Panzerkampfwagen IV Ausf. H

I wasn‘t sure how well those ejector pin marks would be covered once the tracks were installed, so to be on the save side, I decided to fill the with black superglue. I covered the pin marks on the fenders, who were furthest on the edge of them and the ones on those radiator inlets. 

The back plate of the upper hull didn‘t completely touch the structure, because I sanded away quite a bit to eliminate the gap between the plate and the hull. Clamps could‘t be used to press the contact areas togehter, so I used my clamp like this, due to the torque created by the clamp as a lever, the gap was gone and as the glue dried, it stayed in this position. 

Bad ejector pin mark placement but once you find out on how to sand this recessed area properly, the marks are will be quickly gone. 

Using pattafix to attach the wheels to an electric drill. This way I was much quicker sanding the sprue gates away and also created realistic sanding marks along the circumference of the wheels. 

The cheap washi tape I used to hold the inner wheels to the electric drill left some sticky residue. This probably happend because heat was created when the sanding paper touched the parts which led to the glue coming of the tape. To be sure no residue was left, I washed all wheels in soapy water. 

Here I used a soldering iron set to roughly around 500C to lightly melt the muffler. I held it up to the plastic until the area got more shiny and the used a sculpting tool to create dents. In the picture you can see that I protected the thin muffler protection using water drops because those small plastic areas melt way faster and I didn‘t want to risk ruining those parts because they melted completely. I actually got the idea of the deformed muffler from the instruction manual, where they showed pictures of the back from a real Panzer IV with deformed fenders and a deformed muffler. I strongly advise to try the melting behavior on a piece of leftover sprue from the same(!) kit. First I started at 200C and noticed that nothing was melting. Then I turned further and further on the potentiometer of the soldering iron until I was at 500C where the melting started fast but in a very controlled manner. However, don‘t take my numbers for granted, since I have no idea if the temperature reading of the soldering iron‘s potentiometer is even correct, maybe I was actually on 300C because the potentiometer is broken. And test your current plastic reactions first!! 

Some update on the Panzer IV build. I recently got hold of the book „Modeling tanks and military vehicles“ writen by Sheperd Paine. In it, I read that you can aviod to fill the gaps on the main gun barrel simply by using way to much cement and pressing both halfs together. Due to the force, melted plastic squezzes out of the sides and after some time, while it‘s still soft, can be scraped away using an exacto. I used Revell‘s Contacta Professional because it is much thicker and doesn‘t evaporate so quickly like extra thin cement.  

The rear storage compartment, which is located behind the turret, fitted so well, that no seam lines were visible. Because in real life, to access it, the top plate is lifted up, I decided, that a deep panel line should be visible. I used plastic 3m tape, to guide my razor saw. After that, I used a special panel line scriber (the thinest one from mrp) to further improve the panel line.  

Here‘s a picture of the rescribed storage box. 

I finished the interior of the turret as long as everything was accessable due to the top plate missing. I protected the areas from paint that will „touch“ the top plate using liquid mask or masking tape, to be able to use plastic cement and get a strong bond. 

I am thinking about doing a diarama in the future, were the tank is resupplied with ammo through this door, so this will be the only spot to look at the interior and even than, there will not be alot visible because it will be quite dark in there, no need for super detailing. 

I didn’t add alot of detail because most of it will be hidden anyways. 

Using stretched sprue and 0,2mm lead wire, I created new springs for the back fenders. 

Due to being from the 80‘s, there are quite alot of ejector pinmarks on this kit, however, most of them can be sanded away easily like here on the additional turret armor. 

The metal beams that hold the additional skirt armor were fixed in position using patafix. That way I could see, how all the parts fit together without glueing them to the model. In the right picture you can see for instance, how the beam that holds the side armor is not touching the other beam, thus they need to be pressed together go create a good bond between them. Especially with such a critical parts like this armor and the fact that this kit is from the 80s, I think it is very important to dry fit everything to aviod unpleasant surprises.  

Next to the antenna mounting, you‘ll find those metal tubes on the panzer IV, I think they were used for cleaning the gunbarrel. In order to stick them together, they used to be hollow, thus I used a small drill to create those holes because they were missing. 

On the „Schürzen“ armor are some ejectorpin marks. Thanks to the simple surface, those can be sanded away easy. For me personally, I found out, that wet sanding on such a big surface has many advantages. First, there is no sanding dust, which is a nice touch for your lungs and secondly, the sanding paper doesn‘t really clog up compared to dry sanding. Just make sure that you clean the surface from the old „sanding water“ from time to time, since most of the sanding debri is contained in this water. 

Because it only stuck to the model thanks to patafix, the finished structure which holds the skirt „schürzen“ armor can now be taken off the model, which maks painting easier, afterwards, I will glue it on the model using CA glue. 

In Sheperd Paine‘s book on modeling armor vehicles, I heard about this trick to create natural track sag with pins pressing down on the track. However, in the book, they tell you, that you only need to build a support structure for the metal pins. This means however, that each support structure needs to be on the same height as the hole for the pin, which means, that every support structure needs a different height, because those pins enter the hull in different spots, depending where they press down on the track and how much sag you want to have. Thus, I „updated“ this technique by utilizing 2-component putty. Now each support structure has the same height and the only job of the structure is to provide some additional surface for the putty to stick to. To enlarge the surface even more, I scratched the surface of the inner hull and the support structures. I think its important to roughen up the surfaces, since the smooth surface of the plastic won‘t provide the putty with alot to grip into and I don‘t fancy the idea of some of the pins or the putty coming loose once everything is glued together. After drilling the holes for the pins, I quick fixed them with CA glue, since it dries very fast and thus you have alot of control on how much the pin is pressing down on the track and after applying some CA-activator, the position of the pin will stay fixed. After the CA has cured, I mixed my putty and put a generous amount around the pins. With the putty still being soft, I used the rest to fill some holes in the hull. The last thing I did was to create a large hole in the hull and glue a nut in. Now I am able to screw the tank on a threaded steel rod which will provide a good stand for painting the tank, you might know the trick from Nightshift.  

Before glueing the pins in place, I tried to find the best position of each track. This is important, since those old tracks are bended and on some areas they even bend in- or outwards. I tried to place the tracks this way, that areas which are heavily bended are positioned over the idler- or sprocket wheel. This way the bad shape is hidden alot.
And trust me, attaching a weight to the tracks and hoping they would straighten over time did not work out at all. 😄
Once the best position of the track was found, I marked a spot on the tank and the corresponding spot on the track with maskimg tape, to ensure that each track would look the same in the end, as they looked in this picture.
The top picture shows the track without the pins and the bottom picture shows how everything looked, once the pins pressed down on the tracks. Worth it for sure in my opinion! 🙂  

I decided to leave the turret storage compartment open. Unfortunately I made this decision when everything was cemented together. Thus I had to cut out the door with my razor saw and as you can see in the first picture, I cut way to deep. When cleaning the cut up using extra thin cement, those areas collapsed a bit, thus I had to rebuild this structure using CA glue and sanding paper (second picture in the top row). Last step was to create those metal struts inside the compartment using stretched sprue. Now I am quite happy with the result and I think this will look great with some jerrycans or fabric rags inside 🙂 I got the inspiration from a picture of a super detailed kit, which also had this compartment open. In the future I plan on doing a diorama where the tank get‘s reloaded by some guys and I think this open compartment will also look great in the whole scene. 

You might know this if you are watching nightshift: Using Tamiya‘s Basic Type Putty and Mr. cement S I created the texture of rolled steal. You apply it by brush and then sand it once dried. Nightshift mentioned, that he likes Mr Cement S because it drys so fast, in my opinion it nearly drys to fast, since you need to put the cement on your brush every time you want to pick up the mixture because the mixed stuff already dried. I am quite happy with the result but next time I need to do it way way earlier right when all major structures are glued in place and not when all the tools, boxes and so on are already on the model, this makes sanding in some spots impossible 😄 

Using my exacto blade, I created flamecut marks on thick steel plates. However, there are not to many of those thick steelplates with exposed sides, thus, only the front plates of the hull and the turret recieved this treatment. 

Due to sanding the steel structure, most of the injection molded welding seams dissapeared. Thus I had to do them myself, here is a short guide.
Create groves where the weld seams were. You want to use that one tool, that you would never use for airplane panellines because I creates such a wide groove, wide grooves are important. Before using the panel line tool though, I used guiding tape a my razor saw, this leads the panel line tool and helps to make a straight line. Then you want to angle the tool while creating the groove, this way, the groove will become V-shaped. Now you need to create small noodles of two part epoxy putty (I used Green Stuff but more on GreenStuff vs Milliput in the next picture). Using a toothpick, you need to press the noodle in the groove. Now I used my home made „Welding C-Shape“ tool (i will create a seperate post on this tool) to created the typical C-Shaped weld seam by pressing the shape in the noodle many times. Thanks to the wide groove, the noodle will stay in place and after 24 hours, everything is rock-solid. 

Here is a comparison between Milliput (on the left) and Green Stuff (on the right). They both handle completely different. Milliput is easy to mix and it‘s very easy to change the shape of this stuff, once cured, it‘s rock solid. Green Stuff on the other hand is quite hard to mix (my fingers were hurting after mixing it 😄), it holds itself together alot, thus changing the shape is not so easy and once it‘s cured, it behaves more like a very resilient rubber. I should also mention, that green stuff is way more sticky than milliput.
So, why do you see the same vehicle with two different weld seams? Well, first I did them with Milliput but I was not happy with the result, the weld seams were to wide and they looked a bit extreme. Thats the thing with milliput, it is a joy to mix and to shape it in small noodles, since this stuff doesn‘t hold together alot but thats the exact problem, its hards to create very small noodles and once you apply the c-shapes on it, it‘s so soft that you cut the noodle instead of pressing the shape on it. Then it is also not as sticky as green stuff, which means that it is more likley to stick to your tool instead of sticking to the tank. To hinder it from sticking to your tool, you have the make it wet but then the noodle holds it self together even worse, problems after problems!
So I wasn‘t happy at the time, all the work was gone and I wanted to get Tamiya‘s Quick Type Epoxy Putty, because Night Shift really liked this stuff for making weld seams. Unfortunately, it is hard to get here. Then I thought that I can give my local hobby shop a try and thats where I found Green Stuff.
And that‘s the end of the story: thanks to it‘s ruber like texture, you can roll it (and even stretch it!!) in very thin noodles, it is sticky, so it will stay in the groove and it is more resilient to changing the shape, which means that you wont cut the whole noodlle by applying the weld shape. But don‘t get me wrong, for filling gaps etc., Milliput is, thanks to it‘s soft nature, still the greatest stuff 

I had no high hopes for the towing cable since the kit is old an it lags quite alot of detail. When I first looked at it, I was pleasantly surprised, since there were only some minor problems with it. First I disconnected one end of it (red circle on the right) since it was molded to the cable but then I thought, that it would look more realistic and „heavy“ if the end of the tow cable would hang down slightly. Highlighted on the left red circle, I created a line in the cable, to give the impression, that the cable is wraped around two times, there was no line and it looked odd if there was no seperation between those areas where the cable touched itself. I even completely disconected some areas using my razor saw to give the impression of a real towing cable. Then there were also some molding lines on the cable. I got rid of them using my metal file. However the file destroys the „cable look“ because it is sanded away, to restore this pattern, I used plastic cement to soften the cable and then, using my hobby knife, I carefully carved out plastic to get to the right surface pattern. 

Here I scratch-build those hinges for the front fenders. First I cut away the old ones using my razor saw and my wide Trumpeter rivet tool. Then I shaped a thin cooper wire in the right shape and fixed it, using VMS‘s extra thin CA glue. The next step showed me, how good of an investment my DSPIAE nippers were: I stretched a sprue and then I sliced the thin stretched sprue in half, using those nippers. Ordinary thin cement was used to secure those in place and just like that, a big improvement is finished!  

Here I upgraded the Schürzen armor of the turret. Using my punch and die set, I created bolts with a diamter of 0,7mm. I used my thinnest sheet styrene which is only 0,5mm thick. Then I also improved the hinges for the doors by adding stretched sprue as the bolt on which the doors rotate on. The last improvement was the open door on the right side. One of the doors was missing anyway but because I plan on doing a diorama were the tank is reloaded thru the right door of the turret, this was not a problem. I took measurement on the existing door and replicated the door in the open position, using 0,5mm sheet styrene. This was quite alot of work as I needed to straight-cut alot of tiny styrene parts but it was worth it in my opinion. 

Here I was very impressed at Tamiya detailing! Getting the right angles on the „schürzen“ armor for the turret seemed to be a nightmare, fixing each part with patafix to the turret, holding some parts in place while cementing other parts together seemed impossible to me. Than I took another look in to the instructions and suddenly I see a 1:1 template for the angles on the turret armor! Since the individual pieces should form a straight line on the bottom, you just need to place them accordingly to the template and glue them together. Just used a bit of patafix the secure them. Nothing easier than that 🙂 This saved me alot of headaches, thanks Tamiya for this great detail! 

The doors of the right hand side of the turret will be open. Thus I improved them be getting rid of the ejectorpin marks and by cutting out the handle of the door, before, this parts was solidly molded to the door but a short usage of my trusty razor saw, gave the handle a more handle-ish look 😄  

I found this tool in the house by coincidence, I used to use it for soldering, when two wires needed to be soldered together in an akward angle. For glueing parts together like the „schürzen“ armor, this tool has proven to be extremely helpful, since it will hold/press the parts together while they are on the vehicle. As you can see in the second picture, there was alot of mechanical tension because the parts didn‘t fit well to the turret, just putting glue on, pressing on the parts for 10 seconds won‘t do the job here, this tool pressed on the joint for a couple of hours to form a solid bond. 

One of the last upgrades I added was to scribe the panel line of the front fender, because they were missing on the inside (left picture, red circle). On the boxart, I saw, that there were also springs attached to those fenders, they were also missing in the kit, thus I took stretched sprue and 0,5mm lead wire to create some myself. The bolts of the towing hinges should also be connected to the hull, via a small chain, I created this chain by twisting very thin copper wire together, bending it in the right shape and secured it, using CA Glue (right picture, red circle). 

Looking at my reference pictures, I saw that many Pnazer IV‘s had a cover over the muzzle if they were not in battle. This gave me the idea to create one of those covers myself. Unfortunately they have the shape of a bag, which is very hard to create youself while maintaining a very thin thickness. Thus I rolled out green stuff (using water underneath because it is so sticky) very thin, streched it a bit to make it even thinner and then I put it around the muzzle, trying to create a realistic shape. Many of those bags were kept in place via a string which was tightend and secured with a knot. I created the string out of very thin copper wire, which I stuck in the greenstuff and secured with a tiny drop of CA. Copper wire is great, because it keeps it‘s shape quite well and you can get thinner wire compared to lead wire.  

Gave the whole model a bath in warm water and dish-washing soap to get rid of any hairs, oils from the skin etc.
Drying time was decreased by placing a small desktop ventilator infront of it, roughly 24 hours after the bath, the model was ready to recieve the primer. 

Added some dents to the fenders, especially the front ones always seemed to have some bending towards the outside, judging from historical reference pictures. 

Everything primed in Mr.Surfacer 1000. 

Here is a reason on why the use of primer is recommended. I made the spring on the left myself by taking lead wire and glueing it together using CA glue. Unfortunately I used clear CA although I own a black one aswell, thus I didn‘t see where the glue was applied and the result can be seen in the picture, the spring structure is covered in glue. Using primer means that nothing is lost because the main paint job will be applied over the primer anyways. In the right picture you can see an injection-molding flaw, I never noticed it but as soon as the primer was applied, it jumped right into my eye.  

Here I am adjusting the „Schürzen“ armor by cutting out pieces, some of the plates will also recieve dents and bents by heating the plastic up, using a soldering iron. 

Here I tried to bend the schürzen armor. Before explaining the bending process, it's important to note, that the real schürzen armor were very thin, face hardened steel plates, which were just hung on a framework on the vehicle. Thus they rarely bended, because due to the hardening it was very hard to bend them and if the force was great enough to have caused a bend, the particular plate jumped of the framework before bending. Thats the reason why I wanted to keep the bending as minimal as possible, if you take a look at the picture 38, you can see a reference photo, where the tank seems to have bended schürzen armor. I think that most of those "bends" where just misaligned plates, I hardly saw any really bend schürzen armor in my reference picture collection. However things got a bit out of control when I tried to bend the plates.

(Top left picture): I tried to bend the plate using a soldering iron, because I have sucessfully bended many parts using this technique. Unfortunately the heat is very concentrated but at first nothing happend. As the hot plastic cooled down unevenly, it created weird shapes as you can see in the top right picture. Thank god I was smart enough to place a piece of sanding paper inbetween the plates, to avoid that the heat also softened the other plate, because then, both plates would have developed such a terrible looking shape.
(Top right picture): After I failed using the soldering iron, I switched to hot water (at boiling point). As it takes way more heat than 100°C to bend plastic, it took me quite some tries and unexpected amounts of force to bend the parts. However it started to work and it is way more controlable than the soldering iron.

In the end I sanded the pointy bend from the soldering iron-fail away and than I was quite happy with the results 🙂 (Lower left and right picture for the results)  

Decided to break the muffler off because I want to do some rust effects like nightshift and there would have been no way to properly paint it while its glued to the hull. Unfortunately I broke some surrounding parts off but I prefer to break some parts now, before the major paint job is applied, than having to break it off later or get a messy/bad result on the muffler. Glued those parts back in place and some sanding should hide the crack 🙂