Dave’s Borrowed Chieftain #47

[David M Wilks]

Chieftain no 47 arrived today after pacing up down like an expectant father .
I hope to research and build Chieftain 02EB71 Mk6/2 built 1966 assigned to the QMT Bovington Armour centre in Sept 1979.
In 1982 ish the tank Museum arranged for a mate and myself to play tank crew for a day for services over the years, unfortunately we were not allowed photographs as Challenger 1 was on low fluid trials ( madness to an RR engineer) so only 1 photo exists at the wash station at Bovington.
I want to find out about it’s early years and fate if possible. Dave W

[David M Wilks]

As with other builders, slow progress on the Chieftain, but I thought sharing a method of turning the rivets supplied in the kit to something more representative would be useful, as the thought of mutilating expensive tiny bolts to be glued in ,is madness .
Drilling and tapping M3 in a piece of scrap steel, drilling a clearance hole for the rivet in an M3 cap head screw, tap the rivet to form a hex, make an M3 extractor bolt with a pin or broken drill (I have many) to push the rivet out from the opposite side.
There could be other tight fisted forum members out there, hope it helps .Dave W

[Adrian Harris]

That's certainly a cunning way to make hex heads

Though I'm going to stick to using BA hardware

Adrian.

[Robert E Morey]

Cool! Great idea, the hub caps look great.
Best regards,
Bob

[David M Wilks]

Update on a super slow build, the idlers have now had their cosmetic coatings and painted, the last 6 months have been spent on the exhaust box machining and detailing.
Unfortunately this will be the last post on the Chieftain, as the tank will be passed on to the next owner to carry on the build, I’ve enjoyed the project challenge, but the next part involves playing around with the heavy castings of the front armour and turret which I am unable to handle physically . Dave W

[David M Wilks]

Oops, files too big.

[David M Wilks]

Files still too big .