Tamiya Abrams M1A2 - TUSK I+

[wasdale32]

Hi

First attempt at modern US armour ( or should that be "armor") - Tamiya M1A2 Abrams Tusk I - should have been Tusk II but the "K" sprue was missing.

Built OOB apart from scratchbuilt stowage and non-skid coating from self-adhesive aluminium plumbers tape textured over sandpaper.

Optics are self-adhesive holographic plastic - bought for Cricut stencil cutter - hence the varying colours captured by the camera....

Waiting for its crew which are still guests of the postal service...

Only issue other than the missing sprue (which would have cost almost as much as the entire kit from Tamiya) were the tracks which had been folded in half to fit the box and had split at the fold requiring careful use of CA glue & accelerator to reconnect.

Colour scheme is Vallejo Modern US Armor with a light pin wash of burnt umber oils and dusted with chalk pastels.

Mark

[Tim Marlow]

Come out well hasn’t she Mark. Good tip about the aluminium foil as well.

[Guest]

Very tasty Mark. I like that a lot!

[papa 695]

Very nice indeed.

[wasdale32]

Come out well hasn’t she Mark. Good tip about the aluminium foil as well.

Cheers Tim

The foil is something one of my club members suggested for natural metal aircraft panels - I've also used for Zimmerit as it can be easily textured with the appropriate pattern and for belts/straps.

I originally tried the TET / Stipple approach but it looked terrible then I remembered the foil.

I found a useful template for the Abrams non-skid panels online which helped enormously.

Mark

[Gary G]

I like that, the Evian water, nice touch.

[Steve Brodie]

very nice

[Steve Jones]

Great work with all the stowage. A very nice build all round

[JR]

Another award for a suburb build with some neat tips.
On behalf of the committee the dogs award.

[Jim R]

Hi Mark
That's come out very nicely. That foil idea is good.
Jim

[The Migrant]

Great! Some lovely detail on that and the foil texturing works well.