Small Scale Military Headquarters

Hi folks,

Just got back from a KB where I found an Action-grade Forces of Valor 1:32 Sherman for $16. Pretty good deal. You might have seen in another thread that I'm looking for some die-cast metal vehicles my son can play with, and cheaper FOV stuff looks like it might fit the bill.

Here's the thing: the turret sticks when moving through the forward position (0 degrees) -- badly. It turns left and right easily enough, but when coming back through it's initial forward position, it requires quite a lot of force (more than my son can muster) to 'snap' it through a full revolution. Is this normal for the FOV Sherman and/or for all the FOV armor?

Thanks,

-Harrigan

I can't speak for the FOV Sherman exactly, but I have had stiff spots with turret rotation on a couple of other FOV tanks. Specifically, these were the Matilda Mk II (action grade) and the M1A1 Abrams (Enthusiast) as well as some on the T-34. They did not cause me too much trouble, and yours sounds like a bad case...

There are a few remedies. The easiest would be to turn the turret around in the socket a number of times to wear it down and perhaps loosen it. However, if you really want to get creative, you can detach the bottom hull piece using a small phillips screwdriver, then detach the turret from the upper hull piece and file down the edges of the hole that the turret fits into. The turret probably has an upper and lower piece, which should unscrew. (I have never actually done this with an FOV tank, but similar procedures have worked with 21st Century 32x tanks and those, I would imagine, have a similar construction to FOV tanks.) Hope this helps!

harrigan,

I had the same exact problem. What you need to do is unscrew the hull from the upper body (4 screws) and then unscrew the turret from the upper body (3 screws).

At the 12 o'clock position on the turret botton there is a small tab that gets stuck in a slot on the 12 o'clock position on the upper body. I guess that is there to keep the turret facing forward?

Anyways, just clip that little tab off of the bottom of the turret piece and then lightly file the edges of the turret bottom (the piece with the three screws in it). That's all that you need to do.

I hope this helps you.

C2000