The kit
The Panther Ausf "G" from Tamiya is still one of the best model kits of this type. As usual the sprues are at a high quality and detailing is superb. Therefore the model could be built straight from the box as well. But I decided to add some after market products, such as single track links from Friulmodel (ATL-08) and PE parts from Aber (No.: 35A24).
Assembly
The assembly of this Tamiya model is - thanks to the good fitting - a pleasure and very easily to do. To facilitate the use of the PE-parts, I had to alter some plastic kit parts.
So I removed both front fenders and all deepenings for the accommodation of the tools. The latter were filled with Squadron´s "Green Putty".
Next task was to simulate the weld seams by pulling long threads from heated pieces of sprue. The thickness should be: 0.5mm (0.02 inch) for the thick seams at the hull and 0.2mm (0.008 inch). Those threads were glued with Humbrol Colle liquid onto the top of the hull at the appropriate places. After at about 10 minutes i softened the seams again with liquid glue and structured them by means of a scalpel.
Further I wanted to show one of the tool boxes at the rear of the tank open. First I outlined the form of the opening on part C 30. Then the opening was cut from the kit part. The exact edges were made by sanding them with a peaked file.
Also the exhaust pipes were improved. I widened the mouthpieces to get the right thickness of the tubes. The holes were also bored deeper than they were provided by the kit. At the original tank one can see a prominent feature: a small horizontal bar.
This can be made quite easily: first you have to bore a hole with a width of 0.3mm (0.012 inch) at the upper end of the tube, at about 1mm (0.039 inch) from the top. A stretched sprue is inserted into this hole and glued. The surplus pieces are cut away afterwards. Sanding brings this work to an end.
As I wanted to build a well seasoned vehicle, I treated the rubber road wheels with a knife.
Now let´s talk about the PE-parts from Aber: as the package is very well furnished, I omitted some of the items.
Usually I only take those, that make sense, as for instance tool mounts, radiator cowling, latches for the spare boxes or the gun cleaning device, muffler mounts and so on.
With this model, I first tried to solder the parts and not to glue them. First of all I had to do some practice on waste material, which brought some repectable results after a while. Important is, to clean and dry the spots thoroughly, where we want to solder the pieces together. Some sanding helps to prepare the bonding surface. After this, we use soldering catalyst and fix the pieces with pincers, tweezers or similar devices.
Instead of putting the solder onto the tip of the soldering iron and touch the PE-parts with it (that was my method), one can also attach the solder at only one of the two parts, prior to clamp them together. Then by touching the conjunction with the hot soldering iron, the tin in between them melts and the bond is rock hard and neat too.
The PE-parts were glued as usually with Loctite super glue onto the model´s surface .
Aber provides also the small chains for the lock pins. Due to the character of the PE-fabrication, these look rather odd, because they are too flat and the realistic sag is nearly impossible to achieve.
Fortunately my friend Werner gave me the hint, to use chains from the railway accessories stock. I got a very fine one from the ROCO-company.
The side skirts of the Panther consist of 10 square single metal plates, that were hung at the sides of the hull. The kit had those skirts in two big parts with all five plates in one piece. So I had to make them from thin aluminum sheet. I already mentioned, that I wanted to depict a weary look of this vehicle and so I only produced three of these skirts.
The measures of these sheets are 37.5mm x 19mm x 0.25mm thickness (1.476 inch x 0.748 inch x 0.01 inch). Every skirt gets a square hole (1.5mm x 1.3mm = 0.059 inch x 0.051 inch). I punched these holes by means of a self made stamp from a nail. The openings had to meet with the brackets at the hull.
Finnaly I want to meantion the fine single track links from friulmodel, that are certainly quite expensive, but the effect is worth every single buck.
The second part oft this story will deal with the painting and will also be published in the "tips-section" soon.
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Kit
