An excellent week last week, lots of excellent builds and interesting subjects. It should be interesting to see what this week has to hold, so could we have your updates please.
All the best,
Paul
I have so many stalled projects on my workbench that I really shouldn't start anything else, but I've been itching to start something for this group build, and I finally broke down last night.
My subject is the OKB Grigorov M109 155mm Self-propelled Howitzer. I've had this kit in the stash for a couple years now, and it looks like a pretty straightforward build compared to some of OKB's more recent releases.
I started out with the wheels, and ran into two issues, one minor and one not-so-minor.
The roadwheels are cleanly moulded, and actually depict the undercut wheel rims. A couple of the wheels suffered from pinholes where they were attached to the moulding blocks, but these were easily fixed. The resin was nice and easy to work with - a lot less brittle than what I've encountered in the past. When I tried assembling an inner and outer roadwheel, the gap between the wheels looked excessive. When I put the assembled roadwheel against the track, the rubber sections were overlapping the end connectors, so I decided I needed to reduce the gap between the wheels. This was easy enough to accomplish by removing the raised boss from the outer wheel, and drilling the hole in the outer wheel a little deeper. I had to be careful when drilling - the first time I manged to pop the hub cap right off the wheel! Fortunately I managed to find the hub cap and reattach it.
Here's a comparison of the wheels before and after the fix:
The bigger issue soon became apparent - the M109 had 14 paired roadwheels, and my kit only provided 12 pairs! I went back and checked the photos I took of the kit contents for On The Way back when I bought it, and sure enough there were only 12 pairs of roadwheels present. This seems to be a recurrent theme with me and OKB Grigorov kits! I didn't have much luck when I contacted OKB in the past, so this time I reached out to Free Time Hobbies, where I'd purchased the kit.
Here's the photo I took when I bought the kit back in June 2014:
I'm going to press on in the hopes I can get replacements for the missing parts.
I used the same process on the idlers to reduce the gap. I had to drill out the holes in the back of the idlers to fit the axles. Similarly, I had to drill out the holes in the inner sprockets. I was impressed with the non-brittle resin when removing the sprockets from their moulding blocks - it was easy to clean up the parts, with no lost teeth! I suspect the width of the sprockets may need to be reduced to match the track. Unfortunately the kit does not provide any tool to help align the inner and outer sprocket halves.
The kit provides separate roadwheel arms, which are a nice detail, but may be a little flimsy to bear the weight of the model. The arms have triangular pins to fit in keyed holes in the hull and ensure the correct alignment. Unfortunately the holes in the hull are too small to accept the pins! I figure I'll drill out the holes in the hull, and use a jig to ensure the correct alignment. I also used a Dremel tool to hollow out most of the turret to reduce the weight.
Still lots to do...correcting the muzzle brake, replacing the simplified and incorrect stowage on the turret, adding detail to the hull, etc., etc.
Will
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