Tiger 131 In South Wales

[davidwilkins]

Hi All,

I have made the decision to try and upgrade the cupola as I know it would annoy me everytime I look at it if didn't. So using the two main parts from the kit as the starting point then first thing to do was to reduce the diameter by 7mm for the main body from 152mm to 145mm and the upper ring to 140mm. This part was straightforward as I could hold the parts from there inside diameter in my 3 jaw chuck on the rotary table.

The next part of the upgrade was a lot more difficult to do as I could not fit the large round 150mm billit needed to make the insert ring to get the right internal measurements. So to get around this problem I had to drill out the centre by hand and use a hacksaw for the rest, then clamp it on the rotary table and machine 3 points to clamp it in the 3 jaw chuck this took all morning to do.

Once I had this billit in the chuck it was straight forward to make the part and fitted inside the cupola perfectly, I was one very happy chap.

As I have now destroyed the fixing position for the cupola to the turret roof I have drilled and tapped some fixing points to flange that sites down into the turret roof and will fit some small plates to grip under the roof.

All the measurements that I used were from David Brydon tiger tank website so a big thank you for the info.

David

[davidwilkins]

Hi All,

Still working on the cupola but have hit a bit of a problem when I made a new roof plate to fit inside the cupola to take the hatch, nothing seemed to line up properly. I have been using the 5 bolt location points on the cupola and roof as my starting position but this puts the vision ports the wrong way around according to the way I understand the layout of the vision ports.

My understanding is that one vision port is facing directly forward with piece of wire in the middle to give a quick but rough guide line to the target, but using the 5 bolt location it is always facing directly to the rear of the tank. Although I am not using these bolts for the final fix of the cupola it just stopped me in tracks as to weather I built wrong or was my understanding of the vision ports wrong.

Because my fixing of the cupola allows me to pivot to any position I want, so adjusting to a forward vision port was easy enough. However this change also put opening of hatch out line so I had to realign the roof plate inside the cupola to allow the hatch open in the right direction.

I just hope that I have got this right.

David

[davidwilkins]

Hi,

It's been a while since my last update, most of the time I have just been tinkering with the cupola hatch trying to make work properly because the hatch is 5mm smaller in diameter than the original armortek part. It has taken me a long time to make the new hatch and this has given me new prospective of how complex and over engineered the tiger 1 is (that's my opinion).

I have drilled the drainage holes for the cupola at 20 degrees and 2mm in diameter also repositioned them either side of the vision ports. There are a few more bits and pieces to make and then the cupola will be ready for painting

Regards David

[Vince Cutajar]

Great result on the cupola David. So if I understand correctly you remade it from scratch?

Vince

[davidwilkins]

Hi Vince,

Thanks for your comment. No it's not completely from scratch some parts have been heavily machined from the original parts other parts have been made from scratch. I think only 1 hinge (that might be re machined a little bit before it's finished) and the 2 extension pieces to the hinge are original and unmodified.

Sorry about my updates I have not got the photos in order to make better sense of build process.

Regards

David

[simon_manning]

superb workmanship, don't forget the interior detail, you will only look inside at a later date and wish you had done it, regards simon.

[andymusgrove]

Fantastic work David. Wish I had some of your skills .

Keep up the good work.

Andy

[davidwilkins]

Simon,

Thanks for your kind words and encouragement. I did say only a few more pieces to make and then it's ready for painting but the more I look at it the more I see there is make and do and that's just looking at the outside of the hatch. I think I will finish the outside and inside of the hatch lid and then consider the interior area of the cupola as there is a lot that can be done with the vision ports.

Andy,

Many thanks for your kind words. My only experience with working with metal before working on those models was welding broken down farm machinery in my early working days as a tractor driver. Building these armortek kits has been a real challenge but very rewarding (when it goes right). Building this cupola has been an interesting experience and by far the hardest part to make has been the the hatch lid even though I have had some excellent engineering drawings and dimensions from David Brydon tiger info website, but I still made some mistakes that is very frustrating but is all part of the learning process.

David