Sprocket

The turret basket now rotates with the turret

When I was in the Gulf I was always worried about tank drivers getting trapped if the gun barrel was over his hatch and the tank was on fire, You can see he can't get out back through the turret basket there is so much machinery in the way. if that hatch is jammed by the gun it's nightmares all round.

This is the area under the Centurion main gun, the sectioning has cut right through the main electrical junction box under the trunnions.

I'm doing a bit more on the interior parts, bonding the turret basket supports to the turret ring this bulkhead is the ammo store forward next to the driver, I'm not going to drill holes in it, I have some pe shell bases that I'm going to add to that in neat rows. All British AFV interiors are painted dull silver, except lend lease tanks like Grant and Sherman that were painted white in American factories, where a vehicle was burned out, and recovered for a refit by a British base workshop, it was repainted Silver inside as per British practice. This area on a sectio

adding some cables to the turret using the chieftains hatch video for ref, he's standing in the way most of the time but there's enough for what I need.

Yes I'm bolstering the mount to hold it, but first I placed the tip on the wrong way around, shame really as I liked that look, but it should look like this. the bogies fitted and the bump stops that fit between each.

nothing else is glued, the major components are fitted then tested for the scratch internal parts I'm making up, the breech needs building at the back end. Then I'll take it all apart again and add the running gear to the hull.

The Aber barrel needs to be assembled right away as I need to use the kit barrel for the breech tube inside the turret. a very nice looking component. almost a shame to paint it green. some engineering needed to keep it in the mantlett as it's quite heavy compared to the plastic kit horror. let that rest while the glue dries.

track painting for this is going to be really important, as a cold war warrior this beast would have been well maintained by it's proud and dedicated crew, who must have felt a bit elite. So working track, elsewhere, semi shiny eggshell finish, not gloss of course, but well looked after. This close detail view shows a replacement track link not as weathered as the rest.

I went and had a look at a real one today at the Tank Museum in Dorset, I've taken a series of pictures that I'll be using for reference during the build, I have to bear in mind that the kit is a Mk2 and the Exhibit at Bovington is a Mk1. Still this detail view of a section of track gives me some colour reference

building a massive breech block for the gun as it's not in the kit.

Thanks for the interest guys, the extractor is for the main gun spent shells cases, But I have two turret baskets to make as the commander has his own mini turret, this was part of a new advanced fire control system where the commander could seek another target while the gunner engaged the previous one. Ive started making the turret lift system for ejecting the cases, lot more to do there... I made the engine bulkhead and fitted an extractor fan, this won't be visible from the turret hatch, but I'll put in an access panel there too

Before I fit any of the running gear to the hull I need to scratch build the part of the interior that can be seen through the open commanders hatch, so that's the commanders position, and the mullens auto ejection system and the massive gun breech. So making a few rough sketches to see where all the parts I'm making from plasticard go in relation to each other, It's complex down in there, at least that is the impression I want to achieve. the kit hull will give me the size of the space I have to fill with the lift tray and breech. but I'll start with the engine bulkhead

nice to know there's still new stuff coming out from them, I always found it odd that the PT Boats had an odd flak gun to Starboard side, but not one on the Port side. That would look nice in a snazzy Pacific cam scheme.

yes, you're right there Warren. You have to expect a large repetitive parts count on a modern AFV kit, that T62 I built from Tamiya had all the suspension molded on as part of the hull, so If I wanted to show the wheels on uneven terrain, well forget it, I could alter the angles of these bogies to show the tank going over an obstacle, it would be complicated though. Lucky for me I'm doing this on level ground. sub assemblies stacking up, I've joined 4 of the 16 road wheels together so far.