1/16 German Pz.Kpfw. IV Ausf. H Medium Tank - Trumpeter

[Thomas_M]

Yeah! That´s right!! April 2061, maybe...

[Thomas_M]

The box itself is as large as a suitcase! Inside there are four boxes comprising the sprues. I marked each one with the letter of the sprues inside each box. I try to work organised, so I will have to open each box hundreds of times...



There are this many different parts to assemble, this many sections of this tank, that I leave my organisation and work on those parts I like to when being on the bench. Organisation? Pffttt....



There are parts I am excited to see the detail given to them, finest weld seams, nuts, bolts, and so on. Then, there are parts I cannot understand at all why such simple parts have been moulded in more than one part. Raising the total parts count?

Many mould seams have to be erased, many more than I would have expected from a new kit. I only did a few parts as seen above, but not few of them needed filler to get rid of part´s mismatch. You see that I rarely have used filler on other kits when I tell you that my trusty Tamiya filler has got this hard I can stand on it with my feet to get a little bit out of the tube... Gladly we have other fillers around the bench.

Waiting for some new colours now. My hobby shop took three days to handle my order, with DHL having spend two more days to get it over to me, hopefully today... The more those posties raise their prices the slower they get...

[LyleW]

That is what we'd call a "boatload" of parts. Methinks you should put them all in a wash tub and shake them up!

[Thomas_M]

Just a few pictures to keep you entertained!

Had to post those two pictures on my Facebook page for all interested (Trumpeter, do you listen?). I cannot understand why some one there in China got seven (7) ejection nodes onto the detailed side of a single part, leaving the back side empty and clean??? Front side, visible later:



Back side, to be glued to the gearbox later:



Get it? Man, I wished I could the responsible designer for this stupidity!

[Thomas_M]

There also is a good example that it could be favourite to read and understand a kit´s instructions before glueing! Don´t follow this in step 42 on page 45:



Why? Because glueing part G47 to part F2 here will make it impossible to add part F6 in step 44 later! F6 has to go between F2 and G47!
Did anybody at Trumpeter actually build this kit according to such instructions?

BTW: almost no colour information is given to the tank´s interior parts. Sigh...

[Thomas_M]

Came upon another incident when working on the Maybach engine:





See the missing fit of the hose to the round part? Man, who designs such a crap?
Another job for Magic Sculp later...

[Thomas_M]

The tracks are rather large in 1/16 scale, even the small ones of a Panzer IV. They are nicely moulded and will be fully free to move later! I like that!



Will be fun to clean up and assemble 99 track links per side! Kind of...

[Thomas_M]

Assembling parts C43 and C44 left a nasty gap where they met. Thought about to add some filler, to be sanded a day later. Then I decided to hide the seam by using 0.2mm plastic stock instead:


Tamiya tape still in place to hold the plastic sheet while the glue sets.


Finished!

[Thomas_M]

The tanks gearbox, a wonderful piece full of detail!



A generator?



The PE part is a heat shield for the exhaust of this small auxiliary engine attached to it:

[Thomas_M]

The tank´s Maybach HL 120 TRM engine in the works:







Looking at those pictures it is remarkable that nothing is left to be seen from all the seam cleaning, filling, sanding and fitting of dozens of dozens of parts. In the end this project is lot´s of fun, maybe because I still have hundreds of parts to assemble.

My special thanks to DHL Germany, who could not manage to deliver a parcel with colours and stuff from northern Germany to my doorstep in two full days!