Boldman, Challenger 1 WW3 what if...

[Guest]

Andrew can't wait to see this in progress.

scott

[Ian M]

Hoovering BEFORE you open the kits is always a good idea. You are eager to get started!

I too will be watching the build.

Ian M

[Guest]

Decals arrived today:

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These dcals represent tanks from King's Royal Hussars, Queen's Royal Hussars and Queen's Dragoon Guards as deployed to Kosovo and Bosnia in 1996/1999. These will be useful for the Challenger and also later for my Scimitar/Scorpion builds as I intend to have them all from the same units.

So as for the build, been busy with the road wheels, hacking them up and wearing them down to represent a well used tank. The road wheels will be left off until its ready for placing on the diorama base so that I can fit the tracks over the terrain.

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as is my usual habit, I'm painting as I go along, but its slow work...

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[Ian M]

Good call on the road wheels Andrew, The rubbers on challengers are notorious for getting ripped to bits in no time. Some of them came off compleatly, some had huge chunks out of them, others just small dinks. One thing for sure you can't go over the top on them as thats the way they where.

Like the decals by the way.

Ian M

[Guest]

Good start to the build Andrew will be followining this with interest.

scott

[Guest]

Progress has been slow, if not glacial in the last week! I've been working on the back plate but there have been too many distractions like Abingdon and such to allow me to get much further. However there has been some progress...

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This shows the back plate and the fittings for it. if you look at the fuel drums you'll see I've banged them about a bit and weathered them with a bit of discolouration in preparation for some proper weathering later once things are all together.

I'll probably hold off putting all the fittings in place until nearer the end of the build. I'd like to add some fine chains etc to the tow hook, so that will come later as well.

I'm using NATO black XF 69 instead of raw black XF1 for the mudguards as that is more realistic, although the plastic does look a bit too thick. Next comes the upper hull...

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[Guest]

Nice job so far Andrew keep it up.

scott

[Guest]

So after a month of inactivity due to holidays in Portugal and being distracted into building a 1:48 scale Tamiya Spitfire Vb which turned into a bit of a disaster (more on that in another thread if I can be bothered ) I'm returning to the Challenger... well almost. I had an idea for a diorama that would require the dozer blade to come into action so I've started the base...

The base is initially made up of a large old picture frame I found in a charity shop for £2. Onto this I've added a balsa frame and then a layer of air dough to define the landscape:

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Then the cliff/slope has been added using plaster bandage over newspaper:

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So that is this evenings work - I now have a bit of clearing up to do - that plaster bandage stuff is VERY messy!!

You can probably guess now what the idea is... a landslide blocking the road that the dozer blade will have to try to plough through. I've got various plaster-castable rock formations to use on the slope/cliff face

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I painted these an an experiment earlier in the year while I was making the Tilly diorama and was quite pleased with the results on most of them. I'll probably have to recast and repaint some to get the rock colours consistent. These were just colour experiments here.

I'll put a layer of claycrete over the landslip itself as it has such a great earthy texture and embed stones and rocks into the claycrete. The road will be a "dirt" track type road with a gully down the side which may or may not end up with water in - depends on how I feel later on as things progress a bit further.

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[Ian M]

The base has gotten off to a good start. Those plaster cast rocks look the part too, where did you buy the moulds for them?

Ian M

[Guest]

They are the Bachmann molds. I got them from ModelZone earlier in the year. I've got about 4 different moulds but the set thats in the photo are from the "cuttings" moulds. I've got a variety of rocks to play with now. Sadly everythign has had to be packed away for a few weeks while I prepare to move at the end of July, so I doubt there will be anymore progress from me until August now

[Guest]

So having moved into my new house 10 days ago and just this afternoon had the BT engineers connect me up (BT Infinity is pretty good!), I can finally update the progress on my Challenger...

First off, the base has progressed quite a bit as can be seen here...

Next, I sourced some small chain to add detail, as seen on the tow hook

Tracks have also been painted, using Mig pigments and Tamiya Nato Black

These have then been fitted to the chassis. The clamp is lifting the rear road wheels up to give the hull a slight "nose" down aspect to represent the digging in of the dozer blade into the landslide

and finally, the dozer blade itself has been built up and given a silver undercoat

Once the silver paint is fully dry, a coat of olive green is added, allowing a few streaks of silver to show through to represent a hurried paint job, along with scratches and dents that show the raw metal underneath. Dirt, oil, grease and mud will also be added.

The landslide on the base has been modified since the previous photo to make sure the dozer blade will be in full contact with earth and rocks.

Next will be the turret and figures...

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[Guest]

I've been thinking more about the background "story" that I'm trying to tell with the diorama and I'm backing away from the "what if" WW3 idea and going with a Balkan setting to fit in with the decals I sourced. This will fit in with my larger plans of including the Scimitar in an extended diorama later on, so while the Chally is clearing the landslide the Scimitar is providing over-watch. The decal sheet thankfully has spare regimental markings, so I can use these on both Chally and Scimitar. This puts the date of the diorama in the mid 90s, a time when the Scorpion had been retired. However, I've since bought the Tamiya Chieftan which paired with the Scorpion can represent the previous generation of British armour for another diorama story from the early to mid-80s.

[spanner570]

That looks well Andrew, nice all round job.

It has all the makings of a great diorama.

Ron

[Guest]

This is looking good Andrew nice job so far.

scott

[Guest]

Dozer blade

Well progressed has - erm - progressed and here are some pics of the dozer blade, assembled, painted and starting on the weathering.

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So here we see Tamiya Dark green painted over the silver/metal undercoat, done so that hints of the silver show through to represent a not very enthusiastic paint job! Oil and grease has been added around moving joints and mud has been added via tamiya weathering stick, although this was later covered up with further mud weathering.

Next I added some rust and more oil and a couple of small details.

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I had some trouble fitting this to the front of the challenger - you can see my solution in these two pics - I drilled holed into the ends of the dozer arms that "bolt" onto the front of the Chally and also in the front of the chally, adding two pins that engage into the holes. Careful observers will also see the hole that went wrong! Thankfully this will get covered up when the dozer is mounted!

Next: the final assembly and mud mud glorious mud!

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