I decided to finish a 5 year old (I think?) shelfqueen for one of the local GBs held by our IPMS. This is the Academy M3 Stuart “Honey”. Built her OOB, knowing she has quite a few issues.
I painted the fender tricolor in the wrong position. The box art has it in the right place, but the decal sheet is wrong. Forgot about this but decided to live with it.
I used British Light Stone instead of Portland Stone by mistake for the yellow, but the shade is close enough for me.
Thanks Don! I actually think you do an awesome job on weathering your model AFVs I find it helpful to look at reference photos not only for the technical aspects of the kit but also for how to weather them. I Panzermeister36 did an excellent job explaining how he does this for his stuff:
Thanks Rick! I feel great joy in finally finishing kits that have been laying around for ages in my stash - it also frees up space to get newer and better kits.
Looks very nice. So much controversy on which colors to use for Caunter scheme. I think these look fine. A question for any and all. When would a gun barrel have some powder black at the muzzle? Never? only with a muzzle brake? always?
Thanks Carlos Honestly, I value good fit and engineering more than accuracy nowadays - just as long as there aren’t any overly egregious errors in the dimensions and other details of the vehicle. That’s probably why I like Tamiya and Academy kits so much!
Thanks Jack! From what I can remember - black powder/residue on the end of a muzzle break almost never happens in in-service vehicles. I can’t recall seeing a photo of a tank with that kind of soot on the barrel so I don’t apply them on my kits There are probably exceptions though.
Thanks Peter! This is my first vehicle painted in Caunter as well - I would like to get some practice before doing the same scheme on more valuable kits like the newer Tamiya Matilda
In W.W. 2 they did not use black powder. It had been replaced by newer types of gunpowder beginning at the end of the 19th century. With black powder you could get residue, but not with the more modern types. Discoloration at the muzzle or muzzle brake was caused by heat from firing the gun and residue left from the crew cleaning the gun barrel. It tended to darken the paint in these areas. I like to add a very light wash of dark brown or dark grey to this area to simulate that affect if needed. But it certainly isn’t necessary as not all tanks show discoloration in this area.
Regards,Bob
I never fired a tank main gun or artillery piece. But I did fire plenty of small arms ammunition- old & new, pistol, rifle, and automatic weapons up to .50 cal. Not to mention WWII production ammo for some of the firearms of that era that I own. All of the military ammo that I’ve fired left plenty of carbon staining around the muzzles, flash suppressor or not, and of course around the actions.
I would ageee with this. Lots of people claim modern smokeless powder doesn’t leave residue, but I too have shot lots of new production and milsurp ammo out of my ww2 era guns and all leave a black residue.
If you wipe your hand around the muzzle on a gun you’ve shot a lot without cleaning it your hand will be stained black so I imagine a bit of black residue around tank gun muzzles did occur
Not gonna lie - this is on my to-wish list. I just can’t find it available at a reasonable price locally though (from PH) - gotta love the early-war fascination with multi turrets though. You did an excellent job as always
I find it helpful to look at reference photos not only for the technical aspects of the kit but also for how to weather them. I Panzermeister36 did an excellent job explaining how he does this for his stuff:
Accuracy issues or not, it looks good!
