Today was a good day but I have not had as much bench time as I wanted.
But I have made some progress on the Panther tank.
This is what the turret looked like at the beginning earlier today. I like the plain look of the Zimmerit with nothing on it.
However the Cologne Panther had spare track blocks that were hanging off the turret and the rear of the hull on the side sponson's.
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1. track jack
2. two track blocks
3. four track blocks
I assembled enough spare track blocks to hang on the outside of the Cologne Panther. I also assembled and mounted the track jack.
I figured out where the track hangars needed to go on the turret by studying the various pictures that I found online.
I also had some spare track hangars that were from a previous 1/35 Tamiya King Tiger build. They were perfect and exactly what I needed to use here. They were included in an individual track link set that was made by Tamiya for this particular King Tiger model. I had to carefully cut away some of the Zimmeritt in order to glue the track hanger brackets in place on the sides of the turret, since I was using plastic glue.
Since I was working on the turret I decided to add a handle on the loader’s hatch. I had a few spare parts in the bin and I picked one that looked pretty good as far as the size goes.
The Cologne Panther was a Command tank and was operated by the Platoon Leader. As such it had a different set of radio antennas mounted on it.
This is the base for the “Befels” command radio antenna. It was taller and had a larger diameter base than the typical one had.
Luckily for me I had one of these in my spare parts bins too. So far so good.
This is what it looks like when installed on the rear deck. This is supposed to be the correct location and it looks pretty good when compared to the original pictures that showed the Befel’s antenna mounted on the tank.
The Starboard side of the rear hull had the correct number of spare track blocks installed on it too. Typically we see a total of 6 track blocks bolted on here on the typical Panther. They are bolted on in groups of two, so you will see what looks like three track blocks. But trust me here, what you see is actually a group of six when it's fully loaded.
I’m not exactly sure if I have the Port side of the hull done correctly but it looks like it could be. It was an odd arrangement on the other Port side, and looks as if it could have only held two sets of spar track blocks in place of the typical three. This could have been a field modification or simply they were left off ...
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1. would have been mounted here
2. spare track blocks
3. No track hangar is visible
4. hole from Pershing tank 90MM
5. possible track brackets ??
One the Starboard side you can see a pile of tracks on the ground next to the rear of the hull where they would have been placed. I’m guessing that the heat from the fire and possibly the impact from the 90 MM main gun hits nearby might have been enough to crack the welds that held the spare track brackets. Another possibility is that after the Panther caught fire, the ammunition began "cooking off" which caused numerous explosions inside the tank. Some were larger and more violent that others. This might also be why we don't see the track blocks mounted on the side of the hull, and instead they are laying next to the tank.
Another possibility would be that souvenir hunters or maybe scrap dealers had already started to pick the carcass of the burned out Panther and then left the track blocks on the ground when they realized how heavy they were.
This makes me think that it was probably the heat / impact as the most likely cause.
A souvenir hunter as the second choice, as a scrap metal man would have been excited about getting his hands on the tracks. The more metal he could get the more money he’d have in his pockets at the end of the day. Because of that I would think that a scrap dealer would have taken the tracks with him after he worked to remove them from the hull.
However, I don't see the track mounting brackets where they should be, but I have identified something that could be the brackets. They may have been moved by someone of they could have been tossed a little by one of the explosions. If so, then this lends itself back to the scrap man and a combination of the heat and impact of the main gun rounds from the Pershing as to why these track blocks are lying next to the tank on the ground.
Who knows ? Maybe it's a mixture of all three theories ... or maybe just two. There may not have been a scrap man yet, and what I see (and have pointed out in the cropped / zoomed photo), could actually be the track hanger brackets... This makes one wonder.
OK maybe just three people in the whole world wonder, with me being one of them.
This shows how the rear upper deck looks with the spare track blocks and the Befel’s antenna installed.
Remember the steel wheel Panther in the previous post ?
Here it is now under construction. The basic chassis was built. It has a working suspension and the torsion bars are attached on one end and the road wheel arm is loose. This allows the road wheel arms to articulate and I think it is a cool design.
It’s a little bit confusing at first but now I have it figured out so I will build the remaining three kits to this point and then decide what I want to do next on them.
As usual comments are encouraged. Thanks for stopping by.
Good night everyone.