Armortek

Connecting with Adrian's thread on separating the LEDs and MG sounds, here is the original User Handbook for the .50 Ranging Machine Gun fitted to the Cents:

http://merseysidertr.com/RTR/chapter%203%20full.pdf

http://merseysidertr.com/RTR/fullch16.pdf

Regards

Stephen

It's been a marathon to shape the front track guide roller housing but it's finally complete. I was a bit conservative in milling off surplus material and left a lot to do by hand with a Proxxon router bit in a hand drill. It took forever to get the rough shape and then a very careful piece of machining to get the mounting lugs right.







I made one fatal error and forgot to rotate the housing 90 deg from the orientation of the Armortek part and removed too much on one side on one blank and had to replace some material as you can see on the right hand one below. Must have been on autopilot. The old phrase "measure twice, cut once" applies.





Paul Scott who provided my reference photos said it was almost impossible to photograph the mounting on the real tank and the same applies on the model - apologies for the quality of photos.













Now for the other side......

Thanks for looking.

Stephen

Congratulations on your impressive work, Stephen.
Your pursuit of detail is truly fascinating and worthy of note, as always.

A fine Aussie Cent model at the Yeovilton Model Show on Saturday. Good to see you Dennis.













Pretty good for 1/35th.

Regards

Stephen

Completed the second jockey wheel housing. It always surprises me how quickly a second off piece can be completed. This one took a day and a half, the first about three weekends.





Mounted:













Now for the suspension units, six off.

Regards

Stephen

Hi Steve,

Yes good to have a chat on Sunday, luckily no floods on the way home.

Dennis.

The Cent final drives stand well proud of the sprocket rings - it's a quite distinctive recognition feature:





The kit final drives are accurate in every other respect than they are very flat so I decided to do this one bit of improvement:



Firstly, some work on the final drives themselves to thin the support webs and remove the rounded corners:



Then take a large chunk of ally round and start turning:







Rough assembly including trying to fit the split pins on the final drive retaining nuts:







Next, the centre locking nuts will need refining, the webs extending and some filling and texturing.

Regards

Stephen

Good to be back on the Cent after a couple of weeks travelling. Finished off the castellated nuts and split pins on the final drive assembly. The fillets for the extended final drives cut to shape and applied:





With these sorts of mods to the kit, I sometimes wonder whether they're worth doing. You don't really know until you see the end. The real Cent final drives are very prominent so I'm satisfied it was time well spent. Not always the case with some mods which disappear into well deserved obscurity.....


















Regards

Stephen

Stephen.
Brilliant job on the drive sprockets, just as the rest of your build is. I always look forward to your posts wondering what amazing mod you are going to do next, your eye for detail and building skills are the very best.
Keep posting your great work
Regards
Steve

yes stephen i also am enjoying this construction, the attention to detail is what makes the build more interesting, so keep the fans happy out here and keep going, regards simon.

Fantastic work as always Steven. I love to see you take a chunk of metal and make something lovely out of it. First rate work.
Best regards,
Bob

Hi Stephen.

Just following on from what the others have said, brilliant job as always well done indeed.
Cheers Paul.

Hi Stephen,

Impressive work, this is going to be a stunning model. Did you glue on the spoke extra material?

Also I noticed on the real sprocket ring it´s not completely flat but is has a "wedge" form, like most sprockets, see arrow below;



Will make the model run even better. Looking forward to your future posts.

Per

Thanks guys, appreciate the feedback. Per - eagle eyes award to you sir. I'd not seen that on the sprocket rings but easy enough to do on a rotary table. Stephen

Chamfered the tangs of the sprocket rings as suggested by Per, 5 degrees:



Then to complete the final drive assemblies, the Armortek castellated centre pieces were re-profiled:



And a distance piece turned and added to allow for the greater stand-off:



Then a longer retaining bolt was counter-bored and fitted flush, then glued in place with Loctite 3450:





Next, an insert was turned for the centrepiece and the locking bar was added with its two retaining bolts and lockwire:





Finally, base coat and trial fitting:











The prominent final drives give the Cent real character, so I thing the effort to enhance them was worth it, although Mark has done all the hard work in the kit.

Regards

Stephen