The 20th anniversary build continues. Little amphibian is coming along nicely, has already reached the point beyond my first (ever) attempt, where hull, turret and details were made & put together. Previously, as starting modeler had lost my patience while preparing road wheels and simply let it go. It was a challenge from a start, had no idea about ways of folding card, no idea what glue to use (as a kid had only school glue and used it extensively, but after a while it simply fallen apart) or about tools. Now, two decades later, with little better skill and another copy, could get back to the roots of m hobby and build the model again and also (hopefully) finish it.
Having model standing on it's own wheels means majority of hard work was done. Next step was preparation of tracks, which are laser cut tracks. It costs price of the model itself, but giving time required for assembly and result of design provided within the kit, it was completely justified. Tracks come as 3 parts, to be punched out of pre-cut sheet and glued together. It surprisingly taken only few hours of assembly and few minutes of painting (no weathering necessary as it is to be a standard build). Tracks are textured, made out of 1 mm card, quite easy to form as well (if done properly, at several places should have done better fold, some details simply split off). When assembled and painted, tracks were put under road wheels first to line them up then bent over front & rear wheels and joined on top.
Assembly instruction may suggest different building order, but I thought about easy access to wheels during track fitting, hence left fenders/floaters until all chassis was done. It was good call after all, had plenty space and easy access to all wheels. Fenders/floaters were not easy parts to assemble, long straight edges may cause a lot of problem when folding, sometimes if handled incorrectly, folding may leave creases that don't look good. Ready fenders/floaters were fitted to the hull. Base of the turret was built next, grooves for driver visors were cut out. To give visors little depth, I cut plastic tube, capped all visors from inside and painted dark grey (Citadel Charadon Granite). Now it looks better than looking inside the model and seeing white fields or even painted surface or seeing through. Other hull details were assembled after, small box behind turret base (part 12) was cut tab free, small frame cut out and replaced with jewelery mesh. Rear hatches were also cut out, fitted with handles and glued to the hull. Pipe (don't know it's purpose) was cut out of copper wire sleeve.
Other detailed followed, but extra attention had to put to exhaust and its cover. Here I came across parts that could not fit, were too large - in this case cutting down is easier than adding up. The muffler had greater diameter than the cover (parts 20). Cover comes as 3 parts, frame, 'mesh' and color-inside part. Color inside part was 2 - 3 mm longer than frame and mesh - part after assembly, it was to be U - shaped and muffler inserted inside. Could not work out how to properly fit it as there is very few assembly drawings, and text description does not exactly explain this either. I cut out the excess (white sticking out tab, shown in left pic). Because that the muffler did not fit under so had to change it's diameter. It did not turn out bad, especially when added up layer of jewelery mesh. As previously, pipe was done using wire sleeve.
Remaining details took surprisingly long time, 4 hours to assemble light, visor, horn (?) and four hooks. I scratch built the light, using door buffer & paper clip wire. Visor was assembled out of parts provided within the kit, but small piece of copying foil was glued to front plate, which previously had cut out a small square. All details were fitted after paint application to main hull.
Turret had some fitting faults, especially with shapers inside, top & bottom, parts were simply too large, so had to cut on inside of black line. Apart from that everything fitted nicely with no other problems. Because card of this kit was quite old (20 years after all!) it split when shaped round or rolled, that is why I decided to build 20 mm gun (prototype was never fitted with such weapon) from scratch (part 53). Thought about using tube from emptied pen, but it turned out to be to thick. Decided to copy a part to paper and simply roll it. After assembly it was painted using Citadel Catachan Green. Barrel was glued to previously prepared mantle, crown shaped, rolled in tube and bent inside & fitted to he turret. Renaming hatches (top & rear) were fitted to the turret which was left unglued, turning on a peg. That completed my anniversary build, 20 years after starting I finally finished my first model. Maly Modelarz is the cheapest on the market, has some faults, but realized for such price it can be assembled into really enjoyable model.
The 20th anniversary build continues. Little amphibian is coming along nicely, has already reached the point beyond my first (ever) attempt, where hull, turret and details were made & put together. Previously, as starting modeler had lost my patience while preparing road wheels and simply let it go. It was a challenge from a start, had no idea about ways of folding card, no idea what glue to use (as a kid had only school glue and used it extensively, but after a while it simply fallen apart) or about tools. Now, two decades later, with little better skill and another copy, could get back to the roots of m hobby and build the model again and also (hopefully) finish it.
Having model standing on it's own wheels means majority of hard work was done. Next step was preparation of tracks, which are laser cut tracks. It costs price of the model itself, but giving time required for assembly and result of design provided within the kit, it was completely justified. Tracks come as 3 parts, to be punched out of pre-cut sheet and glued together. It surprisingly taken only few hours of assembly and few minutes of painting (no weathering necessary as it is to be a standard build). Tracks are textured, made out of 1 mm card, quite easy to form as well (if done properly, at several places should have done better fold, some details simply split off). When assembled and painted, tracks were put under road wheels first to line them up then bent over front & rear wheels and joined on top. 
Assembly instruction may suggest different building order, but I thought about easy access to wheels during track fitting, hence left fenders/floaters until all chassis was done. It was good call after all, had plenty space and easy access to all wheels. Fenders/floaters were not easy parts to assemble, long straight edges may cause a lot of problem when folding, sometimes if handled incorrectly, folding may leave creases that don't look good. Ready fenders/floaters were fitted to the hull. Base of the turret was built next, grooves for driver visors were cut out. To give visors little depth, I cut plastic tube, capped all visors from inside and painted dark grey (Citadel Charadon Granite). Now it looks better than looking inside the model and seeing white fields or even painted surface or seeing through. Other hull details were assembled after, small box behind turret base (part 12) was cut tab free, small frame cut out and replaced with jewelery mesh. Rear hatches were also cut out, fitted with handles and glued to the hull. Pipe (don't know it's purpose) was cut out of copper wire sleeve.
Other detailed followed, but extra attention had to put to exhaust and its cover. Here I came across parts that could not fit, were too large - in this case cutting down is easier than adding up. The muffler had greater diameter than the cover (parts 20). Cover comes as 3 parts, frame, 'mesh' and color-inside part. Color inside part was 2 - 3 mm longer than frame and mesh - part after assembly, it was to be U - shaped and muffler inserted inside. Could not work out how to properly fit it as there is very few assembly drawings, and text description does not exactly explain this either. I cut out the excess (white sticking out tab, shown in left pic). Because that the muffler did not fit under so had to change it's diameter. It did not turn out bad, especially when added up layer of jewelery mesh. As previously, pipe was done using wire sleeve.
Remaining details took surprisingly long time, 4 hours to assemble light, visor, horn (?) and four hooks. I scratch built the light, using door buffer & paper clip wire. Visor was assembled out of parts provided within the kit, but small piece of copying foil was glued to front plate, which previously had cut out a small square. All details were fitted after paint application to main hull.
Turret had some fitting faults, especially with shapers inside, top & bottom, parts were simply too large, so had to cut on inside of black line. Apart from that everything fitted nicely with no other problems. Because card of this kit was quite old (20 years after all!) it split when shaped round or rolled, that is why I decided to build 20 mm gun (prototype was never fitted with such weapon) from scratch (part 53). Thought about using tube from emptied pen, but it turned out to be to thick. Decided to copy a part to paper and simply roll it. After assembly it was painted using Citadel Catachan Green. Barrel was glued to previously prepared mantle, crown shaped, rolled in tube and bent inside & fitted to he turret. Renaming hatches (top & rear) were fitted to the turret which was left unglued, turning on a peg. That completed my anniversary build, 20 years after starting I finally finished my first model. Maly Modelarz is the cheapest on the market, has some faults, but realized for such price it can be assembled into really enjoyable model.
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