would be. The parts fit together easily and with a little cleanup they look far better.  

The tracks were applied as suggested in the box. Flexible super glue was used to allow a bit of movement for the rubber.
(Out of the box the track look like they have been used a s a chew toy, a new sharp blade was used to slice of the blemished edges of to create a straight-ish line along the outer edges). 

I decided to take a break on the half-track and focus a bit on the gun. I didn't really have any plans for this part of the model so I built it straight out of the box. The only change was made by filing the back of the armour plate to about half of the original thickness. 

I got back to the bodywork of the kit for some tedious bits. There was a visible gap between the walls and wheel/ track arches which would be unrealistically large for the scale. This was filled with black super glue, and then slowly rubbed away with debonder to leave a strip of black filler. 

I decided to do something about the many bolts which are seen on the armour of the real truck. One option would be to recreate them with resin rivet decals like those supplies by Archer in the US. As I don't have any, I decided to compromise and make holes on the model instead of extrusions. This was done using the 0.75mm rivet marking tools made by Galaxy Tools. I bought these a few months ago and haven't decided to use them yet, and I can already see they will make huge improvements to my model aircraft kits. I used it freehand so the 'rivets' may be a bit wobbly but I think they will help sell the illusion of armour plating. 

Some reference images were used to find the position for the bolts. 

The front bench was a similar job to the middle one, the back was removed and replaced in full with two strips of styrene, and the gap underneath was filled with another strip and some filler. 

A single long handle was made for the back of the front bench. This is about as much as I can do for this part, so no gun clips or perforated details. At this point I am still spending time twerking the various super glue joints across the model, trying to strike a balance between adding and removing glue until the parts are seated correctly. 

It has been a little while so I thought i would start on a quick job. I had a dig around and found some suitable drill bits to have a go at hollowing the headlamps out with. A guide hole was drilled using a small straiht bit, the i used a round dremmel bit to carve out a bowl shape. This was done slowly by hand as my rotary tool is too harsh for such a small part. The rubber was used to brace the piece so it didn't fly off while i was carving it. 

The result was perfect. A bit of thin cement was used in the lamp to melt away any rough edges left. The headlamps were superglued to the chassis as thier pegs are a bit smaller than the holes they go in. 

Here I decided to try something new. For a while I have been considering how to go about completing the details on the back, adding the metal basket and a retracted canvas roof. I have no wire ehich is suitable for this so went for stretched sprue instead (something I have struggled with before so not used for a long time). After stretching a batch of sprues I used the thickest parts to complete the railings at the back of the vehicle. This photo was taken before debonder was used to clean up the joins. 

I then selected the thinest sprue parts and cut them into assorted lengths. I glued the parts together by using an upward facing piece of masking tape to hold the rails still. all the parts were first assembled as four flat components and then came together at the end. I used a flat edge to make sure all the legs were aligned while I was glueing them, but some still beeded trimming slightly to allow the whole thing to sit flat. 

Its a bit messy but at this scale it doesn't show up too badly. This wasn't a very accurate way of making these parts but there is not much else that can be done besides 3D printing or photo etching new parts. 

I then completed the cab using some bits of wire for the passenger handrail, handbrake and gearstick, and then glued in the steering column and wheel. The hole for the column in the footwell had to be widened from underneath for an easy fit. 

This image shows the model with all the parts currently glued on at this point. 

I made a template of the shape that the folded up canopy needs to be made at. This was used to cut flattened 'Green Stuff' 2 part putty into the right shapes three times. 

The three pieces of green stuff were layered up and shaped to look like creased fabric using a scalpel and a toothpick, then trimmed to the right size so that the stretched sprue poles could meet up with the putty. 

The poles were made of three pieces of stretched sprue and a thin strip of alluminium can, and the assembly was superguled to the model and only pressed into the putty while soft. This was the last detail I intended on includig in the model, so I am looking forfard to getting some paint on it and seeing how it looks. 

It's been a long time and little has changed. The model has been ready and waiting to paint for a while. Here it has recieved a base coat of mostly desert yellow XF59 with lighter tones added. This was to serve as a shaddow coat, so the paint was mixed with Buff/Deck Tan further to make highlights. This was a bit tricky to paint with because of the added railings, footwells and 88mm gun details. The result was still too dark for this scale and to take into account weathering later on. 

I soon after mixed a new colour, mostly Buff XF57 with a hint of Desert Yellow. This was quickly sprayed over the whole model, followed by a Deck Tan mix for highlights. Tyres and tracks were hand painted with a mix of German grey and Nato black mixed with thinners. 

Some of the previous layer of paint is visible from the undersides of the wheel arches and gun parts. 

This image shows the effect that the rivet too had on the model now it is panited. Unfortunately they cund not be saned flat but hopefully they will add realistic textures to the surfaces. 

My handpainted grey mixture was added to some Red Brown to make the bench leather base colour. This red brown mixture was then added to some Brown XF72 to make the canopy canvas.
I'm getting quite concious of how long this tiny model is taking, but I know the weathering is going to be quite important if I don't want all that time to go to waste. 

Decals applied,given a panel line wash and stage 1 chipping complete 

Decals applied, given a panel line wash and stage 1 chipping complete 

All that detailing earlier is paying off! After a second stage of chipping, some rust effects and grime, its starting to obtain a lot of texture and scale. The chipping is probably too rough and large, but I havent done it for a while and could do with a new 000 brush for this. Sorry the picture quality isnt great, I will do a proper job when it is completed. 

Im assuming the mud flaps that are pinned back are rubber, so they are just painted grey for now. 

The canopy still hasnt been painted properly, just base coated so far. I have some of the airfix troops which I will dig out, they may come with some stowage i can chuck in teh basket. 

The gun still remains in three seperate parts while i weather it.