Tamiya M10 Achilles-"Lying in Wait"

Hey everyone,

Another wonderful kit from Tamiya, the British M10 Achilles. I've never done an armor piece from the Commonwealth and I've always loved the M10, so I decided to give this one a go. Like most Tamiya, it went together well and a relatively easy build. I made some basic modifications with texture and some bent and broken bits, but basically OTB.

It should probably be painted straight British Green, but that seemed so boring and I know that they would often have a subtle two toned camo, so I went that route to bring some visual interest. Whenever I've seen pics and footage of the tank, I noticed how much "stuff" the Brits would hang and drape all over the tank and did my best to do the same to mine.

I made the Hessian tape out of, well, tape. Tamiya tape cut into thin strips and painted. I may have done the scale just slightly off in size when seen in the pics, but in hand it looks about right. I did some on the barrel as well as hanging from the front armor, like a kilt and from the rear of the turret, like a dress. Ha. Camo nets are my standard tack cloth which is really sticky, so you have to soak it in water and paint then you can apply as needed.

The base is driftwood I got from my river near my house. Works great and has some visual interest. The leaves are from GreenStuffWorld in Germany. Excellent place for tons of great diorama stuff and will use these again. I made the trees with said leaves and sea foam. First time using this technique and overall pretty happy with it. I may do more elaborate ones next or at least try to. I also made the pine tree. Still have work to do on this technique.

As usual, painted with tamiya paints. Weathered with Mr Weathering pastes and other enamels. Not much oils on this one. Only complaint I have was the rubber tracks. Usually for Allied armor, rubber tracks are fine as there is no "sag" and detail these days on rubber tracks is usually good enough, BUT for this kit the track tension is SO TIGHT and no way to slack it that inevitably with the enamels on there, it snapped on the right side. Right before the competition! No worries asI had not hard glued the hull and was able to superglue the tracks under the armor plate so it could not be seen. But yah, they are actually not connected under there. No other choice.

The figures came with the kit. Overall good, but plastic figures always presents some issues compared to resin. I did the best I could and considered leaving them off, but it's an open compartment, and an M10, so yah, they really needed to be in there otherwise it would just look weird.

Well, that's pretty much it. I was born in October, so I really love foliage and I was excited to make an Autumn scene with this one. I think it makes the Achilles pop on the page.

Hope you like it and please feel free to comment and critique.

Cheers,
Graeme

13 additional images. Click to enlarge.