Tamiya 1:35 Tiger I Frühe Produktion

[Radzy]

Hello

I know Coen only for very short time, started watching his modelling vids somewhere in 2013 and in fact he is one of those three guys who twisted my mind upside down and caused I returned to hobby (other two are Hamilkar Barkas and qdc748a).

So there was no other option but to build my Tiger for his great deed , actually the first tiger I have ever build (previous attempt - Italeri Ausf.E was so crap in fitting it ended up as a target dummy on nuclear test site in Bikini ).

I've chosen Tamiya's 1:35 scale Tiger I Frühe Produktion (kit no 35216). I will make tank 332 from s.Pz.Abt. 503 of Wehrmacht in Soviet Union (October 1943).

So before start, few "What's in the box" pictures:












I have also ordered two aftermarket parts from Aber. Fantastic quality gun barrel & grills (sorry no pics for them yet )


So that's all for now folks, I'm out to smell some styrene solvent

Cheers,
Radek

[PaulAyrey]

Great kit, look forward to your build

[Coen]

Radzy!!!!
Hey Bud!
That's a good solid kit choice. I've used that kit a couple of times and I was always pleased with the experience. The grills and that barrel will look superb too.
Nice subject choice too.

[Radzy]

Hello merry fellows

The kit is indeed superb in details and ease of building. Although I wouldn't be me if I haven't screwed something

So what went wrong?

Well instruction says:



But who cares about instructions Real men don't read them...



The only problem was that this way of glueing them didn't fit the suspension config

So ... cut, chop, grind and glue...
read instruction because they're true




Eight times

But I finally managed to glue all the stuff. Then I primed it with Chaos Black primer from Games Worrkshop and then I used reference Tamiya German Grey (XF-63) to paint main camo. As this could lead to dull and boring surfaces I broke the monotony by adding XF-2 (White) & XF-1 (Black) to provide some variety of colour. Later I used Gunze's Top Coat Gloss to protect surface before applying decals.

So the Tigger now looks like that:





And I would be perfectly happy with results if I didn't play WarThunder ground forces... My Tiger in the game was a little different than one on the bench. After investigation I found that the metal barrel did not fit perfectly and turned out shorter than it should be (maybe instructions were right telling that this barrel was designed for Dragon kit ). I need to face truth though, now I can't do nothing without destroying my hard work and struggle with damaged airbrush. So unfortunately the gun will be shorter a little bit ...

Kind regards,
Radek

[Coen]

Looks great so far Radek. I have no idea what the deal was with the wheels, I've built this kit a couple of times and I've never seen that before.
Either way, it looks like it should now so Winner!
I love the colours, they're fantastic.

[Radzy]

I have no idea what the deal was with the wheels,
I love the colours, they're fantastic.

Heh, Michael... if you think you're smarter than instructions it happens . I think I was mislead by Jagdpanther I have put on a side for a while. in Panther chassis the wheel needs to be glued this way... I believe this is what happened...

I will give it a panzer grey dedicated filter from MiG (the one with blueish tint), so it might give additional layer.

If we're talking about colours, Michael, can you give me a hint what colour was the fire extinquisher on Tiger? I have read of two options:
1) red;
2) camo colour...


Cheers,
Radek

[Coen]

On the inital production tigers it could have been either.
A newly replaced extinguisher would have come out of it's box in red then been painted the next time the crew touched up the camo on the tank. An extinguisher that was original to the tiger from the factory would have been painted the same colour as the rest of the tank.
I've done both.
They look really cool in red with the white label on them with the background of the camo on the tank I think.