Trumpeter 1/35 Stridsvagn 103B Main Battle Tank
One of Trumpeter's early offerings was the Swedish S Tank: the Srv 103B. This is my first go at doing a tank in 1/35th, and I elected to choose one of my all time favourites to start my foray into AFV modelling.
It's a pretty straightforward kit, no dramas with construction of the hull & wheel assemblies. The plastic is a bit too soft for my liking and had a tendency to crumble on the really small parts, so a bit of care had to be exercised.
The tracks are rubbish. My references indicated that the shape of the tracks were a bit inaccurate, which I could live with that, however disaster struck when I tried to un-warp one track length with hot water. The vinyl began to melt & the water wasn't that hot either! You have been warned.
Mistakes have been hidden as best I possibly can.
This has been built out of box.
Vallejo's grey primer was used, with some pre-shading on top.
Lifecolor's Green RLM02 with about 15% Green RLM82 was used for the top coat.
Next came Mig's excellent Dark Brown enamel wash to highlight the busy surface detail.
Various weathering powders were also used, and the whole lot was sealed with a coat of Future.
For more details on the build checkout the Work In Progress Armour posts in the groups section of this site.
http://imodeler.com/groups/work-in-progress-armor/forum/topic/135-trumpeter-strv-103b/
Please feel free to comment, but in the meantime thanks for looking.
BEAUTIFUL ! I like the low profile of this tank. Well done!
Thanks Morne. I've liked this design ever since I saw a picture of it in one of the Sunday Newspaper's colour magazines way back in the late nineteen seventies.
This is a cool looking tank, Marek, and you seem to have captured its low down outline very well, nice photographs as well!
Thanks George. It's a pity there's not a lot of English language reference material for the Strv out there on the net. For such a cool looking tank it's a very overlooked subject.
Beautifully done and photographed...nice work!
Thanks Craig, much appreciated as always.
Very nice job! As a kid I build about a half-dozen tanks, and this was one of them, as it was also one of my favorites. I haven't seen one in quite some time so this was a treat.
Cheers Greg, I'm now at that age in life where I'm revisiting all the stuff I thought was really cool as a kid. I think some call it a "second childhood". By the way it's only served to whet my appetite and next in the stalls is the old Tamiya Leopard Mk1.
🙂 ... Greetings ... 🙂 :
WOW! ... It has been quite a time since I last saw one of these.
Nice work,.
Thanks, much appreciated.
wonderful paint and weathering
Thanks Bob, the painting & weathering was the most enjoyable bit of the build too.
I really love models like yours in times of heavy weathering fad. And this is clean and greatly detailed and beautifully painted. Thanks for sharing, awesome job!
Thanks Lukasz, incidentally I was advised by a few former Australian Defence Force personnel at my local model club to go easy on the weathering for peacetime Armour.
Nice tank! I agree with you there on the weathering! Very subtle weathering and dusting shows of the vehicle a lot better!
Thanks Richard, much appreciated.
Thats a fine piece of modelling, Marek ! Great build with a superb paint job.
Especially the subtle weathering looks spot on.
Rubber tracks can be tricky, they look perfect from my side of the web !
Well done !
Bernd, thanks as always & your comments are much appreciated.