Movie stars: A pair of Shermans.

[ShaunW]

Thanks for the info re the white paint, sounds just the ticket for those tricky to do worn winter schemes. Fury is coming together very nicely indeed.

[PaulBradley]

Looks terrific, Steve!

Happy New Year to you and yours.

[Softscience]

Nice furry, Steve.

One thing to be mindful of, is that Tamiya thinks, the Sherman can be steered by instruments. If you're going to build a tank on the move, maybe open up the periscope flaps on the hatches.

[flakmonkey]

Thanks again for looking.

Taking a break from a Tamiya Supra that somehow found its way onto the bench, I have spent a marathon session on the Fury model, concentrating on the stowage items and other accoutrements.

Some of the items are quite unique and not available as off the shelf items, so you have to make them. Items such as the somewhat distressed 5 gallon oil drum hanging off the back right fender. A quick check of Hannants revealed that nobody makes a somewhat distressed 5 gallon drum in 1/35, and so out came the litho plate.



That's a reasonable starting point. Just a piece of litho plate with the stiffening ribs created by scoring from the reverse side with a ballpoint pen. Simple but quite effective. That was then wrapped around a suitable former (a pencil) and glued together.

Some distressing later...



Job's a good 'un.

Next, I gathered together my collection of mostly home made stowage items and began to aarange them in layers, as per the original. there are three layers in the stack of items on the engine deck. I carefully studied pictures of the real thing and I think I have it reasonably close to what one can see on screen. Bear in mind that the arrangement of items does change a little from scene to scene, presumably as things fell off and were reattached.









Around the front, I have attached a road wheel (not a Sherman road wheel, and neither is the one on the real thing), the five spare track links, and the hood ornament draped over the left hand side light.



The hood ornament is a modern US "Fritz" helmet modified with Milliput to more closely resemble a German WW2 helmet, with a gas mask fashioned from Milliput and a piece of sprue for a filter canister.

One thing to be mindful of, is that Tamiya thinks, the Sherman can be steered by instruments. If you're going to build a tank on the move, maybe open up the periscope flaps on the hatches.

I was aware of this issue with the kit, but it will be built all hatches open, and occupied by this fine assortment of small men...



Next job will be to permantly attach the engine deck stowage, with the interleaved tarpaulins as seen in the film. The fun never ends.

[David Silver]

Fantastic work on the Fury FM, I love that you have made so much yourself but what is the litho plate that you mentioned? And now for something that may seem a little ironic, you bought a Tamiya Sherman to build Fury with and I bought the Italeri Fury to build a Sherman, I wanted a Sherman and the Italeri Fury kit was the cheapest on ebay at the time

[jssel]

Great work Flak.

[flakmonkey]

Thank you, gentlemen.

what is the litho plate that you mentioned?

It's an annealed aluminium alloy sheet about 10 thou thick that is used to create the embossed plates for lithogrphic printing. A similar product can be found in craft shops for embossing. It's a very handy modeling material which seems to have fallen out of favour these days.

[bassman]

This was Fury when I visited Bovington in 2017. Ik guess this the version you are making?

[Cardinal]

Pretty good work so far. It looks heavy and battle tested.

[ShaunW]

Great work, that is really looking the part. I recall litho plate featuring in more advanced builds than mine back in the days before PE became all the rage.

[B4en]

Excellent stowage work as always Flak. I love the gas mask and helmet!

[flakmonkey]

Thanks again for looking in.

All the stowage on the Fury model is now completed. There really is a lot of it.





I opened up one of the ration boxes, and put in some cans made from sprue and painted with Vallejo chrome. I also rebuilt the radio antenna using various guages of wire so that I could get a more realistic bend at the sprung section. What appears to be a carelessly discarded M3 Grease Gun is in fact, strategically placed and it belongs to our friend, Grady the tank's loader, who is riding shotgun on the rear deck ready to man the Ma Deuce in case of an emergency.





He is from the MiniArt US Tank Crew Special Edition set, which really is a super set. The figures are well posed and beautifully sculpted, especially the faces, and the special edition set gives you another two sprues of accessories and greatly improved tanker helmets. There's even a 40s vintage 35mm camera in there, and a new decal sheet which provides rank insignia and the 2AD shoulder flashes that Fury's crew wears. All this for the price of a single resin figure. Excellent value.

The next job, then, is to paint the figures.

This was Fury when I visited Bovington in 2017. Ik guess this the version you are making?

That's the one, yes. Or at least, as close as I can get it.

[JamesPerrin]

Looks like they’ve packed for a weekend away with the kids. Impressive work

[flakmonkey]

Looks like they’ve packed for a weekend away with the kids. Impressive work

I hope everybody has been to the toilet before they set off.

A brief update today gentlemen, in which we meet the crew.



From left to right; Wardaddy, Gordo, Bible, Machine, and Coonass. Kind of.

As always with MiniArt, the figures are magnificent. If only they could paint themselves to the same standard.

[Clashcityrocker]

A fine looking crew.

Nigel