The Road to Singapore: Malaya 1941-42

[Neil Merryweather]

very convincing, Tim :thumb2:

[scottie3158]

Tim.
They look great I will have to look that stuff up.

[Mini Me]

Now that's what I call a tree. Well executed Tim....looking forward to further developments. Rick H.

[TIM FORSTER]

Trees glorious trees!!

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None are fixed in place yet - hence the slightly wonky appearance. They may be getting a little trimming in places and I have some loose leaves coming from Mininatur to cover any gaps - but to all intents and purposes they are done. Phew!

[Neil Merryweather]

there's a lot in that base ,excellent work Tim :thumb2:

[The Smythe Meister]

Simply stunning work Tim!

[Mini Me]

What they said......Rick H.

[outrunner]

Brilliant bit of work, love the trees.

Andy.

[scottie3158]

Tim,
Cracking work mate.

[rtfoe]

Looks good Tim, :thumb2: :thumb2:

Cheers,
Richard

[JR]

Top stuff Tim.

[grumpa]

Fantastic work so far Tim, and great subject matter, we don't see enough Japanese stuff.
BRAVO!

Jim

[Peter Gillson]

Tim

very nice trees.

Peter

[TIM FORSTER]

Thank you all for your comments - and apologies for five months silence.

I'm afraid that there hasn't been much progress with the diorama itself in the meantime, but those who have followed this build so far are in for a bit of a shock when it comes to my little Ha-Go…

It is fair to say that the Fine Molds kit had its share of advantages and disadvantages, but I had managed to get a fair way through construction.

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FineMolds end of the line

But then disaster struck. The kit was on a shelf in my modelling shed one day during the hot summer when it seems that a coincidence of strong sunlight and the angle of the window created a beam that was sufficient to melt the plastic on part of the turret!

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To be honest, the damage was not that serious and, with a little bit of effort, I might have been able to repair it. However, this experience had reinforced a paranoia which I had already developed about the slightly ‘soapy’ quality of the plastic in the kit and, if truth be told, I had started to become a bit disenchanted with the kit generally.
At the same time I had started to jealously eye the Dragon equivalent: Type 95 Ha Go ‘Early Production’. So I took the plunge and bought the other kit.

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As we will see, the Dragon version is not without its faults, but I have to say that it is, overall, the superior kit. Not only does it have (for the most part) crisper details (such as the embossed writing on the tyres), but it also comes with full internal details for the Type 94 37 mm main gun and the two ball-mounted Model 97 7.7 ball-mounted MGs. These are especially important for anyone (like me) who wanted to build a model with an open commander’s hatch and no crew figure, because the Ha-Go has an especially large cupola hatch for such a small turret.

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In a way, switching to the Dragon kit was a shame, because I had already gone to considerable lengths to scratchbuild these guns for the Fine Molds build… but since this hobby is largely about the pleasure of achieving the representation of the real in miniature, I am just going to put this down to experience!

Also, although I had already taken the trouble to scratchbuild much of the rest of the tank’s interior, I decided that this could all be transplanted into the new kit. And so this:

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Fine Molds interior

… became this:

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Unpainted Dragon interior

… and then this:

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First Aluminium on interior

… and then this:

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Interior weathered

[TIM FORSTER]

There are actually quite a few shots of the inside of Ha-Gos on the internet these days, including the magnificiently restored specimen that turned up at Tankfest a couple of years ago. The latter shows that everything was painted in a silver grey paint, a bit like British AFVs of the period.

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The hull interior was based on anything I could lay my hands on in the spares box. The light brown floor and transmission came from an old Italeri Achilles kit and most of the light grey bits from an AFV T34 interior, as did the engine parts. The driver’s dash is a cut-down Tamiya German radio set and the rivets are Archer transfers - this was the first time I had used them and they certainly save a lot of time! The base colour used was Vallejo acrylics: Aluminium highlighted with Steel with some details picked out in Brass and Rubber Black. I then used Vallejo Acrylic Wash and added some spent MG shell casings from snips of brass rod. The larger shell cases are actually from the 2-pounder set, so they are technically too large (40 mm as opposed to 37), but they look fine…

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First Aluminium on interior


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First Aluminium on interior


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Interior weathered

It’s certainly not supposed to be anything like 100% accurate, but just to show something approximate in the gloom of the lower interior visible through the hatches…

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Although the Dragon kit comes with a very nice reproduction of the main gun and ball-mounted MG, the ammo stowage is the most glaring omission. It also shows how cramped this turret must have been - even for one over-worked commander.

Luckily I was able to simply transplant most of my scratchbuild from the Fine Molds kit. The shell clips are simply made from left-over photoetch ‘sprues’ (it’s always worth keeping these after you have used the actual PE parts) bent to shape and the scalloped rests for the bottom of the cartidge cases (which were stored upside down in the real tank) came from a German grenade box kit. The shells are actually for German 3.7 cms guns and hence a little too long, but they will look fine through the hatches.

Another distinctive aspect of these Japanese tanks are the asbestos panels which line much of the interior. These were made from plastic strip and Archers transfer rivets.

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Fine Molds interior

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Unpainted Dragon interior

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Unpainted Dragon interior

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Unpainted Dragon interior

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Unpainted Dragon interior

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Unpainted Dragon interior

The Fine Molds kit did yield some useful parts for the turret floor however - specifically the clamps that hold the turret in place on the ball race. You can see them heare after painting and weathering.

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Interior weathered