Pedrail Landship - The first ever tank…...well, nearly. Gorby gets seriously scratchy again.

[Hutch6390 1,966]

Looking great, Gorby - it's amazing how much difference the small details make.  I'm glad you're back to building, i hope to follow soon - like you, I've had a nasty spell of energy-and-mojo-sapping bugs/infections & stuff, hopefully getting over that now.

[Mr Bowcat 344]

Fantastic work Gorby. I'm trying my hand at some scratch building at the moment (which is not going well) so appreciate just what you have accomplished here.

[Col. 7,046]

This is looking rather fantastic and also quite sensible believable. Nice progress again Gorbs. Hope you're feeling better soon fella.

On 15/01/2023 at 16:14, Gorby said:

..heat and fumes would have ended up filling the tower. As that would be where the officer is likely to be, I assume they'd want him to breath.

You don't want them doing that. The oxygen goes to their heads and they get all giddy then start thinking and having ideas - that's when the trouble starts 

[Gorby 16,287]

Thanks for comments/likes and for the tea and sympathy. Illness has more or less departed, it's just the SAD and the chronic fatigue left now – sympathy not required as I'm used to that and they get me out of working for a living so it's not all bad. 

Before spoiling it all at the colouring-in stage, I thought it needed something else, so I decided to try making some stowage to add a bit more interest. I don't want this to be a prototype, I want to look like it was in use. Oddly enough there isn't much in the way of aftermarket stowage in 1/52.3561 scale….and even if there was I'm too tight to buy it. No choice then but to hack some plastic.

First up, some tools.

     

 

     

     

Other than the last two bits they were made from scrap bits of 1mm thick plastic card. The spanner is from 0.6mm card and the sledge hammer from 1.5mm for the head and stretched sprue for the handle. All together they took me just over an hour to make.

Next, I wanted to have a cable. I have some 0.07mm copper wire – about six foot of that folded a few times and then twisted. The ends were dealt with like this.

 

Then I added a handy storage container for paper clips and other stationary stuff. The things at an angle are spare pads for the Pedrail tracks and I added some spare road wheels as well. The random bits of wood I tried in my last dio…

Covered in PVA soaked single ply tissue it's a quick/easy/cheap way to look like gear covered with a tarp.

 

Then left to dry overnight.

The weight was to get the sledgehammer head to sink into the folded tissue to make it look heavy. 

 

Primed.

 

Posed.

[Mad Steve 19,869]

Man that looks good Gorbs. Excellent work on those tools 

[steelpillow 602]

Fantastic work. Those tools would have taken me at least a week. Still, maybe I should sharpen my scalpel blade up a bit.

You really will need to make out that it is the real McCoy, lie about your references and watch 'em scuttle off tapping intensely into the ABE Books app. Otherwise you'll get no peace at all.

 

[Col. 7,046]

Smart work again Gorbs.

[Hutch6390 1,966]

Superb work 

[Lost Cosmonauts 4,764]

On 28/11/2022 at 16:30, Gorby said:

Good god no. I just like to kid myself that this design is workable to at least a tiny degree.

A very, very tiny degree.

I’m impressed, @Gorby has split the fabric of probability and managed to unlock the smallest quantum unit of feasibility. I propose we the new SI unit for measuring and reporting ludicrousness henceforth in Gorbs. 1 Gorb = 1 land dreadnaught, Luft ‘46 designs vary between 0.1 and 2 Gorbs,   an in-service RAF TSR.2 0.05 Gorbs or 50 mGorbs

[steelpillow 602]

28 minutes ago, Lost Cosmonauts said:

I’m impressed, @Gorby has split the fabric of probability and managed to unlock the smallest quantum unit of feasibility. I propose we the new SI unit for measuring and reporting ludicrousness henceforth in Gorbs. 1 Gorb = 1 land dreadnaught, Luft ‘46 designs vary between 0.1 and 2 Gorbs,   an in-service RAF TSR.2 0.05 Gorbs or 50 mGorbs

Heisenberg's uncertainty principle defines the spread of probabilities. For every property you nail down, there is a complementary property which gets wilder; this is also known as the principle of complementarity.

So something in this model must have been focused down with extraordinary precision. That appears to be the time and trouble which Gorby has gone to in working through its design.

Moral; the harder you work at a what-if and its backstory, the wilder your idea gets.

[Mad Steve 19,869]

2 hours ago, Lost Cosmonauts said:

I’m impressed, @Gorby has split the fabric of probability and managed to unlock the smallest quantum unit of feasibility. I propose we the new SI unit for measuring and reporting ludicrousness henceforth in Gorbs. 1 Gorb = 1 land dreadnaught, Luft ‘46 designs vary between 0.1 and 2 Gorbs,   an in-service RAF TSR.2 0.05 Gorbs or 50 mGorbs

Seconded 

[Jessie_C 10,951]

4 hours ago, Lost Cosmonauts said:

I’m impressed, @Gorby has split the fabric of probability and managed to unlock the smallest quantum unit of feasibility. I propose we the new SI unit for measuring and reporting ludicrousness henceforth in Gorbs. 1 Gorb = 1 land dreadnaught, Luft ‘46 designs vary between 0.1 and 2 Gorbs,   an in-service RAF TSR.2 0.05 Gorbs or 50 mGorbs

This, therefore, must be at least a KiloGorb. And on the same scale, this one is at least 5 KiloGorbs.

[Sprocket 7,969]

Fantastic and inspiring scratch building Gorbs, it's made me take another look at your concept Dalek model from 2021, I'm struck by the lack of Dinner pictures in this project, are you watching your waistline?

[Gorby 16,287]

13 hours ago, Sprocket said:

I'm struck by the lack of Dinner pictures in this project, are you watching your waistline?

The foodie bit was mainly because of the Nigel Heath connection.

 

(It's also that my diet in the winter isn't as healthy. It generally looks more beige than an NHS hearing aid.) 

[Mad Steve 19,869]

6 minutes ago, Gorby said:

It generally looks more beige than an NHS hearing aid.) 

So most of what Greggs sell then 

[Gorby 16,287]

Back again! 

I briefly considered doing it as a night-fighter.

   

Nooooo. I'm having a go at the marbling thing I've seen people do to make a single colour less boring.

It worked okayish but you can't tell that I made the effort from the photos. 

Bugger.

Aaaaannnyyway. As decals are expensive/not available/evil I cut some masks….

 

With the help of my new(ish) SAD lamp.

And no Steve, the lamp isn't sad. 

Notice that the corners aren't masked.

Because I wanted the red & white thingy which is often seen on early Brit tanks.

 

Finally got the fronts of the tracks on. Again, the camera makes my effort to marble look a complete waste of time.

 

If this isn't a prototype it's looks much too clean, so I need to get dirty.

Better. Still not finished messing it up.

 

Last year my arty daughter in law gave me some stuff she no longer needed and the (FREE! ) haul included a sheet of Letteraset. This is the first time I've tried it on a model.

 

Back to manking it up.

I tried this on me Panther and liked the result. First you need to make a complete Pollock of it.

Streaking it down with turps gets it looking grottier than a politicians soul.

 

I saw a good model on Scalemates with some expensive product simulating mud and thought, 'how would a cheapskate achieve a similar effect'. It turns out to be easy….if you already have a vat of pre-baked garden.

The soil I use for dios is quite coarse (the jokes it tells would make a navvy blush) so I sieved it much finer until it was like dust, then mixed with PVA and a little water to taste.

I'm happy with it and it dries rock hard.

 

The decision making procedure which resulted in choosing brown rather than green for the colour was a couple of weeks ago, so the thought process involved is now a mystery, even to me. 

Colour isn't my thing. I've long suffered from a case of cronic colour indifference and as a result I coined the term 'Made-up girlie colours' – colours which have no place amongst humankind.

Cerise? Nope! There is only pink, light pink and dark pink.

Maroon? Nope! It's either red, light red or dark red. Very dark red is allowable at a push.

Azure? Nope! It's blue, light blue or dark blue.

Apple white? No bloody way. Greeny off-white perhaps if you're pushing it. How many 'whites' can you have? (That's a rhetorical question Mr Dulux! )

You get the idea. Lets see if you're on-message. Lets try one more.

Lapis?

Yes!

But only as a precious stone.

Actually this is a bit more complicated than I thought. 

The paint isle at B&Q epitomises the nightmare…...

Cool Concrete, Transcendent, Stone Quary, Welcome Home, Monroe Bisque, Lenox Tan, Putnam Ivory, Celery Salt, Meadow Mist. Gobi Dunes, Cotton Duck, Silk Paper….all stupid names for varying shades of Beige. In the true order of things there should only be Beige, light beige, dark beige and NHS hearing-aid beige.

 

In Gorbyland dealing in illicit colours is contrary to the laws of nature and will be dealt with all the subtlety of a rhino at a Landrover rally. Describing a colour as 'hemp' will get you booked on the chromatic realignment course to ensure that all that fancy colour nonsense is scraped out your brain without delay.

Possession of the following contraband pigments is likely to get you a custodial sentence at the very least:

'Un-teal we meet again' (made by the criminal organisation know as 'Benjamin Moore' (I kid you not, these monstrositys are real))

'Disco nap' (Backdrop Paints)

'Snugglepuss' (again from Benjamin Moore. Hangings too good for them.)

God help you if you're caught with two tins as that'll result in a charge of 'possession with the intent to supply', will likely lead to a last meal and a blindfold.

That was an announcement from the Gorbyland tourist/penal servitude board.

 

Do you think I may have been giving this too much thought? 

 

[Jessie_C 10,951]

So on that note, you painted it 'Most Likely Found in a Diaper'.

[Gorby 16,287]

1 minute ago, Jessie_C said:

'Most Likely Found in a Diaper'.

You might need to register that name because Mr Dulux will pinch it.

[Mad Steve 19,869]

Fantastic Gorbs, that looks stunning 

[Jessie_C 10,951]

1 minute ago, Gorby said:

You might need to register that name because Mr Dulux will pinch it.

I'll let the have it if it's all the same to you.

[steelpillow 602]

26 minutes ago, Jessie_C said:

I'll let the have it if it's all the same to you.

What, as a free sample to plagiarise?

I sent one of those to the NHS a few weeks ago, at their request. They very kindly wrote back and told me I did not have cancer, but I am keeping my fingers crossed for the Humbrol 2024 colour chart.

[Hutch6390 1,966]

That looks terrific, @Gorby , the dotty oily thingy is excellent for jobs like this - good move!  Good tip for the clarts, too (I want to try talcum powder & PVA, coloured with oil paint, just to see).  Brilliant work, mate!