Tamiya 1/16 RC Panther (resumed after a long hiatus)

[Guest]

A beautiful monster.

[tr1ckey66]

Thanks Chris/Peter.
The Panther is still a way off completion but all the difficult jobs have been finished now and I can relax into the painting and weathering.
Cheers
P

[boatman]

Thanks Chris/Peter.
The Panther is still a way off completion but all the difficult jobs have been finished now and I can relax into the painting and weathering.
Cheers
P

HI AGAIN Paul does everything work ok ?
chrisb

[tr1ckey66]

HI Paul he looks great with his turret an main gun on an is there a M/G mounted on the turret top cupla ? an does the turret revole ok from the R/C as on on of my smaller tiger that was remote controll with wires an controll box the turret used to stick abit as the gearrin was not a 100% an i use to get damm annoyed at it but it was still great fun drivein it over my obsticle course but back to your panzer its lookin very realistic an you will have fun doin all the camo on him i bet an all the wheatherin as thats what im crap at never could get it to look right i suppoce i should have invested in a A/B but to late now as time is my enamy but im lookin forward to seein you do this big guy
all best
chris

Hi Chris
Only the bow MG is RC (with muzzle flash and sound) the turret MG is static. Turret sticking is a common fault with RC tanks. On my Tiger I rectified it by disabling the clutch mechanism (I superglued a couple of the parts together) this stopped the annoying turret jams. On this Panther I stiffened the upper hull significantly on the underside (sorry, I didn't show this process) to eliminate any jams. The Panther upper hull is a very large piece of plastic and without this reinforcement it is prone to 'sink' a little underneath the turret weight which can cause jams.

Everything RC on this Panther works fine now. When this model is finally finished I'll post a vid on YouTube and provide the link. I'm afraid I'm still quite a way off that though but hopefully it will be worth the wait.

Airbrushes are good but you seem to have managed really well without one. I'm in awe of your boat building skills and Tiger promises to be no exception!

Cheers
P

[boatman]

Hi Chris
Only the bow MG is RC (with muzzle flash and sound) the turret MG is static. Turret sticking is a common fault with RC tanks. On my Tiger I rectified it by disabling the clutch mechanism (I superglued a couple of the parts together) this stopped the annoying turret jams. On this Panther I stiffened the upper hull significantly on the underside (sorry, I didn't show this process) to eliminate any jams. The Panther upper hull is a very large piece of plastic and without this reinforcement it is prone to 'sink' a little underneath the turret weight which can cause jams.

Everything RC on this Panther works fine now. When this model is finally finished I'll post a vid on YouTube and provide the link. I'm afraid I'm still quite a way off that though but hopefully it will be worth the wait.

Airbrushes are good but you seem to have managed really well without one. I'm in awe of your boat building skills and Tiger promises to be no exception!

Cheers
P

MANY THANKS Paul for your nice comment on my ship bulidin skills an yea i do try hard if possible to do a nice model an lookin forward to seein the paintin on the big guy an a vid wish i could do one of those but got no idea how to an my low megabyte area wont support to do it as pc so slow but i'll be content to see your tank rumblein along great stuff
chrisb

[tr1ckey66]

More alterations...

I noticed a couple more 'school boy errors' whilst flicking through my reference, really quite obvious stuff too.

The Panther I am modelling (as close as I can) is an initial Panther G manufactured by the M.A.N. company in April of '44. This tank should have the earlier, smaller 600mm idlers as opposed to the later 665mm idlers supplied with the Tamiya kit. I managed to source some of the earlier idlers (Torro items) and ordered these online. Swapping these items over will be no mean feat as the track pins are very secure, making removing and reassembling extremely difficult. The shafts of the Torro axels also need trimming as they are too long, they also need to be partially ground down on one side to except the grub screw which secures the idler.
Here's a pic showing the difference in idlers. Early 600mm Panther idler on the left (by Torro) and Later 665mm Panther idlers the right (by Tamiya).



In the end I decided not to remove any track pins at all but instead try and loosen all the wheels and drive sprocket and try and wriggle the idler free. It worked, phew...



The other alts are to the turret roof and sees the elimination of:
A. The mount for the OrterKompass (which ware first fitted by M.A.N. around the end of August '44)
B. The mount for the Infra Red equipment
C. The sheet metal Debris Guard (which was first installed by M.A.N. in late June or early July '44)




I'm a little saddened by the loss of this debris guard as it's a nice feature but it is inaccurate for this vehicle.

All these items were very carefully removed from the turret and the surfaces made good for painting again...



Whilst I was waiting for the Torro idlers to arrive I used the time to assemble and prime some of the tools and other bits and pieces...


From the top we have: a few schurtzen (Panther 135 still had a few left at the time off capture), the air defence weapon mount, the obligatory bucket!, c-hooks, shackles, shovel blade, tow cables and spare tracks.


And that's it for this post. Hopefully tomorrow I'll have the new idlers installed and the tank back together in one piece again. Hopefully the increased track slack can be taken up with the internal adjuster and I won't need to remove any links from the tracks. That would be the nightmare scenario!
Fingers crossed, all goes as planned and by Sunday I'll be ready to apply the camouflage.

Cheers
Paul

[boatman]

More alterations...

I noticed a couple more 'school boy errors' whilst flicking through my reference, really quite obvious stuff too.

The Panther I am modelling (as close as I can) is an initial Panther G manufactured by the M.A.N. company in April of '44. This tank should have the earlier, smaller 600mm idlers as opposed to the later 665mm idlers supplied with the Tamiya kit. I managed to source some of the earlier idlers (Torro items) and ordered these online. Swapping these items over will be no mean feat as the track pins are very secure, making removing and reassembling extremely difficult. The shafts of the Torro axels also need trimming as they are too long, as well as being partially ground on one side to except the grub screw which secures the idler.
Here's a pick showing the difference in idlers. Early 600mm Panther idler on the left (by Torro) and Later 665mm Panther idlers the right (by Tamiya).

[ATTACH=CONFIG]n1130829[/ATTACH]

In the end I decided not to remove any track pins at all but instead try and loosen all the wheels and drive sprocket and try and wriggle the idler free. It worked, phew...

[ATTACH=CONFIG]n1130830[/ATTACH]

The other alts are to the turret roof and sees the elimination of:
A. The mount for the OrterKompass (which ware first fitted by M.A.N. around the end of August '44)
B. The mount for the Infra Red equipment
C. The sheet metal Debris Guard (which was first installed by M.A.N. in late June or early July '44)
[ATTACH=CONFIG]n1130831[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH=CONFIG]n1130832[/ATTACH]

I'm a little saddened by the loss of this debris guard as it's a nice feature but it is inaccurate for this vehicle.

All these items were very carefully removed from the turret and the paint surfaces made good for painting again...
[ATTACH=CONFIG]n1130833[/ATTACH]

Whilst I was waiting for the Torro idlers to arrive I used the time to assemble and prime some of the tools and other bits and pieces...
[ATTACH=CONFIG]n1130834[/ATTACH]

From the top we have: a few schurtzen (Panther 135 still had a few left at the time off capture), the air defence weapon mount, the obligatory bucket!, c-hooks, shackles, shovel blade, tow cables and spare tracks.


And that's it for this post. Hopefully tomorrow I'll have the new idlers installed and the tank back together in one piece again. Hopefully the increased track slack can be taken up with the internal adjuster and I won't need to remove any links from the tracks. That would be the nightmare scenario!
Fingers crossed, all goes as planned and by Sunday I'll be ready to apply the camouflage.

Cheers
Paul

HI Paul wow just as well you noticed it now or you would have been right in it so its gonna be a nail bitein time for you tryin to get this right well i hope it all goes well for you an you dont have to alter the tracks
all best an my hopes
chris

[Steve Jones]

Glad to see you are on the final stretch with this one Paul. Nice to see the attention to detail. Lovely work all round

[tr1ckey66]

Tools, tow cables and jack block...

Thankfully the new idlers proved easier to install than I previously feared. The Panther is in one piece again and the build can continue.

I decided to take a break from the main build and concentrate on the tools and cables. I mentioned earlier that I would be making the jack block and the tool handles from real wood. Here's the result...



It is quite tricky to hollow out the plastic heads of the axe and hammer to except the new wooden handles but with a little care and patience it can be done.

I also finished the. C-hooks and spare tracks...




Hope you like the results.

Next task is the national crosses, turret numbers and the camouflage.

Thanks for looking
Cheers
P

[boatman]

HI Paul them tools look real but then the whole tank looks real very good work an i am really lost for words to describe this model its a WOW from me now you can enjoy the paintin the camo
keep up the good work Paul
chris

[scottie3158]

Paul,
Very nice work the pioneer tools look very good with the real wood replacements.

[boatman]

HI Paul lookin good he is now i was wondering what colours of the camo will you be doin ? an will you be fittin in figures an i now think its really accrutre to the real tank now is it ? an just lookin through your build again but in the first real black an white pic there is a gizmo on the turret hatch what is it ? an what does it do ?
chris

[tr1ckey66]

Hi Chris
The camo will be the usual 3 colour scheme: Dunkelgelb (dark yellow) base with rotbraun (red brown), and olivgrun (olive green) random squiggles. The brown and green squiggles on my particular tank were hand sprayed by the maintenance crews in the field, on later vehicles patterns vary and could be factory applied.

My build of Panther 135 is fairly accurate now (I think). There are a couple of compromises because of the RC nature of the build (the gun flash unit just visible in the barrel is one) but I’m happy enough with the tank’s overall look.

The apparatus you refer to (in the first wartime Panther pic in this thread) is the infra-red, night vision equipment. This was fitted to later vehicles (not just Panthers). I only included this pic as it clearly showed the thickness of the forward hatches, it is not an image of SS Panther 135 that I’m building.

BTW, thanks to both you and Scottie for the continued support - it means a lot. :thumb2:

Cheers
P

[BattleshipBob]

Cracking job Sir

[tr1ckey66]

Cracking job Sir

Thanks Bob