Pz III New Build

[Stephen White]

No direct joint between the lower plates and the hull floor - they are both supported by brackets which seat onto the hull sides. The lap joints between plates will need some work on the brackets to get the alignment exact - next tasks. Stephen

[Stephen White]

Completion of Pack One Hull and preparation of parts for Pack Two - Final Drives and Idler Mountings.

The completed Hull Pack One with side angles and front and reap upper plates in place:



Seating of the Final Drive Bearings:

[Tim Bowman]

Outstanding Stephen!

Your PIII is coming along very nicely. Keep up the great work and progress photos. It's neat to see such nice photos on a build of a model I don't have. At least I can enjoy someone else's fun through photos. Good stuff!

Kind regards

Tim

[Robert E Morey]

Looking great Stephen, What fun! Looks like a great kit!
Bob

[Stephen White]

Pack 2 Final Drives and Idler Mounting

Front left final drive - no gasket fitted until the motion pack arrives.



The remaining Pack 2 components and the roller housings (and the dog's bed):



The idler mountings went together well, although as others have remarked, compressing the spring while fitting the tension bolt provoked some expletives.









Finally for Pack 2, the hull escape doors which required a lot of work to radius the hinges for free movement.



Pack 3 - Rollers



On another post, I talked about re-positioning the rollers, to achieve the correct contour for the top run of the tracks. The Dragon 1/35th kit is a good starting point and the my efforts are shown below for comparison.







Dale has noted that the bump stops are not vertical on the Dragon model - haven't had a chance to follow this up yet, might wait until I get to Bovington.


The detail derived from comparision of a number of drawings is: left rear roller moved 19.5 mm rearwards. Both front rollers lowered 8mm and rotated clockwise 15 degrees. I had no problems re-drilling the holes and fitting the housings.

Right front:



I did find that the end caps tend to bind on the rollers. Having checked that the bearings were all correctly seated, I ground the mating face on some but two required a thin shim. The final effect:




That's it for today - more Armortek pleasure and a superb kit.

Regards

Stephen

[Stephen White]

I've been focussing on the motion pack and sound, which arrived on Thu - thanks Gill. I've only had time to go over the hull, countersinking some bolts which were proud in preparation for filling.

The hull bump stops are mounted vertical to the top and bottom of the hull sides. Having checked a number of references, including the superb new Trojca book, I've re-drilled the upper fixing bolts to rotate the stops 3 degrees forward of vertical. Although this seems a very small change, the effect is quite noticable:



The Trojca book is 376 pages, covers all versions, with colour schemes, photos and original engineering drawings. Despite that, I still haven't decided which vehicle to model (or indeed which Ausf).






Best regards

[Dan Williams]

Hi Steven
I'm tring to mount the shocks and found out some of the suspension arms
are not at 40 deg.But 43 deg. I can live with this,But I notice other arms
are off too.I have not taken the time to check what angle they are.
Getting back to the shocks,There was a gap bewteen the 2 halfs of the shock,{left rear} so I brought the bottom fitting up a few turns so now
the lower and upper shock parts fit together.
I had to ream out some of my suspension bushing,just the ones that did not
go in well.
Your tank is looking nice,how did you figure where to mount the return roller housing?
Thanks Dan

[Tim Bowman]

Stephen

Again, excellent photos of a build I wish I had the pleasure of doing. I really enjoy watching your progress as I'm sure many others do too. I look forward to the next set of pictures.

Thanks

Tim

[Stephen White]

Dan - you asked about return rollers. If you look at this post: http://www.armortek.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=983 you'll see a discussion on the subject. Mike Stannard produced found some compelling evidence to support our conclusions.

It seems I've done a lot since the last update but there isn't much to show for it. Main elements have been: suspensions assembled and mounted, shape of top lefthand inspection hatch over the transmission altered, shape of front towing brackets altered, surface preparation begun, motion and special effects packs bench tested, radio setup to give incremental gun elevation.

The Suspension and Shocks components:






Suspesion Components ready for assembly:



Assembled:




There has been a debate about the best angle to set the suspensions. I've taken Mark's advice about the amount of settling once the torsion bars have the full weight on and set them at the recommended 40 degrees. It looks high for now but I'm sure the tank will settle to the right level. I'll be adding 15 kgs of motion and special effects packs and two 21Ah batteries at 14.5kgs each so approx 45 kgs of extra weight.

Setting the grub screw angles:



Stages of Assembly:







The two inspection hatches over the transmission should be of different sizes. The starboard hatch is correct but I've extended the port hatch inward towards the centre by 2.3cms. Photos to follow once I've completed.

The front towing brackets should have a different profile to the lower surface and a rounded lower corner. I've used milliput. It does look from photos that there was some variation so an approximate shape would be OK.



Finally, the Motion Pack Components:



Assembly of the smoke system and mounting in the battery tray:









Dale alerted me to the suspension arm section, which is rectangular as supplied but is circular on the real vehicle. I don't have a lathe so I'm looking at how to change the profile whilst minimising any loss of strength (and minimising the work).



Hope this is all of interest.

Best Regards and Happy Christmas to all.

[Stephen White]

I've been working on the suspension arms, to change the section from rectangular to circular. I've finally got a result with which I'm happy. The correct diameter is the same as the longest side of the supplied arms (16mm). I've added some wooden side profiles and reprofiled the alloy arms. It doesn't require much alloy to be removed so I don't think the strength is at all compromised. Once I achieved the correct section, I covered the area with a sleeve. The sequence and finished result is shown below:









I'll probably also work on the hub with some milliput Only problem is that there are now another eleven to go.

Oh well.

[Allan Richards]

Stephen,

I like your work with the suspension arms and I am really glad to see another person who is prepared to use wood. If you look at my Sherman Firefly build you will see that I have no problems using wood. One way of finishing wood quickly and easily so it is sealed for painting is to use Zap Gap super glue. Just spread it on thinly over the wood and any gaps and once dry in a couple of minutes it can be filed over with a smooth needle file to produce a fully sealed surface that paints up just like the metal.

[Dale jordan]

Very Good work Stephen. Peter looked at turning down the drop arm. But this was no good .. I was thinking along the same lines as you !! I was at my hardware shop the other day and they had some flat half round alloy bar , that I was going to pin to either side of the drop arm like you have done .. Then tape up and add the fake casting line down the length of the arm with car filler . So keep us posted on this one Stephen well done .. If you look at Peters build photos he has set the ride height to the correct scale height at the moment to get a good feel of how it's going to look when finished . later when he gets the motion pack he will reset the height to 40.o ., then file the flats on the fixing end of the torsion bars .Dale

[Stephen White]

Thanks. The sleeve I've used is a very tough plastic intended to lag hot water pipes, which I found in a hardware store. It's perfect for the job and, once super-glued into position, will adequately protect the wood. I also used Zap Gap as Allan suggested. I managed to do another arm today, much quicker, using a more powerful grinder to do the rough shaping. Once I've done the basic work, I'll turn to the Milliput to shape the casting seam and get the boss into the right shape. The photo of the Dragon kit earlier in the post gives a good reference for the shape.

Regards and thanks again for the helpful comments. Stephen

[Stephen White]

I've now assembled three suspension arms with the modified circular section. I've also reprofiled the torsion bar boss at the top of the suspension arms. There is more work to do with Milliput, to make the final shape, which is a raised boss with a central cover plate. The profile of the boss was taken from an original German engineering drawing found in the Trojca book.







Finally, I've now cut out the modified transmission hatch, enlarging the left one to reflect the correct dimensions.

[Antony Rowley]

Hi Stephen,

Please keep the photo's coming . I am going to start my Panzer III in the new year and will use alot of your tips to help me . It really is very helpful. I love seeing the progress you and a few other builders are making. I know it does take a little time to post photo's etc and would like you to know it is appreciated.

Thanks Antony