HobbyBoss Pz.Kpfw. VI Tiger I 1:16

More good reference

Before I start I would like to mention that I added the excellent volume ‘Tiger I and Sturmtiger, in detail’ by Culvert and Feist to the References list. I picked this copy up at a show, and have never seen such a visually useful volume on a subject before, it’s great for anyone contemplating a Tiger build.

Due to having ‘work’ done at Smith Towers, I have not been able to do any serious amount of modelling of any sort, so I’ve been nibbling at bits and pieces, when at our club. This has been the Commander’s cupola, the MG 34, the jacking block, and modifying the driver’s vision slit, and more Zimmeriting…

Commander’s cupola

We left the build at the stage where I had added periscope blocks to the commander’s cupola, What I did not realise was that when the blocks were fitted, a plasticard ‘fillet’ would have to be added in front of each of the blocks as there was a large gap not present on the real one.

With the blocks made and the cupola mods and welds added, this was put to one side for painting later.

The excellent commander’s MG 34 comes in two halves split down its length for some reason, but when assembled actually builds into a very nice piece,

… unlike the very simplistic gun on the front of the tank, which looks poor in comparison. It has a hollow groove running the length of the barrel which looks awful, so I cyano’d a piece of electrical cable into it, and cleaned it up; it will be fine now.

The kit part for the gun ball mount is flat, and so looks odd and very ‘front and square’, so I wanted to create a ball-shaped mount, and started looking for some material to do this. The solution was a piece of scrap resin attached to a 1:25 scale figure that I shaped into a slight radius and then drilled and glued into place slightly angled.

Vision scope and block…