Italeri's Old Panzer 1B

[lucasner]

I felt I needed a break from the scratchbuilt M247 I've spent a few months working on...so decided to do Italeri's old 1/35 Pz 1. I built it when I was a kid, had one on my shelf along with a bunch of aftermarket sets, and it's small. So I thought it'd go together quick and then I'd jump right back into the DIVAD. Little did I know....


Here's why I thought it would be a quick build. That's the turret for the DIVAD I am doing a full scratch'd interior


Alot of accuracy/detail issues with this little guy. I did my best (and used most of the Aber set) to fix what I could. I found surprisingly little good detail photos of the Panzer 1B, so I know I made more than a few errors.



Never used Aber's screw heads before





LOTS of .010 rod welds and rivets



Another first...figuring out how to make Aber hinges





Scratched vent hose




Aber tools. Holy cow those brackets were a chore...







Now ready for the primer and paint

Thanks for looking and commenting.
Dave

[OliveDrab]

Amazing modeling!

[hansolo]

Well, you just turned a shitty kit into a master piece!
Such detailing; awesome!

[lucasner]

Holy smokes I have barely had anytime to work on this thing...but I made a bunch of progress on the painting. I just couldn't get those cheap tracks off the sprues without breaking 1/4 of them...so had to rush order some trusty MK tracks.

Primed



Worked on the MK tracks while primer was drying. Had to make my own jig for these tiny guys. Does ANYONE know how to not get the dreaded Link-Link curve? LOL



Since it's Zvezda, the decals were useless. And I didn't have white Balkenkreuzes small enough for the turret...hand painted them and then overpainted them. The turret numbers are from a Dragon halftrack kit, the divisional rhomboid is cut from white decal sheet and the "4" is from a vehicle registration number. First time I have completely cobbled together markings. The marking scheme is from an illustration in Zaloga's old book "Blitzkreig". I read a bunch of posts on ML about the fallacy of yellow crosses, so I like this painted over look instead. The rear white cross has a red "8"painted in it...can't find suitable one in my decal binders...so I have to attempt to free-hand it. GULP!

Initial Blue filter, brown pin wash and some chipping started. I don't like the chipping so far, so I'll be toning it down and adding lighter chips. Looking back, I definitely shoulda left the running gear off and painted the hull separately. Getting the tracks on is gonna be a bear...






Dave