Hät U.S. Tank Riders 8265 - Riding a Frankenstein

Hät U.S. Tank Riders 8265 – Riding a Frankenstein

Just for fun… any resemblance to reality is purely coincidental !!!!

First of all, i was inspired after see this work from a big brother of scale.

Also i was interested in show this new set in a original way… so… i took a look to my spare box.. and begin to ideate a monster…

An engineering exercise taking care of the spare box… 🙂

It took to me 4 days to assemble all the parts, a lot of cut, sand, glue and green stuff (putty)…
There are a lot of parts which i don’t know where come from, but more noticeable ones such turret and tracks come from an Armourfast Achilles (Tracks are cut, a bit more than half), some other parts are from unknown models, such lower turret, body chassis (also cut, and was very difficult to join the two parts again) and many little details. Legs are also done with the Armourfast set, a lot of cut needed here…
Wires in the legs are from an old computer from the work…
Exhaust in the rear part are from a Tiger I i guess… but lateral ones are also unknown for me… (So many unknow parts are because some time ago i brought a huge lot of spare parts in Ebay)

The MGs in the turret are from a recent acquisition… a Dragon set with a lot of options an extra weapons…

2 MG, 1 40mm gun (lower turret) and 1 powerful 155mm gun…

The ammunition belt is one of my favourite parts, it’s done with links from a Tiger I and munitions from a Hasegawa 31102 M2 155mm Gun “Long Tom” set… (I need to buy new ones, as the Long Tom is already done… but need crew and munition 🙂 )

A full view… an strange silhouette have been seen in the horizon… German report.

So this beast is armed with a 155mm gun… capable to fire at an extraordinary rate… although the reload operation took some time… 🙂
The lower turret (unknown) is armed with a 40mm (QF 2 pdr) gun from a Churchill tank, probably a 1/76 matchbox one, so it looks under 40mm… maybe we can say it is a 20mm gun. 😉

A lot of problems trying to make a smooth surface, not achieved, and a beautiful ammunition belt.

The cokes detail is made with a Milk box from the HO scale… hand painted.. but i avoid to put all the brand name… i don’t want to advertise nobody for nothing 😀 , so Coke men, if you like it i’m ready to get an sponsorship… :):)

Some cokes to drink after the work… maybe heated so close to motor… 🙂

About the figures, well, these are not the complete poses, still 4 more poses came in the set, including 2 tank crews…
These figures are a good idea… for my next project a will show how they fit perfectly other things that aren’t tanks… but detail… well… they aren’t the worst, but weapons, faces and feet are poorly detailed… anyway i like this set, and also the other riders set released by Hät, but all have the same problems. Even this, they are a better option than the usual hard plastic figures which comes with the models… the only i guess is some driver for trucks, Jeeps and so, which are not included in those sets. 🙁

This guy is thinking in his coke… behind him there is a hand made detail with tissue paper…

About colour scheme this time a variate a bit my colours for the figures, but i like more y previous U.S infantry figures. This time i used Vallejo Brown Violet instead of green and Vallejo Khaki instead of Citadel Commando Khaki. The brown trousers are painted with Vallejo Olive Drab. All washed with Devlan Mud and highlighted with white mixes and a final touch of Vallejo Iraqi Sand.
The “tank” is painted as always, grey primed and the Tamiya Spray paint. To retouch it i used Vallejo Panzer Series Olive Green. Washed mainly with Citadel Devlan Mud and some pigments.

You can buy the U.S riders here.

I took a lot of pictures because i was trying artificial illumination, as those days is impossible to take pictures with natural light.