Beekster's tank destroyers

[Beekster]

Thought I'd share these as well.  All but the Charioteer are twelve to fifteen years old; the Charioteer dates from about six years ago.  First up, a Canadian M10 in Italy:  Academy kit, Whiskey Jack decals.




Next up, a Canadian M10C 17pdr Achilles.  Academy kit, Whiskey Jack decals, and corrected ammo stowage in the hull along with a few other 17pdr-specific alterations.






Last in the M10 family is this Yugoslav M36.  This is an Academy hull converted to M10A1 specs, done before their M36 kit came out.  The turret is Italeri, and the overhead cover scratchbuilt.  The back end is wrong in a big way, since I did this before photos of a survivor became available.  The lettering is hand-painted, though decals are available now.






And finally, the Charioteer in PLO markings during the Lebanese Civil War.  This is the Tamiya Cromwell with an Accurate Armour conversion set and IMA resin link tracks and sprockets.  The hull has had the engine deck re-scribed to the correct F-hull version.  The turret has had the cast-on smoke launcher wires removed and replaced with real wire. I used a metal barrel (can't remember the source) and made the dust cover of epoxy putty.

[BUCKY]

Four very well done tanks, beekster!! Thanks for sharing these!

[JCON]

Beautiful work brother!!!

[JEFF]

Pretty sweet, Bro.

[JED]

Great builds beeksters 👍👍

[dogfish7 (R.I.P.)]

Makes me want to build my M-10.

[Beekster]

I've long had an affinity for the tank destroyers, flawed vehicles that resulted from flawed doctrine and parochial turf battles within the US Army of the time. But I've been disappointed in the kits available to date. The Academy M10/M36 kits are all four scale inches too narrow, which pinches the proportions and makes them look too tall. The AFV Club kits are too wide, and the M10 turret shape is as wrong as Academy but in different places. I understand that the Tamiya M10 is much more accurate in dimensions; I don't have one yet to know for sure. I wish that Tamiya had done a more common variant than the very early, slab-counterweight variety. I guess I'll have to pick up a couple and see what can be done about about grafting on the wedge counterweights from one of the other kits. Doing the late duckbill variety will be more work, since the angles of the rear turret walls were changed for that final production variant. Oh, and the AFV Club M36 has turret issues, too...the bustle is about an eighth of an inch too short, which means it must be cut off and extended at the front along with restoring/adding weld seams.

[Beekster]

OK, I'm an idiot. Tamiya kitted the intermediate wedge counterweight, not the early slab, and has just released an M10c Achilles with the duckbill turret configuration. Guess I'm buying one of each today via eBay.

[dogfish7 (R.I.P.)]

Huh. The AFV Cub AF 35024 is the only copy I have.

[Beekster]

And It's a good thing I checked; that Tamiya Achilles is 1/48th and not 1/35 as the listing indicated. Anyway, a pair of the 35350 M10 kits are on their way to me now. I've got a couple of Academy interiors for the driver's compartment, which is empty from Tamiya. Any resin compartment set will work too, I'm sure. One of these will get built mostly out of the box, with minor tweaks like drilling the holes in the front of the bogie faces and replacing Tamiya's solid grab handles with wire. The other one might get kitbashed. I could fix an AFV Club M36 turret, cut the lower fenders off, add the E9 spaced VVSS and do an M36B2 from a foreign operator. Hmmm....

[JCON]

The gears are turning...

[BUCKY]

I see a busy workbench in your future!

[Beekster]

Dec 17, 2017 13:25:01 GMT -6 BUCKY said:

I see a busy workbench in your future!

Oh, it is always a busy workbench!  Sometimes too busy...

[Deleted]

cool models all

[Dukemaddog]

All these look magnificent! I just wish I could get all of them in 1/72 scale to add to my collection. Brilliant work overall, I'm looking forward to seeing more of them come off your workbench.

[Beekster]

All in good time, Duke! The incoming Tamiya M10 kits will likely stay on the shelf for a while. Active on the bench are the Madill yarder, the Chilean Mack tank transporter, and an M3A1 Leaflet CDL conversion. Getting a few minutes here and there is an AFV Club M36 turret, which is getting the bustle extended by about .100" and intended for one of those Tamiya M10s, and a reject casting of my IDF M50 turret that needs fixing. That one was a short-shot with a big bubble in the left side of the turret shell, so it needs a bunch of superglue and epoxy putty to fill the cavity, a new styrene base and more epoxy putty to level it up on the bottom, and some restoration of the dust cover retention strip on the bottom of the trunnion housing. Waiting in the wings is Takom's new M31 tank recovery vehicle, which will be built up as a bridgelayer.

[JCON]

Lots of stuff going on!!!

[Dukemaddog]

That is one helluva lineup! You've got your work cut out for you indeed.

[SteveM]

Nice collection of TD there, I especially like the Yugoslav M36

[Beekster]

Dec 20, 2017 17:20:24 GMT -6 SteveM said:

Nice collection of TD there, I especially like the Yugoslav M36

Thanks, Steve!  As I indicated, there are several things wrong with it as a result of inadequate reference, but better material is available now.  The Balkan Wars of the 1990s were the last time that M36 variants were used in combat.  We came across a couple in Iraq in 2003, but they were practically wrecks and were swiftly marked out for evacuation back home to eventually become museum displays.