Maddog Manufacturing Production for 2019

[Stikpusher]

Well I heard that T-64s were always breaking down early in their service life, if you have one of those... perfect for a lowboy trailer...

[Duke Maddog]

I do have a T-64 BV already built; I'm not sure how early a version it is though. Still, if it's a T-64, then it probably still had enough issues to be on one. Now I just need to find a lowboy trailer that I can add to the back of the MAZ to pull this thing.

[Stikpusher]

The BV was late Cold War, mid 80’s and beyond when the Soviets started adding the ERA bricks to their best MBTs.
Another thought for a tank on the back is a T-55 or T-62 leaving Afghanistan in the Soviet withdrawal.

[Duke Maddog]

Excellent ideas Carlos. I do have a couple T-55's done. Still, I need to source a trailer! So far, neither Takom or Modelcollect does a trailer by itself. Until then, this beastie ain't pulling any loads!

[Stikpusher]

Strange.... you would think if they make a truck tractor, that they’d make something for it to pull...

[Duke Maddog]

Strange.... you would think if they make a truck tractor, that they’d make something for it to pull...

I know! Right?

I just found out that Takom does have a model of one of these same tractors coming out in a kit WITH a trailer AND a load! So, what's up with that?

[Stikpusher]

What’s up with that? With all those goodies? Why they want your money, of course...

Believe you me... as soon as I start my DD Sherman conversion project one day, Tamiya, or Academy, or Italeri, or Taska/Asuka will come out with one in 1/35 styrene as soon as I am about to complete it.... that’s my luck on these sorts of projects....

[Medicman71]

What’s up with that? With all those goodies? Why they want your money, of course...

Believe you me... as soon as I start my DD Sherman conversion project one day, Tamiya, or Academy, or Italeri, or Taska/Asuka will come out with one in 1/35 styrene as soon as I am about to complete it.... that’s my luck on these sorts of projects....

I feel your pain. Every time I start a kit, GWH, Kitty Hawk, Kinetic, Tamiya or Z-M come out with a better kit of the same thing. My F-4 being on of them.

[Duke Maddog]

It's been a slow week for me so here's a small update on what I got done at Hobby Day.

I'll start with my armor.

The Italian Trattore had a missing cab which I finally found. I quickly got this glued into place on the chassis before I lost it again:



Later I'll be adding the windows and gloss coat for decals.

Moving on, I got the last resin parts added to the M-51 turret:



I then added all the resin stowage parts to the left side of the tank:



Had to wait for that to dry before I could go do the other side....

Since I was doing an Israeli vehicle, the next project I worked on was the Nagmachon. I got all the suspension parts on as well as some other detail parts. I had also started to fill those crazy gaps:



Gonna refine those fills later. Meanwhile, I pulled out my Centurion tank and added all the photo-etch on the hull:



I also finished all the detail parts and the turret stowage basket on the Italian Centauro:





Now this one is ready for all the photo etch parts.

After this, I started two more small vehicles; hoping to get a few more 'easy' projects done. This first one is the T-Models M-1114 armored HUMVEE. The suspension was finally done after several puzzling test fits on each of the 20+ parts just to figure out what the instructions were trying to tell me:



That was so difficult I stopped there; reminiscing on the simplicity of the Dragon suspension assembly!

The next project I started was another of the ACE Digital design kits: the V-100 armored car. They had me start with the tiny turret. I placed an Exacto blade next to it so you could see how tiny this is:



Next was the sparse interior which wasn't going to be seen anyway:



After that, I turned it over to add the suspension:



With all that done, there was nothing left to do but close up the hull:







Finally the last thing I worked on was the Space Shuttle Shelf Queen. I started out with what I felt was the hardest part: scratchbuilding a forward bracket for the front of the Shuttle. I tried to make this in such a way that the Shuttle would be able to 'snap' into place so I could remove it from the fuel tank for transport. This is also why I made it a bit longer than the lower one:



Also, the vertical tail comes off for transport. Now it fits in one of my flat tubs.

With a little finagling, I was successful with that forward bracket; this beastie snaps into place well. After that, I finished painting and detailing the exhaust bells and then mounted them on the shuttle. They actually have more steel-colored metal showing which the pic does not reflect. The copper colored appearance was my attempt to make these look like they'd been weathered/burned in a previous launch:



Finally, I unmasked the windscreen and upper windows and touched up the edges:



I could finally call this Shelf Queen done! Eventually, I will finish the payloads that came with this model so I can lay them out as a display around the base of this shuttle.

Okay, that's completes this tour of the plant! Thanks all for coming in, comments are always welcome.

[Medicman71]

Very nice!! A Space Shuttle kit is on my do get list eventually.