Small Scale Military Headquarters

Awesome find Axis - can't wait to see your Grasshopper complete!

At an antique store near my area in Bakersfield, CA, there was an approx. 1/6 scale German Feisler Storch model hanging on the ceiling for at least 18 months. It was a vintage tissue paper/balsa build and had a broken wing strut, but looked OK otherwise. It had been designed as an RC model and had the actual engine from what I could see. Every time I would go into the store, I would contemplate purchasing it, setting up a diorama with it using Dragon German soldiers and pilots, but by the time I had actually made up my mind to get it, the plane had sold

But you've made a good find and I am now tempted to check this Grasshopper model out as well

I thought the 21st Century Kubelwagen was inaccurate but what the heck is this thing?

Did GI Joe try to make a Kubel? Looks like a cartoon characterization. What a waste of figures. Anyone see one of these before?

https://louisville.craigslist.org/clt/d ... 52098.html

Axis Nightmare wrote:I thought the 21st Century Kubelwagen was inaccurate but what the heck is this thing?

Did GI Joe try to make a Kubel? Looks like a cartoon characterization. What a waste of figures. Anyone see one of these before?

https://louisville.craigslist.org/clt/d ... 52098.html

It says its hand made

https://louisville.craigslist.org/clt/d ... 52098.html[/quote]
It says its hand made[/quote]

That's what happens when you don't read the whole description. Those wheels look like they came off an early GI Joe Jeep.

That's a lot of work and detail for something not even close.

Hey General Nightmare and T-Man, any chance of posting pictures of the now unable-to-see photobucket items you mention here? I'm about to start another 250 and so would like to see your's T-Man and a 1:6-ish scale 190 would really be nice to look at.

tpa, hope you are doing OK after Hurricane Irma going through your area!

Shown below are the pictures of my Armor Hobbies SDK 250 that were posted earlier on this thread. I purchased this from the now defunct Toychest & Treasures 1/6 scale store as a pre-built model with the MG shield. I later painted it a more accurate German grey color, added some light weathering, added a custom bench and stowage bin to the interior, the jerrycan rack on the rear exterior, racks for the tools, plus the extra stowage. I also added a couple pics of my Dragon Panzer II (prebuilt version) for kicks

First - Awesome as always T-Man! Ok, and yes I realized after I sent the message askin' for pics that I could see I then went to page #1 and realized I was actually one of first to be Photo-bucked off the thread. Translated - "Hey John (me), so where are your pics brah????"

.... um, well, after goin' through the pics already here now I gotta decide if I'm worthy....

1/6 scale update....


Well I ran into issues with the 250 halftrack that became a setback. I had made new seats to replace those art-deco 60's ones they came up with out of someone's imagination only to find out they were way too big for my modified transmission when I tried to install them. So I need to start over there. That's a winter project. Writing it off as gaining experience. The rest of the interior had been coming along nicely.

Been working on the L4. Maxford had an original Cub they modified to make this unit. Studying many photos shows they got the cockpit area and the glazed canopy all wrong. The effort was about as token as the landing gear on 21st Century's 109's and 190D's. They made a plane for sturdy RC installation but I want a static scale model. So I've been doing major modifications to get the canopy and cockpit area more representative of a real L4. The trick is to avoid messing up the thin mylar covering and preserve as much original finish as possible. It's a pain but still way better than building a kit. Maxford did the bare minimum to try to convert their J-3 to an L4 using the paint and markings to draw attention away from the glaring errors. Right out of 21st century's playbook. To be continued...

Oddly enough, the Sixth Scale Collector's Club would be satisfied with the original plane. It is a combination of lack of aircraft knowledge and emphasis on the figures as the main focus. I hope to have this plane displayed with very accurate and detailed figures and an extremely detailed and accurate Dragon Jeep. I'll never get all the issues corrected but hope to have enough improved to make it worthy of the other items.

The cockpit area should be a massive glazed area with minimal bracing. It looks more like a passenger cabin. They made the model more for sturdy construction and accomodating RC features than accurate detail.





The drawing is much more what it should look like.





Both sides were identical except for a very undersized door and tiny square movable window. Note the difference after I roughed in the general shape of the door and window.




The top area had small window panes like the sides. I've roughed out the top and the door side. Two missing braces will be added to the top. I'm gutting the interior that was set up to hold batteries, servos or fuel tanks for a gas powered version. It's the only way an interior can be installed.





This is what has been removed and trimmed or shaved off so far and I still have one whole side not started and all the finishing, filing and sanding to do.





To be continued...

I might need an intervention.....

I have a confession. I attended the local Sixth Scale Collectors Club meeting last night on the way home from the Museum. I contacted them because I had the inner guts of an RC Stuart tank I had removed in a box just sitting there in the way. I had no use for the 10 lb. battery, motors and all the wires, gears and electronics so I said I would drop them off as there were several of them that were interested in the stuff. So am I in denial that I was just using this as an excuse to go there? Hmmmm... Well I've always liked reading there blog from their meetings with pictures of neat stuff. Anyway I escaped with buying only one U.S. Marine figure and some accessories. No one solicited me to join their club which is good. I expected a hard sell. I'm not sure how I would have responded. That was close... Pacific stuff is hard to find in 1/6. Japanese figures are either GI Joe quality or a car payment. Everything Dragon seems to be German, German, German. My interest is turning to the Pacific lately after reading a few great books and watching some movie DVDs: "The Pacific", "Thin Red Line", "Letters from Iwo Jima" and "Flags of Our Fathers". All things I had no time for before retiring. Did take a couple of pictures. Didn't want to appear too interested. This is the type of thing I'd like to do in my basement...
https://ssccohio.weebly.com/marineshoot ... hotos.html

They bring stuff for sale and just show and tell. A lot of German of course...




I wouldn't want to mess with these serious looking Ruskies. Something non-German for a change at least.




What? Wow, An american GI? That's a nice rendition! Above Dragon grade maybe?

Back to my 1/6 scale Piper L4 project. The next step is a huge challenge. It's going to take a lot of work to get this thing looking even close to a scale model. The cowling and "engine" area was token at best. The fat cowl front was to accommodate space for a working engine or electric motor.

This is what the stock kit would look like.



It needs to look more like this....



Working on it.....

Ok, the ghost of pictures past (photobucket) led me to test-drive new ways to posting pics. And yeah, I know, I know, these are old pics once posted in a galaxy far far away but I'm practicing my pictcha-posting skills here.

These were the first ones I found and so figured I'd start here (hey, it's late...)

This is a 1:6 Jagdpanther I put together a while back. It's R/C thanks to a very good friend who helped with the electronics. The hull is from a DeSimone T-34. The rest is built from off-the-shelf parts scored mostly from Home Depot.

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That Jagdpanther looks amazing Fantastic work and that tank must be huge! Have you gotten a Dragon 1/6 scale Sherman tank to go with it?

tmanthegreat wrote:That Jagdpanther looks amazing Fantastic work and that tank must be huge! Have you gotten a Dragon 1/6 scale Sherman tank to go with it?

Hey T-Man and thanks for the kind words. As for the Sherman, I have a DeSimone Sherman and it's RC'd up and ready to go electronics wise. I'm using tracks and suspension (mostly) from a 21st Century M1 (Abrams). I just need to continue pouring over pictures and find out where I want to go in terms of gearin' it up. The turret is HUGE and so I'll need to come up with something that will lessen that some. The other problem is the plastic. No glue that I've found can bind and so applying parts/extras might be difficult.

Another question is filler. Not sure Bondo will work (I guess I can try) but again like the glue it will be a matter of testing/checking there as well.

I will post the other 1:6 stuff I had earlier on this thread but gotta find the pictures.

Thanks again and lets keep this thread alive.

John

Ok, here's a few pics (again, from the past). This time it's an R/C 250 I built a while back. The tracks and sprocket are from a Stuart. The three road wheels are simply plastic off-the-shelf wheels from Home Depot with a groove cut down the center-line. The front/rear bumpers were added because of the notoriously bad plastic that these were made from and figured if they were gonna get played with I'd better add 'em on.

Here goes...





John

Well how does it roll ??????????????????

I have ideas for a whole bunch of Stuart running gear .!!!!!!!

Fantastic work, tpa05! Did you start that custom project with the Armor Hobbies SdkFz 250? I know from the work I did on mine that they had weak plastic.

First many thanks for your comments. I've gotta say I'm a little humbled as I've seen the work you guys have done in the past and to say it inspires me would be an understatement. As always, your opinions/suggestions are welcome and again thank you for your interest.

Ok, to (try anyway) to answer some of the questions, here goes...

Tristan you are more than correct regarding the plastic. I've made more then enough of a stink complaining about the plastic on other websites and I'm currently 4 outa 4 in that every one of the four 2-fittie's I've received came with the bad plastic. In one case I gave one of 'em away as a gift. A few months it was given back as it was just too much work just to get it ready to build. I'm in the process of making another R/C version but not without first reinforcing the insides. Here's a pic that shows how some of the under-surfaces were reinforced....



Matthew as far as how it roles, given the plastic issues Tristan mentioned, I decided to basically build a "skateboard w/electronics" using the motors/gear from the Stuart. The front rear bumpers were added for protection and with the 250-shell simply placed on top. Here's some pics of what that looks like as well as the off-the-shelf wheels from Home Depot used...







Note for the chassis I simply dremelled out the center-line and was pleasantly surprised at how well it worked. Matthew you mentioned that you had a bunch of ideas for Stuart Running gear and I'm anxious to see what they include as I also have the "Stuart-Panzer" that, while decent looking (I think), still sits on top of the old Stuart wheels.

Thank you,

John

The 1/6 scale show at the Entertrainment Junction train center was several weeks ago. Just now getting around to posting about it.

The displays were amazing as always. They outdid themselves this year with a display on 1/6 scale flatbed train cars! The displays and items for sale were WWII German heavy as usual.













A 1/6 display wouldn't be complete without at least one custom Stuart.






Germans, Germans and more Germans....





No idea how heavy this Panzer IV would be.





Here's an example where you surround your terrible 21st Century Kubelwagen with some nice figures and give the vehicle a nice paint job and add some accessories, you can distract from how really far off from a true scale model the Kubel actually is. Still lipstick on the pig.




Almost forgot, there was a war being fought in the pacific too. Finally, a couple of nice Marines mixed in. Couldn't find a Japanese figure with a search warrant.






When's the last time you saw this much 21st Century stuff for sale in one place?






Looks like a lot of work went into this tricked out Little Bird.





STICKER SHOCK!!
Prices took a huge jump this year for some reason. I can't explain it and some of the guys there were discussing the same thing. Don't know if it's greed or if this stuff has become that hard to get? Supply and demand?

The Scout Car and the Command Car were both missing many parts but were still priced $250. Even the Kubel was $95. A few years ago there was a complete new in box Command Car for $225. The guy with the artillery pieces was going for the gold with his prices. Didn't see anyone buying this overpriced stuff. Unlike other years, I came home with only a decal and some sandbags. Didn't see any bargains like in previous years. Greed could really hurt this scale.

tmanthegreat wrote:Fantastic work, tpa05! Did you start that custom project with the Armor Hobbies SdkFz 250? I know from the work I did on mine that they had weak plastic.

Got out my 250 to work on it. Just about have the interior done. Found two more cracks in the plastic body. One is jagged and crumbly. It's a mystery like the brittle 1/18 21st century weapons carriers WC51 and WC63. Got to keep reminding myself to be ever so careful handling it.

Axis Nightmare wrote:

tmanthegreat wrote:Fantastic work, tpa05! Did you start that custom project with the Armor Hobbies SdkFz 250? I know from the work I did on mine that they had weak plastic.

Got out my 250 to work on it. Just about have the interior done. Found two more cracks in the plastic body. One is jagged and crumbly. It's a mystery like the brittle 1/18 21st century weapons carriers WC51 and WC63. Got to keep reminding myself to be ever so careful handling it.

I'm now about 75% through building my third 250 and yup, it too is made from the bad plastic we've heard so much about. Upon opening the box it took about 30 seconds to determine that it too was made from the "bad plastic" and decided right then that ALL flat panels would have to be reinforced. What this also meant is that (unfortunately} many of the pieces would go into the junk pile. Though not happy with having to make this decision, I realized this was the right choice given many of the pieces shattered when tossed into the shoebox less then 3 feet away.

One thing that I have found more and more useful with each 250 I build was the decision to use off-the-shelf plastic signs from Home Depot. You'll notice in the pictures above I used "For Sale/Rent" signs in my first 250 but then found out that (not unlike the 250 itself) that not all plastic(s) are the same. Once I found the right plastic/glue combination and simply "Practicing" how to bend/mold the plastic to conform at places where seperate pieces are joined. This is especially true at the edged areas that don't always match as well as the cracked/broken areas that continued to develop.

Another thing to consider when using the thin plastic off-the-shelf signs is that these can be layered and therefore made even stronger with each layer added.

John

I said a while back I'd post pics of the Sdkfzwtf StuartPanzer (once I found pictures). These were posted prior to the passing of p-bucket and so if they look familiar that's 'cause they are (Translated - man, I'm too lazy to take new pics....)

Here goes...

Buetepanzer !!

I like it !!

While coping with a couple of nagging and very annoying physical issues (Sciatica and cronic sinus issues at the same time) I made a decision to halt any current projects and go back to unfinished, or in this case, barely started projects from the oldest and work forward finishing one at a time. This brought me to my Armor Hobbies 250 halftrack from years ago. It's a terrible kit and it's no wonder they went out of business. In addition to the brittle plastic that cracked with ease, it was bare bones as it gets and devoid of interior detail or what little was there was from someone's imagination. I saw a metal kit that was $1,200 that had all the details this kit was missing. I used pictures of it along with inspiration from the incredibly talented people here as a guide. I was determined to not let this kit defeat me like it had when I put it back in the closet many years ago.

The variations of the 250 are staggering and even within the same version, no two looked the same. Interiors, stowage, lights, tools, everything was different. Each one seemed personalized by their crews. They made field mods likely scavenging from disabled and abandoned vehicles, captured or civilian vehicles and whatever else was wanted for creature comforts and necessities. The vehicles were their mobile homes.

The kit had glaring errors and omissions. There was no instrument panel and the seats were something out of 1960's art deco recliner. I scratch built a panel and scratch built seats out of bits and pieces of scrap plastic, wood, wire and other bits and pieces to better resemble ones in photos I used. there was no transmission case or shifters which are prominent in interior photos so I scratch built representations of those.





That thing in the middle is a kit provided seat. Once assembled, you really can't see the panel or seats well but I couldn't use them and place storage behind the seats like pictures showed, so I replaced them.





With those changes I decided to go all in. I added a bench seat with storage bin, an additional chair seat, fire extinguisher, first aid kit, storage behind the seats, textured non-slip floor strips, hand holds, hooks for hanging gear and scratch built radio equipment for starters.







These pictures were from a week ago. The entire project should be complete this weekend. Photos to follow.

Axis,
Great job so far.
Can't wait to see the completed project!
Razor