Dragon Jagdpanzer IV 70 (A) Kit 6015 COMPLETE

[GazzaS]

G'day friends!

     After some fruitless attempts at soldering, I've ordered a helping hand that will hold the parts together, hopefully.  Looks like this:

But it's not here, yet.

So, today I decided to paint the Panzer Art figures.  I decided to try to do it the way Nightshift does.  He uses thick washes to do most of the coloration, and I just couldn't seem to get it to work right.  I either have too much paint or too much water.  Or too much surface tension.

 

So, I've decided to do it in a combination of his style and my style instead of redoing them totally.  I've already used acrylics to apply a base color, highlights and low-lights.  So, I prepared a pallet of white and black to use as filters to blend the colors as naturally as I can get them.  I'll give the oils overnight for the oil to leach out.  It's cooler now, so there's little chance of them drying too much.   Here are the men now:

Even they are all wearing 'white' cold weather clothing, I tried to make their whites in varying shades that will hopefully show once the filters are applied.

 

Happy modelling!

[DocRob]

Very nice Gary, I'm getting goose pimples by the freezing look. I tried washes only to the same effect like you on some figures once and like you decided for a mixed approach. I have no idea, how working with washes only should work, as there is not enough coverage.
Your helping hand will come - err - handy. I received mine a week ago, a similar construction, I plan to use for rigging tasks and soldering of course.

Cheers Rob 

[GazzaS]

32 minutes ago, DocRob said:

Very nice Gary, I'm getting goose pimples by the freezing look. I tried washes only to the same effect like you on some figures once and like you decided for a mixed approach. I have no idea, how working with washes only should work, as there is not enough coverage.
Your helping hand will come - err - handy. I received mine a week ago, a similar construction, I plan to use for rigging tasks and soldering of course.

Cheers Rob 

Thank you, Rob!  Washes are done to blend the colors, subtly.   So, if you don;t like the result after the first wash...  you do another.  The trick is to not go too far.  And to let them dry enough that your next layer doesn't activate the layer below.  Of course, another thing to determine is how thick your wash should be.

[Martinnfb]

Fantastic results. Very pearsuasing 

[GazzaS]

6 hours ago, Martinnfb said:

"pearsuasing "

Thank you!  Have you been drinking?

[Peterpools]

Gaz

A nice approach I haven't thought about and the results look really good. 

Keep 'em comin

Peter

[Martinnfb]

1 hour ago, GazzaS said:

Thank you!  Have you been drinking?

 not yet, just studying till 3 AM

My evil plan to alter Oxford Dictionary has began 😈

[GazzaS]

Well...   I had to strip em'.  The acrylic method just doesn't work for me.  Good thing the 100% Iso ate right through the combination of paints used thus far.  Love that stuff!  Sadly, I re-broke the handles of the Teller mines.

I am happier with the face painting.  I used enamels instead of oils.  Which dry much quicker and therefor easier to deal with.  But they don't clean as well.  Here they are so far...

Dunno how much I'll accomplish tomorrow.  I'm babysitting my 6-year-old granddaughter.  We're gonna go buy ingredients...   then bake pies...  Pumpkin pies.  Lunch out...  and then put her on some technology while we wait for her mama to get home from work.

 

Until then....

[Peterpools]

Gaz

Looking good and sorry to see you had to backtrack, strip the paint and start over. In the end it's always the best way to go as you'll never be happy that you didn't.

Keep 'em comin

Peter 

 

[Martinnfb]

Middle guy looks super realistic. I mean it, marvellous figure painting. 

[GazzaS]

2 hours ago, Peterpools said:

Gaz

Looking good and sorry to see you had to backtrack, strip the paint and start over. In the end it's always the best way to go as you'll never be happy that you didn't.

Keep 'em comin

Peter 

 

Thank you, Peter.  I probably could have lived with the pasty white faces.  But the uniform painting just wasn;t working.

17 minutes ago, Martinnfb said:

Middle guy looks super realistic. I mean it, marvellous figure painting. 

Thank you, Martin.  His face is carved very nicely.  Nicely carved faces really do a lot of the work for you.  It makes buying expensive figures much easier.

[KevinM]

Gary you do some Nice work Sir your weathering is always so Nice!!

[GazzaS]

3 hours ago, KevinM said:

Gary you do some Nice work Sir your weathering is always so Nice!!

Thank you, Kevin!

[Kaireckstadt]

Great looking figured Gary. The stripping and starting the paintjob again fully paid off! 

[GazzaS]

Thanks for the kind words, Gents.

My helping hand arrived this week, and I've spent a lot of time trying to get a decent result.  Sadly, my work has not yielded impressive results.  Soldering tiny parts isn't very easy.  And soldering mobile mesh isn't easy, either.  Thinking back, another way to do it would have been to do it as one solid skirt.  Perhaps I'll do it that way on the Pz IV J I have in the stash.

Anyway...   there is a lot of detail on the Thoma Schurzen.  They may have been lighter than the earlier Schurzen.  But they certainly have a lot more small parts holding them on.

I wanted my attempt to at least appear more detailed and less clunky than the plastic parts.  So, I've used brass strip and rod to replace as much plastic as possible.  There is still some bolt heads for me to add, and a few bits of photo etch as well.  That nasty stainless steel photo etch.  Just thinking about it gives me the shits.

Here are some photos.

 

[DocRob]

Nice metal works Gary, I wish you luck with the skirts itself.

Cheers Rob

[Martinnfb]

Mega neat detail, I would even dare to use this old Swahili word, describing mesmerizing perfection,  "pearsuasing"  

Cheers

M.

[GazzaS]

9 hours ago, DocRob said:

Nice metal works Gary, I wish you luck with the skirts itself.

Cheers Rob

Heh...  I'm done with the skirts for now.  Pretty much a failure.  I've actually made the whole set more than once.  The mobility of the brass fibres are part of the reason.  It's impossible to lock them in straight lines nor is it possible to freeze the edges.   I've tried with both solder and CA. 

Another reason are difficulties that come with working with tiny parts and a very hot soldering iron.  Whereas I've learned to make the solder flow, it's still a messy process and you can;t use your fingers to hold the tiniest parts.  Likewise, the alligator clips are too big as well.  What you need is a non-ferrous clamp whose ends are as small as toothpick tips.

It's just something I'll have to try again later on.  Fortunately the brass mesh I bought can be used to simulate the torpedo nets on my 1/350 scale SMS Seydlitz.  Otherwise it would be a wasted material.

[Peterpools]

Gaz

Detailing does look good and it takes awhile to develop your soldering skills. Many years ago, I was into model railroading and I found myself soldering all the time, adding detail brass parts to the engines ( most cast steam engines), with the hand laid track and turnouts. What I found worked best in situations you are dealing with, would be to carefully tape the framework down on my soldering board, lay the mesh in place, taping it in place as well. Then with a tinned soldering iron, I would 'tack solder' enough point to hold everything basically in place. Remove the tape and solder the rest.

On the engines, I would tin the part, hold it in place with my tweezers and then just apply enough heat with the soldering iron to allow the solder to flow. It did take time to become comfortable. learning how to do all of this but now, when I need to solder, it's like meeting an old friend. Doing track work was somewhat the same as I either use jigs to hold the turnouts in place while I soldered the individual pieces and the electrical was done by tinning as well.

Most important of all, is not to use too much heat as things happen way to fast. My money is riding on you that a few more tries and you'll have this down pat.

 

 

 

[GazzaS]

2 hours ago, Peterpools said:

My money is riding on you that a few more tries and you'll have this down pat.

Thanks for your thoughts,  Peter.   Unfortunately, things have surfaced to completely change my plans and render a lot of work pointless.

This morning I woke up and looked at the model and had a suspicious feeling that something just wasn't right.  Consulting my reference photos, I realized that the mounting brackets that were attached to the hull were too short.  Over 3/8" too short.  I compared them with a later iteration of this kit, the size was clearly wrong.  So...   I had to rip them off.  And then add a few more parts from the Eduard PE  to show how the brackets had been attached before they were ripped off.

So now...   she's ready for paint.

So...   Once it warms up a little more outside, I'll apply the camo.

[Martinnfb]

3/8" is a lot, this really sucks. Yet, I don't think that this contraption survived on the vehicle in tact longer than few days. 

 

[belugawhaleman]

Nice work! I especially like your figures!

[GazzaS]

3 hours ago, Martinnfb said:

3/8" is a lot, this really sucks. Yet, I don't think that this contraption survived on the vehicle in tact longer than few days. 

 

Very nice picture, Martin. 

There is a book out there about a Canadian who served in the German Army during the war.  Though most of the time was on Pz IV, the latter part was in a Jagdpanzer IV.   It's called Panzer Gunner and the author is Bruno Friesen.   In it he details the extra lengths the driver of these Jagdpanzers had to go through to avoid ruining the gun.  I highly recommend it. 

[GazzaS]

Anyhow....

The camo scheme is on.  I've also started the base as well as slowly working on the figures.

 

[Martinnfb]