The Unofficial Airfix Modellers' Forum

59North wrote: I've also thought, that you as a modeller, are attracted to the more unusual subjects.

I think you have summed my up nicely I do tend to like the odd ball subject.

I have used the scratch built turret as a master and made a two part silicon, mould.

The image below shows my first attempt at casting the turret in resin with a coat of primmer, I can see some small bubble holes that I think are down to my lack of experience.

That looks a pretty darned good first go Splash!

That's a really great effort, Alan and a swipe of filler will see off those pesky bubble holes I'm sure!

Looks very good. I've bought several resin kits with lots more holes than that. Where's the seam? I can't see one.

David

dwomby wrote:Looks very good. I've bought several resin kits with lots more holes than that. Where's the seam? I can't see one.

David

I ran the seam up across the curved side, across the top just behind the hatch and down across the flat side with the round hatch as I thought these are the easier areas to clean up.

I have sorted out the bubble issue and managed to get several good turrets cast.

I have removed the front track shields sorted out the square side hatch and given the whole tank a fresh coat of green. The turret still needs some lifting shackles added and the Besa gun.





If anyone wants a go at this, I have a spare turret going free to a good home, just drop me a PM first come first served

Quite different to a normal Churchill. Must be very satisfying to do such a great conversion job.

David

dwomby wrote:Quite different to a normal Churchill. Must be very satisfying to do such a great conversion job.

David

The Airfix Churchill was my nemesis kit, I recall back in the sixties it was the only kit I ever throw against the wall with frustration because I could get all the wheels to fit.

Now my skill level are good enough to actually build it without loosing my temper I can actually see the attraction of the tank and all the different variants, this build is encouraging me to try more simple conversions like the snake with the pipes on the side or the version with the very large fixed turret.

Looking very smart .... I can feel a shelf full of different variants of these coming along soon ... assuming you can source enough cheap kits ...
It is the one type of tank that I have enjoyed building a number of variants of in 1/76 come 1/72 scale.
(the armourfast kits are cheap enough and easily available to avail themselves for this type of a longterm projects base kit ...

I trust you have found the "lloydian web page"?

The other that I am tempted by is the Sherman...

Cheers Chris, Lloydian’s website has been one of my inspirations.

http://www.lloydianaspects.co.uk/models/church.html

For my second CDL conversion I’m using the Airfix Matilda, this is not a kit I have built before, but have been pleasantly surprised, after only two hours the main components have been assembled with no sign of any filler being required I’m tempted to hunt down another of these and build it in the colourful sand/sky/green colours.

I’m using my original scratch built turret on this one.

Great stuff, that looks excellent. That blister pack takes me back - that's how I remember Series One kits when I first started, the plastic bags were just a little before my time. And that looks like a 19p Woolies price sticker on the card header

ShaunW wrote:Great stuff, that looks excellent. That blister pack takes me back - that's how I remember Series One kits when I first started, the plastic bags were just a little before my time. And that looks like a 19p Woolies price sticker on the card header

Unfortunately I got it from eBay at a tad more than the 19p label . The good news was it came with a early bagged Churchill tank and I only paid £10 for both .

I’m not a fan of the blister packs, only because I remember as a young lad going into Woolies and seeing all the latest kits hanging up in the bags, I think the series one bagged kits cost two shillings (10p today’s money) and the biggest kit they did was the Sunderland flying boat.