Much of the construction is done. I assembled the tracks and running gear at this point, as I will prime the tank black and the side skirts cover most of the lower hull, which thus will not really be visible from normal angles.
The GPS antenna on the turret rear was made from scratch with the size and positioning being guesstimated from two photos I´ve found. It might actually be sitting a little too low, but I can´t say for sure.
The turret has a lot of ERA, giving a nice contrast to the textured base of the turret. The radiation cladding wasn´t textured to differenciate it from the rest of the turret. I also made some minor damage to the side skirts which have yet to be fitted with ERA blocks. Additionally some detail also remain to be added.
PE parts and the unditching log were added to the vehicle... I plan to do the log in the green base-colour but prominently chipped to reveal the underlying wood.
A goo shot of the lefthand side of the turret: The scratchbuilt part and the tarps are well visible here... while I am definetly not a proper sculptor, I am satisfied with the results, as the filled up some "empty" space on the turret nicely.
Side ERA panels are still missing, as they will be painted seperately to make sure I can reach all the parts of the rubber side skirts and paint them accordingly.
I painted the side skirts and rubber tires and then proceeded to highlight several panels on the tank using acrylics. Specifically on the ERA it nicely sets apart the individual bricks, although just a bit more contrast wouldn´t have hurt the model to be honest... 🙂
The stowage items have also been painted and recieved some subtle highlighting. I decided to paint the tarp on top of one of the tent-rolls in a very light color to give the turret-area some visual interest. A wash helped to bring a little more depth to the vehicle
As I wanted the tank to be weathered in a very dusty fashion, I mixed an earthy dust tone from Tamiya paints. After putting a coat of chipping varnish on, I sprayed that colour onto the lower parts of the vehicle.
The result may again not be 100% optimal, but it gives a nice rendition of old dust/dirt layers that have dried, been washed/rubbed off or just chipped away.
On the side skirts attention was paid to have some vertical "streaks". This duting gives me a good direction of where to build up the additional weathering using enamels
Note that some of the high-traffic areas on the hull also got a light dust layer. Again more will be added with enamels. Chippping will be rather subtle and oriented around the directions the chipped dust gives for it - which is the reason I didn´t do it before on this one.
The T-72 SIM-1 is a Georgian upgrade of the T-72A, consisting of a Polish optical sight and a new communication system among others. The vehicles were ordered in 2006 and participated in the conflicts of 2008.
The kit is an offering by Modelcollect including a cast lower hull, link-and-lenth tracks as well as some photoetch. The instructions give one overall dark yellow-ish option, which seems incorrect, as I only saw plain green and camoflaged vehicles on original pictures. Additionally, the instructions make you put a stowage bin on the right side of the turret, which agiain - judging from the references I found - does not seem to belong there. Instead I put the snorkel there (don´t know if this is correct either :/). Most importantly however, the SIM-1 has a antenna-like "thingy" at the rear of the turret, which from what I´ve gathered seemy to belong to a GPS navigational system. As reference photos on the internet where limited and I do not have the option to take measurements of one of these vehicles myself, I roughly guessimated the antennas position etc. and built it from styrene.
Also, some armour-texture was added with MR Surfacer 500 (the stinky stuff - do NOT sniff).
Then again I went away from the reference pictures slightly by adding a tarp and a tent roll made from Milliput onto the turret.
Dave Flitton
Tom B.
