W.I.P Tamiya Leopard 2 A6 - Part 4

Right.. time to update this .... 

Last time, I stopped after putting up the wheels and an almost complete turret. So carrying on from that, I put on some more extra bits of P.E. on the turret.

The commander sight seemed to need an extra touch of details in my eye so I decided to put some P.E on it -

Coming up next , are the Jerry can holders or something like that. Eduard instructions provided two options -

This empty rack -

And the one I put on. I kind of did not liked the empty rack so I just went ahead with the other option even though I have no idea what they are. 

I Decided to put on the hatches and shown them as opened. I can't turn off the figure painting bug. LOOL.

Following that, I decided to put on the side skits now that I am almost ready to paint -

Right -

Left - 

After that, I decided to paint the tracks before I paint the whole thing -

And after that I painted that whole vehicle

And I followed that up with some picking up the individual details  -

I haven't picked out the saw and tow cable yet. I will do so later on.

Well, that's it for now. I will keep you updated. Stay tuned. 

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Another Update from Monoeye Publishing

Right guys.. I have a kind of an update from Monoeye Press regarding the Mecha Modelling guide book.

Unfortunately, I cannot give the good new of '' it has been released '' as you all know how much work has to be done for a project as big as this and not to mention they have their own lives to live. BUT rest assured that I have been taking with Gdx ( Derick ) and he and his team are now doing final check ups and editing, going through all the pages and editing stuffs to make everything perfect. That being said, it is confirmed that the book will be out in a maximum of three months. Just a three more months guys ( IT could be earlier if they can pick up speed, so fingers crossed )... hang in there.

Derick send us some sample revised editing of the sample chapter. I have to admit, I love the new revised editing on the pages and the lay out. Have a look for yourself.

The steps are shown clearly, the text clearly labelled in accordance with the pictures, the pictures are taken with top-notch quality and the wordings are somewhat in simple english so it's very easy to follow.

I have a fair bit of guide books myself ( and this picture is excluding my monthly mags)-

so I know a good guide book when I see one. This is a great book .. ( or rather will be a great book ). I have compared with this with all of the guidebook I have and I am not disappointed ( AT ALL ) but rather the opposite. The revised layout and editing really REALLY helped alot.

So, you guys won't be disappointed when this finally came out and it WILL definitely come out so just hang in there. The exact date is not known but I will update you guys as soon as I hear anything from Derick.

I would like to take this opportunity to take the great guys out there who helped with Monoeye Press Kickstarter. Even though I am not exactly a official member of this project , I'm really grateful to these guys for making it possible to do this book. I am a avid modeller that likes to build all kind of models and as you can see, there are no book ( or reference materials ) available for gunpla in the English language so having the Mecha Modelling Guide book out there would draw many more people to the hobby. So the great guys who helped out Monoeye Press, I thank you for making it possible for Monoeye Press to help out the new beginners, which in turn will help out others and the circle continue.

Anyway .... the BOOK is definitely coming so just hang in there and you won't be disappointed.

Please go give a like to their FB PAGE and if you have any suggestion or see any error, please contact them via their FB or their email  '' monoeyepress@gmail.com ''.

I will keep you updated fellas.... Happy Modelling

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HobbyBoss 1/35 ZTD-05 AAAV

Hello there beautiful people.

Well, here comes yet another finished kit from me. This time, I will be adding a kit most modeller won't touch usually. It's a rather peculiar looking vehicle as well. This is a ZTD-05 AAAV from hobbyboss, released in mid( I think ) 2012.

The ZTD-05 is an amphibious assault tracked armoured vehicle designed and manufactured in China. The ZTD-05 belongs to the series of amphibious vehicles developed by China. The ZTD-05 is a regarded as a light tank due to its firepower. It is the fastest and most advanced medium-sized AAV. The ZTD-05 was designed for China by the Tula KBP bureau, using the fighting compartment of the Russian BMP-3 armoured infantry fighting vehicle as the starting point.
The light tank variant is armed with a fully stabilised 105mm rifled gun. The 105mm rounds carried consist of armour piercing fin stabilised discarding sabot (APFSDS), high explosive (HE), and high-explosive anti-tank (HEAT) rounds, and Chinese 105mm laser beam riding guidance anti-tank guided missile (ATGM). The 105mm missile offers the capability to engage shore targets whilst still swimming at sea, where conventional ammunition would perform poorly due to the motion of sea waves.
More info here -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZBD2000
http://www.armyrecognition.com/china_chinese_heavy_armoured_vehicle_tank_uk/ztd-05_amphibious_assault_armoured_vehicle_technical_data_sheet_information_description_intelligence.html

I don't have any major gripe about the kit. As expected from hobbyboss, the kit is moulded sharply and the fit are quite nice. The only thing I am not happy about is the track, which is a really pain in the back side to put on. The front bow wave plates ( or what ever they are called ) can be made to be workable, which I did but I don't know what went wrong, it wasn't folding down to the top of the hull properly, leaving a huge gap and after spending 3 evenings to try to make it workable, I just decided to just glue the damn thing down.

The build was enjoyable, apart from the time the front flaps and the tracks give me trouble. I made a full account of the W.I.P in the previous posts and you are welcome to look over at them if you are curious about how well the kit goes together. Actually, let me make a list here for the Work in Progress posts -

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4 

Part 5 

I painted this all in Gunze Sanyo, Mr. Colour Aqueous colours ; H313, H312 , H303 and H309. This is my first time I used Mr. Colour and I have to admit, I kinda like it. A little bit tricky to think but covers very good nevertheless. I went for the digital camo scheme as I don't really do that and now is the perfect chance to do one as I have the option to do so. 

For weathering, I kept it rather clean apart from the various dried and wet sand. I did put on a fair amount of chippings on the front and rear plates and along the side skirts. I thought those areas would be chipped more then the rest of the vehicle with the vehicles coming out of the assault ships and going through the shore lines where reefs or rocks on the shallow sea bed or beach might chip away the paint. I'm kinda not happy with the sand effect. It was my first time doing this and it was very hard for me to make clumps of wet sand. The pigments are from MIG and they change colour quite drastically when fixed with thinner. Oh well.. I will just take it as a valuable lesson for my next amphibious projects. The wet effects were done with Tamiya Clear Gloss and Vallejo Clear Varnish. I was broke and couldn't afford dedicated wet effect fluids so I just had to resort to the gloss paints. They actually work pretty well. 

Well, that's about as much I can sum up about the build. The exact steps can be found in the 5-part W.I.P. 

I'm vary satisfied with what I did, albeit it could look better but still, I'm happy.

It's time for the photos - 

(If you think some are small, just click on them ) 

Close ups of the sands and wheels -

Close ups on the vision periscope -

The only three on-board tools 

And some of the close ups of the water and sand splatter -

And as usual, my show case photos from various angles -

And as usual from me -

To be honest, I am not particularly fond of my own paint job on this. This is a bit of self-criticism from me: I was very impatient and some of the pattern are crooked. I had a hard time cutting the bloody masks out ...... GRRRRRR, the horror...

I know I still have a long way to go to be classed as one of the masters and I won't stop until I reach that kind of level. I couldn't keep building if not for my supporting friends and comrades. Thank you guys for always supporting me. Thank you dear readers for your patronage as well.

Until Next time.

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