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Maddog Manufacturing Open in 2021


Mark Deliduka

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Thank you Dennis! Yeah, I try to stay busy on the workbench, but many times real life keeps me away. A lot of these would be done by now if it didn't. Still there are benefits to life getting in the way, like the one where I get paid for my handyman work! LOL!

 

Thanks again for checking out my Thread.

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29 minutes ago, ghodges said:

Very good progress Duke! Of course, your idea of a "shelf queen" is anything not completed in 2 weeks....;)

 

Gil :cool:

Yes, you may be right there! That makes all my big aircraft Shelf Queens since I've been building them all for eight months now!

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Here is my latest progress for this past week and a half or so. I'll start with my Big Tank, the 1/35th scale M-48A3 Patton. Someone told me that Testor's Military Brown was a close enough approximation for the red clay in Vietnam. Since he served there, I took his word for it and finally shot this beast with the Military Brown in order to simulate a dusted tank. It's kind of hard to tell in a couple of these pics:

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Now for the small stuff.

As you remember, here is where I was with the Chieftains:

width="750px" height="328px"https://modelersalliance.org/galleries/wip-british-chieftains-vii-jpg.126279/full[/IMG]

First I added the tracks and sprockets to all of them. It was a bit of a fight too! Note to self: next time do not cement the upper hull to the lower one until the tracks and sprockets are installed.

Here's the Mk.5:

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...and the Mk.10:

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I did the Mk.10 first and then realized the top run of tracks would not be seen once the skirts were on. Hence, the missing top runs on the Mk.5. I also did not get pics of the tracks on the Mk.11

It was time to add the skirts to my Chieftains: I only got pics of the Mk.10 and Mk.11:

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You'll notice I also had decals on that one and the Mk.11 which is here:

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I also noticed that Takom did us a bit of a favor having two strips of clear plastic adhesive on each side of the P/E fret. I only removed one side so when it came time to remove the skirt pieces, all I had to do was slip a tweezer under the part and slowly and carefully peel it off. No chance of the part flying off when disengaging it from the sprue:

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While those were set aside to dry, I added the tracks and sprockets to the M-109A2 since it still didn't have them:

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Meanwhile on the M-109A6 Paladin, I painted all the Jerry cans on the turret with Olive Green:

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On my Israeli vehicles, I added the tracks and skirts to the Nagmashot APC so I could apply decals soon:

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I also moved forward on my Israeli Centurion Sho't Meteor, adding fenders and stowage boxes on the turret:

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Then I went to start my Centurion Sho't Kal Alef by cutting out the lower hull floor to assemble the lower hull:

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I looked for the sides of the lower hull and they were nowhere. I then looked at the instruction sheet and saw why. I am supposed to have this Sprue D in this kit that includes the sides of the hull and the correct engine deck:

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Instead, I have this Sprue D that does not go with this version of the Centurion Sho't Kal Alef:

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And no, I did not pull out the Meteor kit by mistake. I already have that hull built using these engine deck pieces and no, the missing sprue D for the Sho't Kal are not in with the Meteor sprues. I simply do not have that sprue in my kit like I'm supposed to. So, the Sho't Kal is on hold for the time being.

Moving on, I added the decals to Ole Bill, and started on the advertisements on the civilian Type B Omnibus. The advertisements for this bus were painted on paper and card stock and I couldn't tell if they were decals or not. Even the number frames for these ads on the instruction sheet were different from the number frames of the actual decals. So, I cut everything out and pasted them one the bus using Gator Grip Glue.  I worked at the rear of the bus first as you can see here:

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That took a couple days so I didn't shoot any more pics of the bus with the rest of them on.

That is about all for this update. It is a bit short but at least I made some progress.

Thanks all for looking in, comments are welcome.  

 

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Nice progress report Mark. It looks like the M48 is nearing the finish line.I’m sure by the end of this month you’ll be there with it.

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LOL! Thanks Gil! Yeah, I don't know how accurate they are too, but boy do they make that bus look great!

 

It's another weekend and time to open the manufacturing plant for another tour to show the latest progress Thanks to Hobby Day, I was able to get a lot done.  First things first, let's visit the hanger where I managed to finally sand the nose of the A-400 into something resembling "close enough":


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The shape is still a bit off, but it seems beyond my capabilities to get right. It can only really be seen from certain angles. Screw it! I'm tired of messing with this thing, especially after all this time. I'm gonna repair the wheels, prime the nose and move on.


I also decided to take someone's advice to mask off and paint the blue stripes going down the side of the An-124. So, I gritted my teeth and started taping; making every effort to make these straight:


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After that, out came the Sotar 20/20 which I used to lay down the first thin stripe. Getting the point right at the rear was extremely difficult and I doubt I'll be able to make it look good. But the first stripe is down:


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I've been too scared to pull off the tape to see how badly I did. I'm already pretty disheartened by this model already


Before I did that, I re-glued the two broken engines back on the wing:


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Man, what an ordeal! I'll check the stripes later this week and then try to mask and shoot the bigger one above that one.

 


Time to check out the tank assembly plant now....


Moving on, I managed to get a bit of extra work done on the 1/35th scale Patton. First, I assembled the searchlight:


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You can see I did a bit of sanding to try and make that thing look right. Man, that is one extremely fiddly assembly! Installing it on the tank is gonna be even more difficult!


After that I wanted to do something that would make me feel good about this tank. I added the tracks and installed all the final roadwheels:


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Yeah, I'm actually liking this thing now!

 


And now for the next project I started for my SoCal AMPS 20-hour build challenge. This is the Russian CLUB M coastal defense missile system, which I got from a fellow AMPS member for my birthday. I was allowed to work on it over the course of the next four hours.


First thing I did, build the transmissions and drive trains, as well as the center differential so that I could assemble the chassis:


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After that I assembled and added the engine:


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Next I built the floor of the rear missile compartment. Here it is dry-fit on the chassis. You can see I added the floor of the driver's cab already too:


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After that, I decided to assemble all the missile launch tubes ahead of time:


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You can see one needed a little persuasion. After I did those, I saw I had one hour left for this build for the day. Out came the parts for the suspension. I built all the axle assemblies and added them all to the chassis along with the gas tanks:


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Now, we'll check in on the WWI female tank. This one got the decals on it and some dusting. It's not done yet, despite looking so close. I expect this will be in the completed models section soon:


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Now we move on to the Israeli Nagmasho't. Ace has you bend four tiny pieces of P/E into ammunition box holders for the four machine guns on this. I'm so thrilled I had my Hold-n-Fold:


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You can see the Exacto Blade in the pic for size reference. Man, I'm glad that got done! I glued each corner joint with Gator's Grip Glue.


Since I was doing photo etch on this, I added the final parts to the model:


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Once they were dry, I added the decals:


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While the photo etch was drying on the Nagmasho't, I continued to work on the Sho't Meteor tank.


First I completed the details on the hull:


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Next I started adding the details to the turret to bring it closer to finishing:


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Here they both are mocked up with all the details I added:


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Next came all the photo etch. First I did the turret; I needed to bend all the vision block shields and add them to the turret. Later I added the remaining parts to the turret and hull:


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Later I added the hatch ring to the commanders hatch over the top of all those vision blocks:


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Now this is so much closer to being finished. I should be able to paint this within the week.


Finally, I got tired of the M-41 taking up space. I pulled it out and added the fenders, the photo etch braces and the fender boxes to this:


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Next I did final bits to the turret. This is getting closer to paint, but I still have so much more to do with it. I did add the idler wheels and the rear halves of the roadwheels to the suspension but didn't take any pics. Too much frustration with the roadwheels not lining up at all. Maybe you'll see that in the next tour.


That completes the latest tour of Maddog Manufacturing, I hope you enjoyed it. Thanks all for looking in, comments are welcome.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Here is a small update showing my latest efforts to bring a couple more items over the finish line before July. 

 

First off, I rigged the Diamond T wrecker with regular thread since I know that won't melt under glue! Now to find a couple hooks to add to the ends so I can finish this:

 

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Next: There IS a God! With His help, I found the impossibly small ammo box that went missing from my Nagmasho't kit! So, I pulled out the one I removed and installed them both. Finally this is truly done:

 

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Moving on, I had a few more steps to do on my Sho't Meteor. First was the turret. The version I wanted to do required a plate be added to both sides of the turret. There was a template on the instruction sheet, but how to make a plate from that? Then it hit me: clear plastic! I found a sheet of thick clear plastic and cut out two plates to match the template. I cemented them on the turret using Gator's Grip Glue:

 

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Later they got painted, glossed and decaled:

 

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Next I had to add the wheels and tracks to this. That went fairly fast, although the adjustments to line these up took longer than the installation:

 

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Yes, it says "Meteor" on the bottom. I had planned on building the Sho't Kal Alef alongside this so I wrote that to keep from confusing which hull was for which tank. Turns out I didn't need to. Best plans and all that....

 

I then glued the two halves of the tracks together using black tire glue:

 

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When they were dry, I tried installing them and naturally, I broke the idler wheel when trying to thread it through under the fender:

 

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The other side went on fine though... of course:

 

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Later when the idler dried in place, I was finally able to finish the tracks on the other side:

 

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Finally, here she is all dressed up in her skirt and shoes:

 

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Later I finished this up completely. You can see it in the finished armor forums.

 

Thanks all for looking in, comments are welcome.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Welcome back to the plant everyone!

 

Thanks to Hobby Day I got a great amount of work done so this will be a long tour of the manufacturing plant with an intermission in between.

 

All aboard as we head over to the hanger first.

 

I was determined to make some more progress on my A-400 because I'm getting tired of that thing cluttering up my workbench. I shot some grey over the fuselage to see how well the nose and all looks; and then hit it with a glosscoat for decals:

 

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I'm pretty pleased with the way the nose turned out.

 

Next I shot the wings with the grey and gloss to even this up:

 

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After that, I had the urge to mock this up. I dry-fit the tail and wings to this to see how big and bulky it is:

 

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Thinking about how I'm going to proceed on this plane, I'm planning on removing the tail and decaling it. Then I'll cement the wings in place. When they dry, I'll fix and/or sand the seams around the wing-fuselage joint and then re-paint it with the grey and gloss. After that I'll add the decals; seal them and then add the tail to finish this Big Bird up.

 

As for the other Big Bird (Antonov) I'm still re-touching the paint on it. Hopefully I'll be able to make progress on it soon. 

 

After that, I wanted to start something simple and nostalgic. That's when I found the bagged Frog kit of the Swedish Vampire. Perfect! 

 

I started with the "cockpit":

 

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Yes, I will be painting that guy. 

 

Later I cemented him into one half of the fuselage to see where and how much weight to add to the nose:

 

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The white is the Gator Grip Glue I used on the flattened bullet fishing weights.

 

After that, I cemented the fuselage together, added the wings, booms and tail; used Vallejo acrylic putty to fill the seams and sanded the joints:

 

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Just need to paint the pilot, mask and add the canopy and I'll be able to paint this little bird. 

 

Next I went looking for something different to build. What can be more different than a helicopter? I found my little Japanese OH-1 Observation helicopter AKA "Ninja" and started on the cockpit:

 

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And that's as far as I got on that because I need to paint that interior. Then I pulled out my Christmas present from my sister: the Russian Kamov Ka-29 helicopter. Started the cockpit on that too:

 

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Next I did the main cabin interior, seen here behind the cockpit:

 

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In order to make sure the upright bulkheads lined up properly, I added these sub-assemblies to one of the fuselage halves to allow them to dry in the proper position:

 

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That rear bulkhead was adjusted after that pic was taken...

 

Later I painted the whole interior:

 

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Kinda bland; only two colors, black and blue! 

 

As the paint dried, I assembled the main rotor hub:

 

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That looks a lot more complicated than it is. 

 

That is all I have on my aircraft so we'll continue on to my vehicle manufacturing. 

 

I painted the interior of the searchlight on my 1/35th scale Patton tank:

 

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Later I'll be mounting that to the turret behind it and then add the final parts to finish it off. 

 

Since I had cleared the desk of almost every small scale armor model in progress; it was time to start some more. Since I had built a Centurion; I decided that I should just go ahead and build al the rest of the ACE Centurions I had in the stash. 

 

First Centurion up was the British Centurion Mk.5 that will be done up as a Berlin Brigade tank. I started by assembling the lower hull:

 

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I continued by adding the roadwheels and suspension bogies:

 

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Later I added all the upper hull plates and assembled the turret:

 

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The next Centurion I started was the Australian Centurion Mk.5/1 Long Range. I assembled the lower hull with bogies and wheels; and then did the rear external add-on fuel tank. That is the little box behind the lower hull:

 

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The final Centurion variant was a one-off test vehicle the British built to counter the JS Stalin class of tanks. It is labeled the FV-4005. The lower hull was assembled just like the other two:

 

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Then I built the big boxy turret:

 

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This thing carries a 7.2inch howitzer on it; that is why they needed such a turret.

 

I placed the turret on the lower hull even though I hadn't added the top plates to it. And yes, it does come with a recoil spade:

 

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There it is; the British KV-2! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Moving on, it was time to start something else. I'd been wanting to start the Italian Centauro B1T, so that one came out next. I built the lower hull:

 

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Then the upper hull was assembled:

 

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Then I went to build the turret for this, but remembered the difficult time I had with the hull/turret fit on my original Centauro. So, I test fit the lower turret plate to the hull and found I needed to remove that raised ring on the upper hull:

 

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 Then I had to widen the hole a bit, as well as thin the edges:

 

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There! Now it fits AND turns smoothly:

 

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Okay, now I could assemble the basic turret:

 

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Then I looked at the main gun and found that the usual ACE issue of sink marks on the barrels was exhibited here so I filled that with Mr. Surfacer again:

 

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At least that one was not quite as bad as the previous gun on the Centurion Sho't...

 

After that I started another wheeled vehicle, this time a V-150 with a 20mm gun. I'm going to do this one as the Cadillac Gage Canadian car. I assembled the lower hull first:

 

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Then I built the diminutive turret:

 

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That was as far as I got with that. There is an interior that goes in there that I'll be adding later, even though it won't be seen once the model is built. 

 

 

I'll know it's in there! 

 

After all those rough ACE kits; it was time to start something a lot more simple and easy to build. I pulled out my recently-acquired Japanese Type 96 APCs and started the Type A one first. 

 

These kits are the Tamiya of Braille Scale! 

 

These models allow you to have steerable wheels in the front. They give you the parts to not only make the wheels turn, but to turn consecutively using this type of system:

 

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That gets covered by the bottom plate that also holds the main wheel hubs in place.

 

They also give a somewhat rudimentary interior:

 

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The rear hatch also opens and closes:

 

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Then I built the upper hull, adding the hatches and other parts. The mini turret on top is just dry-fit now. Check out the fit; that top is just sitting on top of the vehicle:

 

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I then built the Type B APC, doing all the same things as I did with the Type A version. This one has a machine gun (Ma Deuce) instead of a 40mm grenade launcher like the Type A. I also left the main driver's hatch off because I'll be showing it open. Later you'll see the difference on that:

 

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The Type B model comes with troops from the Rapid Reaction Force that these Type B vehicles are assigned to. It even has a 120mm mortar with it. I had to assemble them all:

 

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After I took that pic, I noticed a second sprue with the parts for three more soldiers so I built them afterward. 

 

 

And that completes this latest tour of Maddog Manufacturing. I hope you enjoyed it. 

 

As always, comments are welcome; thanks for coming in.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Well it has been awhile, mostly because I actually picked up a couple jobs. However, this means I will have a pretty substantial update here today.


Let's start with my aircraft. All aboard the tram to the hanger, and remember to keep your hands and feet inside at all times.


To start with,  I had a smudge in the paint on my Antonov that would not go away. Upon closer inspection, it seems that somehow all the white had been sanded away. So, I masked off the whole thing except for the bunged area to shoot some white:


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A couple coats later and after drying, I have a now very white patch! Not sure what to do about this:


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I went ahead and shot a gloss over this so that I could seal it in, seal the decals more, and moved ahead on this. No such luck. I waited three days to shoot a clear on this, and once it hit that blue stripe, it all crackled again:


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You can see the white was fine, but the Humbrol blue cracked like shattered glass. Once more into the breech....


I masked off the strip where it cracked and sanded the cracking smooth again:


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Sorry for the bad pic there; but this was ready for re-painting that section of blue. Already done as of this update. This time I'll be trying Future again, now that I have a new bottle.


Moving on to something easier, I painted the pilot of the Vampire and then glued on the canopy:


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After that dried, I used my Vallejo masking agent to cover the clear portion of that canopy for painting:


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Moving on, I started two new aircraft. While I was building my armor, I was chatting with a friend and we were talking models. The F-27 Friendship was mentioned and since I was already planning to build it, I was motivated to start it today. Here is the interior of this plane all assembled:


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Just for fun, I dry fit that into one side of the fuselage:


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Nice! Later I glued the wing and tail halves together (not to each other though) so that I wouldn't have to worry about that later:


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That was good enough for now because we also started talking about the ancient Matchbox Noorduyn Norseman which I also happened to have in the stash. So, out it came and the most basic interior was completed:


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Here's what that one looks like inside one side of the fuselage:


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I then cemented the float halves together to ease construction later:


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There's where I stopped more or less. I wanted to focus on my armor now since I have so many under production. So, next stop for this tour is my motor pool portion of this factory....


My first one I did was the Canadian Cadillac Gage, which needed the interior, basic as it is:


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Not even sure why I did that, it won't be seen once this is closed up. Oh well, it was fun!


Next up was the Russian CLUB M Coastal defense missile system. I'm doing this four hours at a time for our SoCal AMPS 20 hour build.  Before I finished up the chassis, including the photo etch. This time, I started on the cab with the interior first:


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The outer cab was then done, first the interior dashboards:


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...followed by the windows:


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After that I started the generator cab, getting it assembled:


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Then I started on the launch tube cabin, first assembling and then mounting the launch tubes inside:


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Here's the whole set of sub-assemblies sitting on the chassis:


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This is the other side which shows how this will look:


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I need to paint that interior before I add anything more. And yes, this will be shown open because I figured out how to make the launch tubes elevate....

 

Moving on to my Centurions, my first one is my Australian Centurion Mk.5 LR. I had already built the basic lower hull, so this time I moved on to the turret:


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This has a turret basket on the back so I built that. Later I'll be adding photo etch to it:


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Then the top part in front of the commander's hatch disappeared so I scratched out a new one and installed it on the turret:


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It looks close enough to the original kit part so at least I'm happy with that:


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Next I decided on a new approach to adding the tracks to these beasties. First I added the inner wheels and sprockets:


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Then I cemented the run of tracks to the bottom of the roadwheels, making sure the guide teeth were up against each one. Yes, I used the glue shown in the pic. It works!


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After this dried, I wrapped it around the sprockets and connected them at the top of the run; cementing them to each wheel and sprocket:


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Once that was done, all I needed to do was add in the outer wheels and sprockets and Bob's your Uncle!


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I did the same with the other two Centurion variants and it worked out exceptionally well. Here you can see the progression from first gluing on the left to finished on the right:


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After that, I completed all the plastic assembly for the tank. Next up is the addition of all the photo etch:


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I then worked on completing the hull and most of the turret on the British Mk.5:


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Later I also assembled the hull and turret for the British FV4005; or as I like to call it, the British KVII! The first thing I did, since the turrets were sticking on the previous two Centurions; was to fix and test the turret ring panel before installing it on the hull:


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Should've done that with the other two Centurions...


Got the hull all assembled and stuck the turret on it:


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Later I completed this all the way up to photo etch:


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I also brought the British Mk.5 up to the same level. Here are all three sitting together ready for photo etch:


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And that completes the latest tour of Maddog Manufacturing, I hope you enjoyed it.


Thanks all for looking in, comments are welcome.

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  • 1 month later...

Well I was going to try and post my latest update but seven out of every ten pics doesn't show. Just the link with the front tags missing. The tag on the end is there but for some reason the front img tag is missing.

If that many don't show, it ain't worth posting anything.

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It's been a pretty productive week for me so far so here's my latest progress on what I've been working on. Time once again to board the trams to see the latest tour...

Starting in the hanger portion of my plant, here is the latest, starting with my Norseman. I got the floats back on and managed to get another coat of white over it. There's a few blemishes to take care of but this bird is almost ready for the second color:

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Next I felt it was time to move forward on my Swedish Vampire. I shot a green topcoat on it first:

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Then when that was dry, I masked off the top to make this ready for the grey underside:

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That is as far as I got in this. I wanted to get more done on my Southern Cross next.

I started by building the two outboard engine pods and sanding the seams:

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I then added the last of the clear parts to the fuselage and later masked them with a liquid masking agent:

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I'm guessing they had the side windows open during flight; there were no side windows included in the kit. It is a 1920's design after all.

Next I masked off the underside of the wing assembly to be ready to shoot an aluminum color on the wings:

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So now I finished off building the third engine and adding the tail feathers to the back of the fuselage. I saw the pilot figure inside the box and thought it would be fun to pose him with his partially built plane:

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Later on I added paper towel and Silly Putty to the big cavernous opening in the fuselage to mask it off for painting:

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Since the channel on one side of the engine pods needed to remain paint free so they would glue onto the main wheel struts, I decided to temporarily glue in a plastic rod about the same diameter to both hold the engine pods for painting as well as mask the channel. I then shot the blue over the fuselage and engine pods:

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Yeah, you can see where one engine fell off the front of the pod. Easy fix.

Well that's everything going on in the hanger portion of my plant; let's see what's happening in the Motor Pool side...

 

Over here in the Motor Pool, we have a couple tanks that made it to the paint stage. This first one is my British Centurion Mk.5 base painted with Humbrol Bronze Green:

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It's actually showing quite light in that pic; not sure why.

The next tank I shot was the Australian Centurion Mk. 5LR, first basing it with the Humbrol Bronze Green and modulating it with Humbrol Olive Drab:

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I did the same thing on my US Army M-41 Walker Bulldog:

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After that, I found the P/E fret for the British FV-4005 and so started adding the photo-etch to it.

First the turret:

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Then the hull:

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I then checked the turret for ability to turn and fixed a couple minor sticking points. This beastie is now ready for paint:

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Since I was already painting everything with Humbrol Bronze Green I shot this one too:

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Yeah, that blob sticking out from under the skirts is the Silly Putty holding the skirts in place for painting.  This does look more like the Bronze Green is supposed to look.

Afterward, I shot a gloss coat over all these and applied the decals, starting with the M-41 Walker Bulldog:

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Then the Australian Centurion:

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Then I did the British Centurion:

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...and finally the British FV-4005:

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That last one had very minimal markings. I will also lightly weather that since it didn't see much service.

As for all these tanks; all that's left is adding the tools and other detail parts; dull coating them and weathering them and they will be done. The next time you see them will be in the Finished Armor Forums.

And that ends another tour of Maddog Manufacturing; I hope you enjoyed it. Feel free to check out the gift shop and snack bar on your way out. As always, comments are always welcome.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Time for another update tour; this one is a small one given how little time I got to spend on the workbench. Fortunately, I did manage to finish four models; you'll see them in the finished forums.

 

I'll start with my aircraft, since all I did was to shoot another coat of white on them after fixing a few blatant blemishes. First was the Norseman:

 

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And then the Fokker F-27:

 

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My apologies for the pics there; they were taken in my 'spray booth'. Barring any unforeseen additional blemishes, I'll be gloss coating these soon.

 

 

 

Now on to my armor, and another apology: I said I wouldn't have any more pics of my Centurions here, but then I realized I still had a ways to go on my Australian one. To start with, I'd forgotten to put the outer return rollers on the one side. Kinda need them since this tank has no skirts:

 

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After that I figured with all the moisture in South Vietnam where this operated; I would rust out the exhaust covers a bit:

 

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Moving on, I wanted to get some more progress done on another Centurion; this time the Israeli Sho't Kal Alef. I added the turret storage bins, the fenders and storage bins on them as well:

 

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After that, I re-started another two projects that I'd been neglecting, why; I don't know. They are so close to paint now so I finished up adding all the extra parts and adding the "open" hatch to the Type 89B:

 

Type 89A:

 

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Type 89B:

 

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There are more detail parts to add later but they would break off during painting and handling so I am leaving them off till last.

 

And finally, this last model that has been annoying me by being in the way all the time: my M-ATV. I cemented the interior to the chassis and then finished painting the interior so I could close this up:

 

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Before I could close it up, I had to add the photo-etch grill screen on the front of the hood:

 

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Finally, this beastie is all closed up and the rear bed is attached as well:

 

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I realized later that there was a photo-etch assembly that needed to be added to the interior. Oh well, it wouldn't have been seen anyway inside this thing with such tiny windows so I'm not bothered. 

 

Now to finish the upper turret, add the windows and some other detail parts before painting.

 

That's it for now. Stay tuned as I hope to have more to show later. 

 

Thank you all for looking in, comments are welcome.

 

 

 

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  • 4 weeks later...

Despite the serious beating my mojo took this past couple weeks, I was able to make some good progress on a number of kits and started a couple more, one of which is a commission build. More on that later. Lets start this latest tour in the Hanger again. All aboard the trams now and remember to keep you hands and feet inside the trams at all times...

 

Having gotten the Revell Aircraft of Desert Storm set, I decided ot start the one plane I didn't start back when I first had this set,. the A-6 Intruder. Later I'll start the F-117 from this set to replace the one that was stolen. For now, this is what I got done...


First was the basic cockpit. It is very basic so I added the pilots to give something to look at. Here is Mutt and Jeff sitting in their seats now waiting for the rest of the plane to get built::


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Next I assembled the fuselage around them. Fortunately the nose cone gets to be left off till later so I can add sufficient weight in the nose area. I had also added the engine intakes and the tail feathers:


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After that I assembled the two wings:


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Here it is all mocked up ready for sanding and filling:


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And in this part of the hanger we have an aircraft I'm building for a Group Build on another Forums called the "Cherry Poppers" Group Build, or, "what have you never, ever built before?" Well, I'd never done a Marine Corps AV-B Harrier so this bird is started as well. Again, we start with the cockpit:


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Then I went through the kit, assembling all the parts that had been molded in two halves such as...


the nose cone:


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...the gun pods too, and while I was at it, I added the panels to the underside of the part to the right:


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... the engine nozzles and drop tanks, even though I expect I'll be leaving those tanks off:


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...and the wings:


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After that I built the engine intake interior:


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Finally, I added the engine intakes, blast panels and flare dispenser to each side of the fuselage so there's less to add later on:


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That's as far as I got on these aircraft.


Moving on to my shipyards, I started a commission build for a friend who's always wanted one built. It is this Revell SMS Emden kit:


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He got it from a friend's apartment when the guy passed away and he paid me with a Revell S-100 Schnellboot. So, naturallly I got started on it for him, laying down the keel and building the main deck and superstructure parts:


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You can see that the hull was warped; what you can't see is how badly it was warped! That took some careful finessing on the main hull as well as the rear part that was molded in two separate parts(?!)


Here is how it looked when I finally got it finessed into place:


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Later I'll add more detail parts and then get started on painting it. He wants it done in the pre-war white and 'gold' paint job.

 


Now the tour will continue in the Motor Pool workshop where a number of new projects got started and old projects got a little more work done on them.

I'll start with a kit that has been frying my eggs for months now, possibly even a year or two! I finally found some hooks to replace the one that had pinged off into oblivion. So, I pulled this Shelf Queen down and added the hooks to it:


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Later when they were painted, I hooked them onto those steps there. After that, I saw that in the process of moving this stupid thing around, the front fender had broken off and disappeared:


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I search for a few hours and finally got so fed up with this that I found an old M-3 Halftrack and snipped the front fender off it and added it to the front of this beastie! It ain't accurate, but it's DONE!!

 

Moving on, I continued with another kit that had been burning my eggs as well. This Galaxy Models M-ATV got all of the plastic detail parts on the body that I felt I could add that wouldn't be broken off during handling:


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There's still a few more parts that go on that, but I'm gonna install the windows first, then paint it after masking the windows, and then I'll add the last pieces.


Meanwhile, as that was drying, I assembled the machine gun 'turret' that goes on the top of this truck. sans machine gun. That will go on last after painting too:


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Here it is all mocked up:


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Another annoying little project that had been beating up the mojo was this Italian B1T Centauro. The small rods that were supposed to hold the outer turret shields were short shot. I finally pulled out a small rod of styrene, cut it to length and also bent the ones that needed it and added them to the turret. Afterward, I added the shields while the glue was still soft so I could position them properly:


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I wasn't as successful as I'd hoped, but at least they are on. I might adjust them later if I get a mind to.


My little French AMX APC was also bothering me so I pulled it out and added the tracks. I also started adding the photo etch parts to this until I tried to bend the headlight guards into shape. The thing was so delicate that it tore! This little beats is NOT getting headlight guards!


I'm thinking that this is ready for paint now, then I can assemble the machine gun turret and add it later:


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My friend Harmon had been asking me to build my Aerosans for the Treasure Train game we are planning to do so I got another one assembled:


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That had been started by another person who'd offered to help but later got wrapped up with other projects and couldn't continue. So I'll be filling the gaps and later on I'll paint this white.


Finally I got to a couple models that started to be fun! This first one is the FV-432 with the Rarden 30mm gun turret on it. I started the resin turret conversion part first, adding the smoke dischargers and the metal barrel:


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Afterward I added the new raised turret ring to it that was also in the conversion kit. It seemed a bit too high so I added some thin strips to bring it down a bit. I used the pour stub to glue it into place:


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It did look better with the reduced height:


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Later on, I assembled the whole hull and dry fit the turret to it:


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There's more to do, but this is already looking cool!


Finally, I got more done on my Israeli Sho't Kal Alef that had been taking longer than I wanted it to. First I added all the last plastic parts to it that wouldn't break off during handling:


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Later on, I added all the photo etch to this tank:


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Now that beastie is ready for paint! I can't wait!


And that completes today's tour of Maddog Manufacturing! I hope you enjoyed it. Thanks all for coming in, comments are always welcome.

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Thanks Gil! Yeah, I had to fight to get some of that done this past couple weeks; I was just so sick of seeing the same things sitting there waiting for progress. I finally feel better about everything now.

 

Yeah, I think I have about seven backup bottles of Tamiya Extra Thin. I do need to pick up their orange top thicker glue though.

 

Thanks again for looking in and commenting.

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  • 1 month later...

Wow, I was on a roll for a while there and suddenly an avalanche of Life swept me away from my workbench for far longer than I wanted! I was starting to experience withdrawal symptoms! Fortunately, I got my fix and got the Manufacturing plant going again....

 

All aboard for this next tour, and remember to keep hands and feet inside the trams at all times...

 

Let's head over to the shipyards first

 

On another Forums we're starting a War at Sea Group Build, so I pulled out something quick and easy... so far:

 

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You can see there's not much to this kit:

 

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So I got a quick start on it, mostly doing all the subassemblies that I could:

 

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I like how the gun turrets and torpedo launchers turn! 

 

In the next slipway, I have been slowly adding more photo-etch to the JMSDF ship Izumo. It's been a tough job, but fortunately I'm so very close to being done:

 

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I've been slowly working my way around the flight deck, here is a closeup showing the bow:

 

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And the stern:

 

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That's what's happening in the shipyards, so now we move on. Since the hanger has been idle, we'll head over to the Motor Pool.

 

I've been going a bit slow on the British FV-432; only getting the suspension on right now:

 

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I did get a couple more of the Russian Aerosans closer to being done. First I filled the most grievous gaps with some Mr. Surfacer 500 and sanded them down:

 

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Then I shot white over them after masking the windshields:

 

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They aren't perfect, but then again, they are for a game...

 

Later I detail painted one of them and added the two decals to it. This is almost done:

 

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Since I was painting, I fired up the airbrush compressor and got started on all the vehicles that have been waiting for color.

 

First was the French AMX VCI APC. Here it is after the base coat:

 

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Later I added a more medium French Army green to this in an attempt to modulate it:

 

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It didn't work out like I'd hoped but I'm happy with it for now. I then shot a gloss coat on this and added the decals and painted the tracks a basecoat of  black:

 

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Next I brought out the M-ATV. I needed to add a clear green to the bulletproof windows all around. Since I lost my Tamiya Clear Green. I improvised with with a mix of Windsor Newton green and Mona Lisa Thinner. It didn't turn out like I hoped again,  but it looks good enough from two feet away:

 

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I added them on to the truck after they dried and later I masked them off for paint:

 

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And then it got painted. I used a bottle of Testor's US Army Gulf War Sand color that I found in my collection of paints:

 

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That's where I stopped on this after shooting a gloss clear on it. I moved on and shot a base coat of Olive Drab on my Italian B1T:

 

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After a coat of gloss; I also added the decals to this:

 

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Yes, there are decals on this; they are very small stencils... about ten of them. Here's proof I finished the decals on this:

 

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Next up, my two Japanese Type 96 APCs which had been languishing for awhile as I got other models to the paint stage. I first shot a base coat of green on the two of them:

 

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I only showed the one since they both look the same...

 

Next I masked them off with my Silly Putty to prepare for the second color:

 

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Then I shot the second color:

 

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...And then I removed the Silly Putty. Yes! They are ready for a clear coat and decals now:

 

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Finally, I shot paint on my Israeli Centurion Sho't Kal Alef, starting with the green drab basecoat:

 

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Later I shot the Israeli Armor Sand Grey over the top, modulating it as best I could:

 

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Finally a gloss coat and decals, as well as some of the detail painting:

 

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Well, it looks like I might actually finish a few of these before year end barring any additional avalanches... That would rock!

 

That ends this latest tour of Maddog Manufacturing. Thank you all for coming along on this ride; comments are always welcome.

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Thank you Gil! I guess that is my impatience showing, I hate to wait or walk away from a model that needs to dry when I still have time to model!

 

Plus, it keeps things fresh overall.

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Gil, Mark is a one man factory. After seeing him in action at club build nights, it is understandable how he does it all.

Mark, I am sure that you’ll have several of these knocked out and over the finish line by Friday at midnite. 😉

Now get on it mister!

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Two down? And with just under four days left? I think at least two more can be completed… 😏

Now where is the pot stirring emoji? 

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