Apparently, it was developed into its modern form during the war, and used to seal ammunition boxes. It’s clear from photos of tanks waterproofed for shipping that it was used for that too.
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More tape, how unexpected …
[ATTACH]405834[/ATTACH][ATTACH]405835[/ATTACH][ATTACH]405836[/ATTACH]
On the hull rear I taped up the engine access door and (re)fitted the exhausts, also with tape over their open ends. On the front, the machine gun ball mount was fun — not. Adding bits of tape of about 5 mm long and 1.5 mm wide into small corners with sharply pointed tweezers is something I was glad to have behind me
The engine deck has tape over the hinges now, and I also closed the gap between the gun shield and the barrel, as well as taping over the whole muzzle brake.
That part, by the way, I sawed off an old gun barrel, I think from a Tamiya Jagdpanzer IV, because I didn’t want to hide the very nice muzzle brake in the Sherman kit. The muzzle brake the Americans developed for the 76 mm gun M1 was closely based on the German one anyway, to the extent that, apparently, one could be taken from a Panzer IV and put onto an M1A1C or M1A2 gun.Comment
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Nice progress Jakko, how many rolls of Tamiya tape you've used so far? :smiling6:
I was wondering how well the paint will stick to the Tamiya tape as it's quite delicate I think.
You mentioned covering it with super-glue, but it's hard to see in the pictures, so all the tape surfaces are covered in super-glue?
Looking good, have fun :thumb2:
StevenComment
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Looking good Jakko. It shows your trademark meticulous research coupled with attention to detail .Comment
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Less than you’d think, as I need to keep cutting it into 1.5 mm wide strips Tip for anyone else trying this: buy tape that wide before starting …
It should be. I put a drop of superglue onto the tape and then smear it out with my finger, and repeat as necessary to try and to cover all of the tape. The idea was more that this will glue the tape in place, as I had’t considered the paint coming off the tape itself yet, but now you mention it, hopefully it helps for that too …
Thanks, though I must admit that the actual placement of the tape is largely guesswork. The general areas it’s in are not, but the configuration of the tape and the exact areas covered are very hard to determine from the few photos I have
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Jakko,
A very different and interesting build.Comment
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Who wants something simple , certainly not you Jakko.Comment
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Looking good Jakko!
John couldn't have put it better!
Keep up the good work.
AndrewComment
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Suspension units with tie-down brackets that were bolted onto the front and rear bogies for transport overseas:
[ATTACH]406123[/ATTACH]
These are just some 4 mm strip with bolt heads and holes added. The bit that folds over the top is just some more strip glued in place, then filed and scraped round so it looks like a bent piece of steel.
I also added some tiny bump stops to two of the units, because the front and rear arms on the tank had these, but they were only visible at front right and rear left, because they were on one side of the arms only.
For the rear deck, I made one of the two large wooden crates into which loose items were packed:
[ATTACH]406124[/ATTACH]
Unfortunately, I had estimated its size wrong at first (the problem with having to work from just a few photos) so I glued 1.5 mm card to one side and the bottom, then had to file everything flat again. The waterproof sheet on top is 0.1 mm plastic “card” (Tamiya Pla-Paper that I’ve had for over thirty years), since this can be folded just fine when soaked in liquid cement.Comment
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[ATTACH]406186[/ATTACH]
Commander’s hatch and gunner’s sight are now taped up. It’s almost entirely speculative, because I can’t find photos that show how the turret roof was actually waterproofed. (Ignore the pencilled lines, I had put those on because I initially intended to tape up that whole area, but realised it is probably far too much and covers all kinds of things that I doubt would need waterproofing.)
I also cut off the loader’s hatch springs and the lugs they attach to, because in a photo of 105 mm Shermans, it was clear the springs were outside the tape. I therefore fashioned replacement attachments on the hatch from a bent strip of aluminium: on the real tank these were upside-down U-shapes, and though they were welded directly to the hatch and didn’t have that strip, that will be out of sight under the tape so I opted for making them easier and stronger to attach to the model.Comment
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Well, as usual I've learned something from this build. I'd always thought that "duct tape" was so called because of its use for sealing joints in ducts, and "duck tape" was a corruption of that, but I hadn't realised that duck tape came first, meaning a strip of duck fabric. I also didn't realise it had been around so long, if I'd thought about waterproofing tanks for shipment (which I hadn't!) I'd have expected them to use Denso tape, or maybe strips of fabric coated with Cosmoline.
Thanks Jakko!
PeteComment
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Looking great now Jakko. That’s plus one on duck tape as well......Comment
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Hi Jakko
Looks great. A real test of patience. I agree with Tim - your trademark meticulous research.
I'm sure that paint will stick to the tape. Will you have to paint all the taped areas a different colour to the body?
JimComment
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