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What do I do now? First tank - Panther Ausf. A


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I am building this Tamiya Panther Ausf A. I decided to try a tank after seeing so many Armor articles in FSM every month. I knew going in this is a really old kit, which is fine, I wanted something simple. Forgive me if I use incorrect terminology, I am not familiar with armor.

 

I have gotten to this point, the major components you see here are all just dry fit together.  The wheels are all attached with glue and poly caps. Everything here is painted tan.

 

IMGP8497-vi.jpg

 

At this point should I glue all the major parts together and apply the camo? What about all the other little things like the tools which are attached to the hull?

 

I also tried a test fit of the vinyl treads and found it was very difficult to get them to stretch far enough to get the molded in pins through the corresponding holes in the tread. Any suggestions to work around that issue?

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welcome to the armor section. Seems like a nice build so far

 

The hull can be painted and assembled as one piece, so the rear plate, top and bottom hull can be glued together. The turret and barrel can be kept separate. Normally (who is normal in our hobby ;-)) all main components and most of the details are allready attached to the vehicle... but what is best left of and what is best attached before painting is a learning proces (It is different for every modeler, some attach it all and do the detail painting on the model, which isn't always easy, some attach it after painting, with a risk for glue spots...) For me, I attach everything that has to be painted in the camouflage, and that doesn't give difficult angles or spots to reach with the airbrush or for mounting the roadwheels and tracks afterwards . After that the basepaint is sprayed... to avoid touch-ups of glue.

 

For ease of painting you can attach the main components with a kind off blu-tack, posterbuddy or the like (some kind of sticky gum). That way, all main components are still detachable and you can spray a fluid pattern. Do you have a camouflage in mind allready?

 

With regards to the tracks, most will use aftermarket track like Fruil, Modelkasten (does this still exist), trumpeter, spade ace, .... Costly, but certainly off added value...

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regarding track attachment, supplied polycaps would come in handy at this stage if you didn't glue the wheels because they would remain removable.

for future projects keep in mind it's best to remove one of the sprockets so that there's leeway, lay the tracks then install the sprocket back while aligning the teeth on the sprocket into the grooves of the track. vinyl being flexible you should be able to do it with ease / without bursting the track, hopefully.

 

keep in mind gluing wheels might have 2 more adverse effects, first IF both sprockets have teeth on them then you might have no way of aligning the grooves of the tracks! second depending on the type of glue force caused by the tracks might actually weaken the plastic in the long run causing it bend and burst (in my experience early trumpeter plastic is notorious, for ex. i've had an abrams idler fly off after a couple of months doing nothing but standing in the display cabinet)

 

regarding your situation, your best bet is to somehow align the the hard to reach sprocket and track grooves first (probably the one at the back which is partially obscured under the chasis), then do the other sprocket. road wheels should be relatively easy afterwards. hope it helps.

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Thanks for the welcome. 

 

I am planning on the camo seen on the box top with a dark reddish brown and a dark green. I have the tamiya acrylics.  I like the idea of taking it together to paint.

 I think one of the sprockets is glued in place, I misunderstood the directions and assembled something out of order, but I will check and see how they are attached and try to work with them to put on the tread.  One of the reasons I  picked this kit since it had vinyl tracks, I did not want to tackle individual links for my first try at a tank. 

 

I will keep yall updated on this build. Thanks again

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