Armortek

Added shackles with modified pins:



Bollard front mounting pin (the rear bollards have a simple bolt and nut arrangement):





Final machining of the front bollard pattern:





Followed by a lot of hand finishing with various burrs:







Final mounting:









Next step will be to make an RTV mould and reproduce the full set of four bollards in resin.

Regards

Stephen

Stephen,

Hurrah! Lovely job!

BTW I never ceased to be amazed by the consistantly excellent quality of your macro photos (clearly honed by expensive training and covert practice!). What camera/lens do you use, and what F stop and exposure? Do you always use a tripod or Manfrotto arm?

I fear my humble Canon G9 is not flexible enough, but equally it could be down to my crappy technique. A retired pro photographer friend has offered to instruct me ( Ah, Grasshopper..) but it would be helpful to have some idea how good results are acheived.

Would you consider casting the bollards in non-ferrous metal, as resin seems such a non-dynastic legacy for your craftsmanship?

cheers, Fabrice

Point and press, my dear Sir.

Don't want to sound like a Panasonic salesman, heaven forfend, but I use a simple digital camera (a Panasonic Lumix DMC TZ30 to be precise). It's got a cracking Leica lens and the automatic mode incorporates a very good macro mode. I use it hand held but do play with the lighting. I've given up on Nikon F3 with 1000mm lens handheld against moving aircraft and tanks and all that stuff, particularly since it started to appear in various museums as historical material.

White metal casting - now there's a thing.

All the best.

Stephen

Cracking pieces once again Stephen.

<rant>
> Panasonic Lumix DMC TZ30

Interesting - I had to buy a compact camera for work and plumped for the Panasonic DMC-FP1. It's by far the worst camera I have ever used. The first shot is always out of focus, however long you leave the button semi-pressed, the low light performance is appalling and the flash has a range of about three feet.
</rant>

I wonder where the forum's tame casters have gone

Adrian.

Stephen,

You comments only confirm that it IS my crappy technique! Back to school...

I was thinking lost wax bronze or at least alu, but White metal may be "mot juste" and affordable. May I show posted pics to local caster I have used?

Adrian,
"Where have all the Casters gone?" Quite lyrical, and rather Dietrich. Marlene rather than Sepp...

cheers, Fabrice

Your fantastic work continues Stephen, superb.
For the uninitiated (ie me ) how do you get the embossed lettering on the bollard? And what is an RTV mould? I realise it is a mould which you would use to recreate parts but don't know the RTV bit!
Cheers
Kevin

great building stephen, i am enjoying the cent project, i am more of a looker than a builder at the moment so not doing much, good to see you steaming on, regards simon.

Thanks for the interest. I should add that I've only been able to reproduce the bollards accurately having been sent some great photos by Paul Scott in Australia. Paul continues to support us and reads the forum.

Kevin - some answers. The lettering is Slater's Plastikard 2mm white lettering. It's widely available. Google will give you a stack of suppliers. They are widely used in the model railway world. I use thin super glue and a cocktail stick but they do need a bit of rubbing down to make them less prominent.

RTV stands for "Room Temperature Vulcanising". It's a quick setting two part silicone used for creating moulds. It's widely available from places such as EMA Supplies but you might like to look at Nigel Lawton's website where he has a guide to white metal and resing casting and supplies Alumilite casting products:

http://www.nigellawton009.com

Fabrice - yes please.

Regards

Stephen

Thanks Stephen
Always learning........or at least trying to
Regards
Kevin

Some repetitive work making the four retaining pins for the bollards:



Now to the hull rear where there is a lot to do. The bottom rear toe plate on the Cent is recessed quite distinctively:



I chose to separate the section from the kit bottom panel and have just positioned it here for effect. I'll now make up some new brackets to secure it, once I've also repositioned the rear plate which needs moving forward slightly:





Regards

Stephen

Back to the idler brackets briefly. The M5 set screws seemed a bit over-size. Paul Scott was good enough to measure the ones on his tank. They are 1.5 inch across the flats, which means the M5 set screws I used were about .70mm oversize, enough to show.

Time to use a new rotary table from Warco. It made milling the bolt heads simple if a bit tedious:





The result looks a lot better:





Just shows that some details don't really make much difference but others can really ruin the scale effect and destroy the picture of the full size.

(Hope you approve Fabrice - thanks).

I'd been looking for a Vietnam era flak jacket for ages when along came Russell Crowe. Somehow appropriate for an Aussie Cent. Thanks to Yeovilton Model Show - great turnout from the usual Armortek suspects. Good to see everyone escaping the winter gloom.



Regards

Stephen

Stephen,

Spot on! Now you can step outside and permit youself the fleeting pleasure of a 1/6th Marlboro!

cheers, Fabrice

The rear hull plates are all inset from the sides on the real vehicle, so I decided to have a go at some mods. I first seperated the toe plate. The rear plate can then be moved foward a couple of mm by adjusting the brackets:



I then re-fitted the toe plate in roughly the right place and it showed up a problem with the bottom edge of the main rear plate, which should follow the contour of the hull sides. Here is a comparison with the rear plate on Paul Scott's tank:



I thought about dropping the plate a few mm but that has consequences, so I chose to mill a strip to correct the profile, which I attached by pinning and a metal to metal epoxy:



No time to clean up the finish but here is the general idea:





Regards

Stephen

Completed the bottom of the rear armour plate with the new profile and final fitting of the lower rear toe plate, repositioned to create the inset look of the Cent, as here:



The toe plate was fitted with two new brackets and will have welds, once I do the final re-assembly of the basic hull.









Now to start adding details to the rear plate, re-position the upper rear plate, re-profile the back edge of the hull sides. I'll then look at creating the baffles and louvres in the hull rear.

Regards

Stephen

Finished fixing the toe plate - now for detailing the rear plate. The air deflector and tow bar on Paul Scott's tank look like this:









I decided to replace the kit mountings for the tow bar as they're a bit undersize and not quite the right shape size:








Regards

Stephen