America can't win the war unless they can mass produce tanks on a scale never before see in the history of industry.
I cleared off the desk, and wiped it all down. Then I got 27 Paul Heiser Models plastic HO scale Sherman M4A3 tanks and cut all the parts off the sprue.
There are many alternate and optional parts for this model, but my final production version ended up being 15 parts per vehicle, 405 parts total. Most of these are extra parts that won't be used on these particular vehicles, but are being held in storage for use in other projects in the pipeline.
The hole in the upper hull is about one micron too small for easy turning of the turret. So each one gets drilled out. The larger hole is so close in size to the original it is almost impossible to tell the difference visually. But the turret revolves much smoother.
Each part was cut off the sprue and then stacked next to a box. As each part was inspected any flash and bits of sprue was cut off it put inside the box as ready for production. At several points this begins to look like a real factory. I think the collection of tank turrets is pretty cool. The model is virtually flash free and all the parts fit very well.
Each track section has six points of contact with the sprue and each one must be cut off and carefully trimmed. It takes a while when you have to do over fifty of them. The Tamiya sprue cutter is able to get a good clean cut on most of the parts. The loaders hatch is a bit thick and has to be sanded down a bit, I used 400 grit sandpaper for that task. Tweezers were very helpful for the many little bits.
I used Plastruct Plastic Weld to hold the tanks together, it is the best glue for Paul Heiser model plastic that I have found. It took me about four days to assemble all these tanks, about one hour per tank.
This puts me well over my minimum 186 Sherman tanks for a US Army WWII Armored Division.
Thanks for reading.
Bunker Talk blog
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Mike Bunkermeister Creek