Tamiya 1/35th Tiger I Ausf E (old tool)

[ShaunW]

Looking good.

BTW, that Ms Feifel can clean my pipes anytime.

Cheers Chris. Ditto! Chip has contributed no end to my build thread with that very useful reference photo

[Clashcityrocker]

It's looking good.

Nigel

[Old_Tonto]

It's looking good.

Nigel

The reference photo & the Tiger.

[ShaunW]

It's looking good.

Nigel

The reference photo & the Tiger.

Cheers OT. It's possible to learn a lot from a good reference photo, a picture paints a thousand words etc etc

[Molly-new]

It's looking good.

Nigel

The reference photo & the Tiger.

Cheers OT. It's possible to learn a lot from a good reference photo, a picture paints a thousand words etc etc

She paints as well? What a woman.

[ShaunW]

Glad to see that we're still having fun with Feifel

Back to the build and I've made some progress with the wheels. If you've never built a Tiger, there are quite a lot of wheels due to the interleaved wheel system favoured by German heavy tank designers. Not as many wheels as David's Churchill build, but quite a few nevertheless.

Here's one of those Useful Things Occasionally Provided By Kit Manufacturers,



It's a wheel alignment jig thoughtfully provided by Tamiya and which has to be cut from the sprues. The jig allows the modeller to align a full side of road wheels, cement certain pairs together and then transfer the whole lot to the hull. I found it to be very useful and easy to use. Here's the jig in action as it were,



Of course, the wheels are reversed i.e. the uppermost wheels on the jig are the wheels that are at the back facing the hull on the model so care has to be taken not to get mixed up whilst using the jig. The wheels are then secured using some of Tamiya's infamous poly caps. These are made of a rubbery vinyl and I found them to be a proper pain to use, being difficult to press on and just, well, pants really. I will secure the wheels with polystyrene cement. I hate the use of vinyl in kits and it still makes an appearance in modern kits. The material should have been left in the '70's IMHO.



The poly caps will now receive a coat of dark yellow. There was no point pre-painting them as the paint would have flaked off whilst I was struggling to press the poxy things on due to them being made of vinyl. Did I mention that I hate vinyl in kits?

Swiftly moving on, here is the model now standing on its road wheels



That's it for today and if I get the time I will try to get the tracks on before we go on holiday at the weekend.

Thanks for looking.

[Chris]

Its coming along.

[BWP]

I hate the use of vinyl in kits and it still makes an appearance in modern kits. The material should have been left in the '70's IMHO.

I completely agree!

Even more inexplicable to me is the inclusion of vinyl tyres (in wheeled vehicle kits) instead of styrene ones. The vinyl needs to be cleaned up (there is always a mold line) but it's extremely difficult to do so, since you can't just file or sand them. They don't look like "scale rubber", so they have to be painted, which they resist fiercely. If you want to depict them weighted, you're probably out of luck, again because you can't shape the material in any useful way. They are just a massive pain. They may as well not include any wheels at all, since you're going to have to buy resin replacements any way!

All that aside, it's beginning to look fearsome!

[ShaunW]

Cheers Bruce. I experienced vinyl tyres in a modern kit in my last build, which was the Revell Mercedes-Benz Wolf. Detail wise they were OK and, remarkably, didn't suffer from the dreaded mould seam to which you refer and which I've also experienced with older kits. They were still a pain to paint and fit mind and no doubt resin replacements would be the ideal solution, but I'm on a budget. Tiger wise, I'm now dealing with the tracks, which are made from hard-ish slightly stretchy vinyl. This material, whilst not ideal, is 100% better than the absolute pox that were the tracks in the Zvezda (Italeri boxing) SU-100 that I built two or three months ago. Those tracks were unusable and I had to invest in a set of replacements from AFV Club, which were superb. It was added expense that I could have done without though.

[ShaunW]

Well, I didn't manage to achieve anything as I've been too busy. Although last night I did manage to fit the drive sprockets and idler wheels. It's been a while since I last built a tank with interleaved wheels and I forgot that I would have to combine fitting the road wheels with the sprockets and idlers as the latter actually fall between the foremost and rearmost pairs of wheels respectively. A bit of bad language ensued as did a bit of a struggle with the various wheels but I eventually everything turned out OK

I'm away on holiday now and will, all being well, finish this build in the AFV section of the forum on my return. Thanks to all who have followed this build, both members and lurkers and thanks for your comments. Finally, thanks to Chris for being the GB leader, I've enjoyed participating in this very much even though I've ended up with a DNF!

[Molly-new]

I like the jig that Tamiya provided, never come across one of those before.

I will be looking forward to seeing this one finished in the AFV section. Have a good holiday.

[spitfire1677]

Great work on the Tiger Shaun

Regards
Chris

[ShaunW]

I like the jig that Tamiya provided, never come across one of those before.

I will be looking forward to seeing this one finished in the AFV section. Have a good holiday.

Thanks Chip and I'm ready for a holiday I can tell you. I last built this kit back in the late '70's and I don't recall the jig being present in the kit back then. Mind you, it's a long time ago and the old memory ain't what it used to be

[ShaunW]

Great work on the Tiger Shaun

Regards
Chris

Many thanks Chris. It's been a bit of a battle in parts, but that often happens with classic kit builds. It will be a public holiday on the weekend of our return, so with a bit of luck I'll be able to at least get the tracks on before I have to start work again!

[Sissel]

Marvellous, Shaun. Looks ace!
You've put lots of great work into this. Sorry I missed it.