Armortek

Just use masking tape and tape close around the rectangle fill with car filler block sand , Then once you have added any other detail to the grill lightly prime the casting , then use Mr surfer 500 .. stipple it onto the whole casting to blend it all together with small flat brush light sand re prime and you are ready for top coat after the build is nearly complete . Dale

Thanks for checking yours Neil! I'm decidedly unhappy to see that yours have the same issues as that means I can't even order good new ones. Now I'm going to have to spend time trying to patch these up and make them look like the other cast pieces. To my mind, this is not a casting artifact. Artifacts, to me, are things like slag left behind, voids, air bubbles, etc. This is clearly a repeatable molding flaw. As Chris said, if someone were producing these for me, I would have refused them. They're just bad, plain and simple.

Thanks for the tips Dale. I had a similar process in mind. I'd just prefer not to do it, as I don't like fillers much. They always seem to crack off, or fall out or otherwise fail over time.

Hi Dave, I´ve been reading through this post from the start.... I´ve built various AT models over the last 15 years, about 20+ in total... (here are some pics to prove my statement) But I never complained about one of them, even though all had minor issues. Milling, filling, drilling, etc. was the order of the day. There is a very helpful bunch of fellow builders who have set up a help tutorial on the forum... These models are no plug and play or Lego. You need to have some basic modeller skills to build them..... THIS separates the BOYS from the MAN!!
In your case, I would use car body filler (2K) and repair the little dent in the covers... Cheap, easy to apply and hard as rock, when dried completely, easy to work with.
Keep you head up, and start enjoying the buid for all the issues you might find. Overcomming them gives your moral and your ego a boost each time!!

Cheers
Peter

Nice pics Peter, you have some sweet models!

Maybe its just the CAPS....but this read a little harsh on the first reading. After second & third readings though I am sure you mean that Dave is a competent modeller and will resolve this issue as all Armortek modellers are in the big league now.

Dave & I are new to this, so we don't know what we don't know

Thanks Neil,

My words are not ment harshly... Pls remember that I´m not a native speaker, thus sometimes I might not use the apropriate words, like you as a native would use.
What I try to says is: You grow with your chalanges... The higher, the more... Just think of Eddison and the light bulp!
I had Leukemia when I was 31, now I´m almost 60, I was CEO of three companies simultaniosly... My slogan always is "If there is a will, there is a way" meaning with hard work and endurance, you can handle almost anything!

So no offence ment, back to building and enjoying the stuff!!
In case you need help, let me know.

Cheers

Peter

No offense taken

I've tried patching one of those flaws already. It's "OK" but you can easily see that something has been done to it. The casual observer will likely never notice, but I know it's there and so it sticks out like a sore thumb. I'm working on the other two tonight and will probably add a little filler to the first one to see if I can improve it.

The Vermont weather has been amazingly cooperative lately, with temps in the high 40s and low 50s, so I've been able to get a lot of priming done. I've started building track and am now assembling the primed bits of the engine deck. With luck on the repairs, I'll be able to get those plates primed and installed and the engine deck will be done, outside of the rest of the Fiefel bits.

After that, my current plan is to work on the bits I can install on the turret deck plate and get that to a stage where it would be ready for priming. Build log spreadsheet reports 43 hours in so far.

I'm enjoying your build David in many ways, warts and all.
It's not all apple pie, it's not a Lego or a Tamiya model, never was.. They are hard work at all levels, the easy ones are brought built and painted, the hard work is writing the cheque. I should know buying two built ones and building four.
Sadly only a very small percentage of owners contribute to the forum. there will be master pieces built that none will ever see, and then, some not so good.

A long time ago a company (Not his one) came up with the Idea of supplying proper engineering kits that a customer could put together in their spare room. They were not very accurate, not very well made and the QA was poor, These models were designed for customers that didn't own fantastic workshops, festooned with engineering machinery. Supplied to newbies not all blessed with the same skills who had an assumption that the kits will be perfect, that was not always going to be "the way"
Things have come along way since then, sure they'll be problems, but the forum is here to help, it's a team event and when a team works together you'll get the best results possible.

I have to agree to disagree with Peter with the likes of Edison, and I'll add Porsche and Musk who masquerade as acclaimed innovators.
(History is kind to winners or money men who can write it) But each of these guys also had/have a vast unnamed design bureau of minons behind them who never usually got the acclaim they deserved.

Edison was apparently a vicious entrepreneur to his fellow employees (minions) and adversaries. And look what he did to Tesla. ACDC.
Did Porsche really design the beetle, not all of it, too busy suckering adolf with a big fat Maus, look how that turned out.
And Musk, I wouldn't trust him to buy fireworks for the 4th of July, let alone a Star ship, X marks the spot.

It's great to see your build David, (there are many like it but this one is yours). High lighting problems is good, how do things get better if weaknesses don't get exposed. It all helps, well it should do.

Well, that was a good couple day's effort done. One down, one to go! I left it a couple links short until it comes time to fit it.

Nice!
Did you use a dry lubricant on the pins?

Hi Neil just leave them as is . Dale

Interesting, your deck plates were cast, the ones on my 2015 Tiger #131 were CNC machined. Different times and models.

David you're in the USA also, therefore different products most of the time. What primer did you use?

I'm about to use Rust-Oleum grey primer, which is a Self Etching Primer in a shake can.

Finishing the tracks is a good feeling, it was a while ago I finished mine but I still remember.

Enjoy the build!

Later Tim

Given that Amazon has it, I used the U-POL 8 primer a lot of folks here use. It's not cheap but I really do like it. It applies nicely and dries very quickly.
I'm currently looking at a couple sample cans of top coat from a company here in the US called Crosslink Paints. I ordered two of their RAL colors and I will paint a test piece to check them out. I have no direct experience with what a Tiger should look like, but there are lots of photo references of 131 down at Bovington. The biggest problem is that lighting and digital presentation leads to a lot of variability in how the colors look. I'll post some photos when I get the test piece painted.

As to Neil's question, no, I did not use any sort of lubricant on the track pins. The build guide did not call for any and they seem to run very loose anyway. Do watch out for bent track pins though; I've had a fairly large number of them. I'm setting them aside and will use them for the spare tracks on the front glacis. The pins go in, but they tend to bind. I also had some links that tended to bind, but again I set those aside and will use them for the spares unless I run short. In that case, I will have to fit them.

Something is missing

Interesting photo.

Is just the one?

Charles

So far, yes, a one-off oddity. More worrying is the number of bent pins I have. I check them as I use them and I'm hoping I have enough to finish the second track without having to wait for replacements. I think I'm OK for now as I can use these bent ones for the spare track links so far. They bind but that won't matter for the spare links.

Almost had a goof today; caught it at the last moment. I nearly assembled 5 long axles with the 5mm torsion bar mount instead of the required four. I was just about to put the Loctite 638 on it when I noticed the Build 4 instruction on the manual page.

I had a friend over today who wanted to do some building with me, so I put him to work on that second track. He cranked out a good number of them, and was very thorough on checking the pins and links for straightness and freedom of movement. I had him build sets of 10, then I put them together later in the evening. Got about 35 more to go.

Having him work on those allowed me to complete all 8 long axles, put bearings in all 8 of the long hubs as well as 3 of the short hubs and install one tire on my spare wheel, plus mock-up one wheel assembly. That Loctite 480 for the tires is some messy stuff.

All in all, we got a lot done today.