International Scale Modeller

When I saw this GB coming I though it is perfect opportunity to tackle my little German cat. I bough this kit months ago and had no chance to start it so this GB is just what I need as I do not really keep stash of models. I liked the shape of the turret and also fact that my home country now has some 2A5's made me want to build one.

About the tank:
Produced 1979–present
No. built ~3,480
Weight 62.3 tonnes (68.7 short tons)
Width 3.75 m (148 in)
Height 3.0 m (120 in)
Length 9.97 metres (393 inches) (gun forward)
Crew 4
Armour 3rd generation composite; including high-hardness steel, tungsten and plastic filler with ceramic component
Main armament 1× 120 mm Rheinmetall L55 smoothbore gun (42 rounds)
Secondary armament 2× 7.62 mm MG3A1 (4,750 rounds)
The Leopard 2A6 includes the addition of the Rheinmetall 120 mm L55 smoothbore gun and other changes. All German tank battalions of the "crisis intervention forces" are equipped with the A6. Canada purchased 20 Leopard 2A6s from the Netherlands. These were delivered in 2007. Portugal also purchased 37 Leopard 2A6 from the Dutch in 2007, with delivery in 2008. In January 2014, Finland purchased 100 L2A6s, as well as munitions, simulators, and a ten-year supply of reserve parts from the Netherlands. The tanks are being delivered in batches between 2015-2019. The Leopard 2A6M is a version of the 2A6 with enhanced mine protection under the chassis, and internal enhancements to improve crew survivability. In the summer of 2007, Canada borrowed 20 A6Ms from Germany for deployment to Afghanistan. The Leopard 2 Hel is a derivative of the 2A6 that was ordered by the Greek Army in 2003 - the "Hel" stands for "Hellenic". The 170 tanks were to be delivered between 2006 and 2009. A total of 140 will be built in Greece by ELBO, which delivered the first units in late 2006.
Source: Wikipedia

The kit
Revell 1:72 Leopard 2A6/A6M.

Considering Revell is touch and go and the quality is not always there, I find their military 1:72's quite decent kits. Having built 3 other vehicles I had no major problems and detail is adequate. This one is made with licence from KMW which manufactures the tank. I am planing to build modernised M variant.
Instruction is black and white older type Revell booklet



The kit consists of 5 sprues in dark green plastic. The detail seems to be quite good and part count probably rivals some 1:35 scale models. Molding is mostly crisp with chassis having anti slip material re-created.



There is occasional flash and no pronounced mold lines. Ejector pin marks seem to be out of sight as well. Tracks are link and length.


Sprues:





Decals:


Paint schemes:
Standard NATO 3 colour camouflage.



To be continued....Thanks!

Looks like it will be a good build, have fun.

Thank you. I did start it while ago but then had other things to do. Will carry on though...

So after what seems like eternity I am posting some progress photos.
Hull assembly


No drama here. All parts fit well.




Road wheels are not perfect, shape is off...but who knows maybe Leopards have square wheels


Some gaps on the upper hull:




So manual tells you to install tracks early on which I had an issue with so had to saw off the mud guards at the back so I can install tracks later on:. I will also leave all the side skirts up to the end as they are in the way.

There's some really serious fit issues with this kit and very poor moulding. Your doing a starling job mate, I'd have bin it by now It's obvious Revell haven't got any better from their days when I was a lad

I have built few of those small scale AVF's and this is the worst one. I had good opinion of Revell's 1:72 military stuff. Sharp moulding, no fit issues etc. This one is opposite. This is my first GB so I want to finish it. No quitting now

Having focus on this kit back, the build continues. This kitten is slowly getting shape...

Front getting busier:


Added hooks at the rear of the tank


Turret shenanigans.
Lots of fiddly parts. Fit is so..so but I will look ok. May need to do bit of filling.

This tank is looking really cool so far!

Ive got an old Centurion Airfix on the shelf half done, same size too.

Thanks. It is taking shape now. Dreading putting on tracks as they are the stupidest solution I have seen.

So in the meantime I had some stuff coming in so wanted to try some.

First is Mr Surfacer Primer 1000. I do not prime in grey much, but wanted to see how it works.

Nice smooth surface with little sheen. You can see it is filling up some of the smallest indentations as expected.


Next back to my go to primer - black Mr surfacer 1500 with MLT






Primed all the little bits:

Starting to paint NATO cammo scheme:

Nato green:
Tamiya XF 67 thinned with MLT









I did not try any tonal variation etc due to plans I have for this tank and that would be redundant.

Next wheels. Horrible, shape is far from round, but I will use them as they are:

Next on NATO Black:
Tamiya XF 69 with MLT

Sprayed with MR Hobby Procon PS- 270 Which is pretty much same as Iwata. Great detail airbrush, still getting feel for it.

Last colour of the NATO scheme...NATO Brown
Tamiya XF 68 thinned with MLT







All three paints were thinned approx 50:50 to 70:30 thinner to paint sprayed at approx 10 PSI. I am happy with demarcation lines and I know PS-270 can do even tighter lines..just need more skill and patience...

I am happy with the colours and cammo, but I want to do something little bit different. After looking at some images while back I decided to make Danish desert version which served in Afghanistan. This is not pursue of accuracy as Dansh version is 2A5 not 2A6 however that is unnoticeable to non experts..like me...and the scheme looks cool. Also, Danes used easy wearing paint so this will be nice exercise in chipping and weathering. Looking forward to this next stage....

Nice paintjob, and I'm really curious about the worn desert camo in this scale!

I see you use MLT to thin Tamiya paints. What is your opinion about X20 and MLT?

Thanks for the comment!
I haven't used x20 as I do not paint with enamels. Only have enamel weathering stuff i.e. AK. MLT is great, and I used it if I want smooth and durable finish. For chipped paint I still use acrylic thinners like Ultimate or x20a.

MWindir wrote: ↑Fri Dec 01, 2017 1:43 pm Thanks for the comment!
I haven't used x20 as I do not paint with enamels. Only have enamel weathering stuff i.e. AK. MLT is great, and I used it if I want smooth and durable finish. For chipped paint I still use acrylic thinners like Ultimate or x20a.

Sorry, my bad. My intention was to write x20a
Thanks for the answer!

The kit seems to need a lot of TLC, but you are doing a great job with it!

Good luck with the desert cammo


Tommy

papatika wrote: ↑Fri Dec 01, 2017 6:08 pm

MWindir wrote: ↑Fri Dec 01, 2017 1:43 pm Thanks for the comment!
I haven't used x20 as I do not paint with enamels. Only have enamel weathering stuff i.e. AK. MLT is great, and I used it if I want smooth and durable finish. For chipped paint I still use acrylic thinners like Ultimate or x20a.

Sorry, my bad. My intention was to write x20a
Thanks for the answer!

No worries. I use X20a and it does the job well. It definitely fails compared to MLT with glossy paints. MLT is created for that.

TommyKillander wrote: ↑Sat Dec 02, 2017 8:40 am The kit seems to need a lot of TLC, but you are doing a great job with it!

Good luck with the desert cammo


Tommy

eah, not the best 1:72 military Revell and really discouraged me in the beginning, but now I am powering through

Here is Danish scheme I found. It is little different and I think the brown and green may be original NATO colours , but I have decided to repaint whole model with my own paint mixes by eyeballing them and took some liberties with whole paint scheme .


Original camouflage has been sealed with one coat of Alclad Aqua Gloss which is great as general purpose varnish. It does not really provide outstanding shine, but leaves sheen with slightly "pearly" appearance. It really shows what its made for when sprayed over metallics though and all those properties make sense then. I recommend it for that.


The paints - all thinned with Ultimate thinner to allow easier chipping. MR Hobby brown H310 seemed a good base to create the shades. I then started adding different tones to get colours similar to the picture. Below is the result of the experiments:
Light beige / Sand
2xH310 + 1xXF57

Sorry, wrong paint jar in the picture

Brown
2xH310+1xXF59+1xH37+1xXF7


Green
3xXF58+1xXF57


Next painting camo again...

Next stage...paining desert camo. Slightly more diluted paints for chipping. As mentioned above I have used Ultimate thinner. I had few reference pictures and generally used bit of guess work and just had fun as it is simple scheme. Paint job on real thing looks very crude and also suggests it is temporary. I belive only 4 Leopards were painted like this for Afghanistan.









Next..chipping...

I have used hairspray technique for chipping. I haven't got huge experience with it, but have done it couple of times already. Damped surface with tap water and then started to rub with couple of brushes. Both quite stiff bristles. also used Tamiya pain stirrer to do some scratches One cut quite short to allow burnishing. Paints were quite tough in the beginning but eventually started to come off. Beige seemed to be the easiest with brown being really though, which is reflected on the model.
Here is the end result:






Now have to flat clear it. Can't wait to get to installing those stupid tracks...

So basically tracks are two piece plastic parts. They seem easy and ok idea on paper, but in practice they may be challenging.So Revel suggest to warm them up in water and wrap around to shape on sprockets and join in two places. I probably made my life more difficult by painting them before shaping. Also, I have fixed the sprockets with glue meaning I could not pass them through the back - lessons learnt . Also, which was blessing in disguise my little boy has snapped them, off the sprue breaking them in few places. That actually helped with sprocket issue as I could join them on top of the sprocket by sliding two pieces from front and back. There was a lot of drama as I snapped couple of wheels and also had to cut some links off as tracks were too long - seems like they accounted for sag on top rollers. Ultimately I only installed as much of tracks as is visible not bothering with top as it will be covered by side armour.
Also, because tracks are moulded in same plastic as rest of the model it explains why it is so soft and does not sand well.

Tracks were primed with black surfacer 1500 and then sprayed with Tamiya rubber black - XF85 with acrylic thinner so I could use enamels straight on without any varnish. I have then run some AK rust streak in all the grooves followed by light rust wash from AK. The result was ok, but I find enamels drying time frustrating, but since I have invested in AK products my buyers remorse is making me use them as much as possible .





Don't get me wrong, I think they are good, convenient and useful. It is just the long drying nature of enamel which annoys me as I like to work fast. I found that oil paint with odourless thinner dries waaay faster and also is easy to remove. As the washes had so so coverage I then mixed AK medium rust pigment with AK sand yellow deposits to give it some texture and body and llighten it. Deposits products are well though off having texture. I added some dacay deposits to the mix as well. I also mixed rust pigment with enamel thinner and pigment fixer to add some random patches in the groves. Rubber pads on tracks were then cleaned and tracks left to dry before next step.
Inside of the tracks was painted with Revel aqua color steel as Leopard tracks get well polished by road wheels. I like those paints and find them little underrated in modelling world. I also found that mixed with some alcohol thinners and /or retarder and flow aid they spray way better than for example Vallejo with good coverage and no running or spidering.

looks good so far MWindir, looking forward to seeing it with tracks on!

Paul

Quax wrote: ↑Mon Dec 04, 2017 1:40 pm looks good so far MWindir, looking forward to seeing it with tracks on!

Paul

Thanks Paul! I am just uploading some pictures.

Pretty much final stages now. Started some oil rendering to give slight dusty look. Seeing Leopard in reality, they do not weather much except some minor scratches and dust.

Dumped some paints onto cardboard to drain the oil and waited couple of hours.

I tried to focus on certain areas and then move along to next ones, not covering whole tank in wash etc. Did some pin wash with brown and dark brown washes and then some dusty one as well to vary all the nooks and crannies.
For the surfaces I dabbed some oil paints and then blended with almost dry brush. Hopefully there is not too much "dust" on the tank.


Some dust on main hull:


Dust on side armour:


Installed tow cables:


Painted in Vallejo black metal and Revel steel.

Added clear Tamiya colors over chrome paint to show all the optics, lights etc...




Just need antennas and its done.




...

All done....

Completed model