What If the British Army bought the M113?

[Weaver]

Here's the Swingfire vehicle so far. Some of this is glued and some is just mockup. The three panels on the RHS of the hull  will hold the launchers between them. The launchers themselves are the little boxes on the left of the pic: they're having some detail added to them at the moment to make them less like plain boxes. The big boxes behind the hull are stowage lockers to go either side of the rear ramp: the FV438 had these, presumably because the missiles took up all the space inside, so I'm presuming my M113 will have to have them too.



Of course the smart thing to do will turn out to be to move the fuel tanks to the outside of the rear plate to make more room inside, but that's a lesson for the future in the timescale of these models.

[deathjester]

VERY NICE!! Me likey...

[Weaver]

Cheers!

More progress:



I'm going to have one launcher raised and one dropped for reloading. The launchers now have muzzle reinforcements, pivot tubes and exhaust door hinges. The "down" one has it's door glued shut, but I've left the "up" one off because I won't know what angle to glue it at until the thing's assembled.

I've cut the bottom out of the "down" launcher bay so that it can depress for reloading. Have to 'fess up here: I got the geometry of the launcher supports wrong (they should have been shorter) and had to extend the cutout a bit further aft than the limit of the FSV top plate. Won't be visible when it's finished though.

The lockers are almost finished: the round bits you can see there are hinges: once they're dry I just need to put the doors on and detail them.

[NARSES2]

Great work 

I can now really see your ideas taking shape 

[Weaver]

Cheers!


More progress:

In this shot, you can see the front of the Swingfire vehicle and the two turreted vehicles. I undercoated the latter two, but then realised there were big score marks in the sides of the roof where I'd taken the aerial protector bars off, and I'd also forgotten to build barrel locks! Both now corrected. The white things in the foreground are the lockers for the back of the Swingfire vehicle, now detailed up with hinges and catches.




Here's the back of the Swingfire vehicle now that the roof's on. I'm leaving the launchers removable until after I've painted their undersides and the inside of their bays.

[NARSES2]

Knowing how small these kits are makes my eyes goe all weird 

[Weaver]

My eyes keep going all weird - I can't work on them for too long without taking a break.

[Weaver]

Minor progress. The gunner's position now has vision blocks , periscopes a base for the missile guidance periscope, and the missile bays have little V-shaped fittings in front of them as per the FV438. Not sure what those are to be honest: I did think they might be wire cutters to sheer off the control wires as the launcher retracted but a close examination shows that they can't do that. My vision block/periscope setup is based on the FV438 but has to be different because my missile "turret" is bigger and different internally.

[NARSES2]

Superb small scale work

[tc2324]

Second that. Great work Weaver. 

[Weaver]

Cheers Folks.

Well, I'm calling the Swingfire conversion done now, or at least as done as it can be before painting. This weekend I've done the wire catcher and the periscope cage in brass wire. It's overscale and not strictly accurate to the FV438, but it looks okay. There were at least two different designs of wire catcher used on the FV438 anyway, and some of them seem to have got pretty knocked about in service.



I'm pleased with the periscope's rubber "gaiter". I made this by putting a piece of Evergreen rod in my Dremel, turning it to a cone, then carving the corrugations with a file. It's drilled down the centre for another length of brass rod to keep it all strong.



Just realised it needs a new ventillator to replace the standard M113 one.... Easy enough to fix.

All I need to do now, once the rest of the vehicle's assembled, is paint the insides of the missile troughs, cut down the missile box pivot pin and seal it in place with little discs at each end, and then stick the "up" box's open exhaust cover on.  

[Old Wombat]

Jeez, man, I'd have trouble doing this in 1/35th, let alone even contemplating it in 1/72nd!

Awesome work, brother!



Guy

[NARSES2]

Jeez, man, I'd have trouble doing this in 1/35th, let alone even contemplating it in 1/72nd!

Have to agree with the hon gentleman's statement - amazing work

[JayBee]

Knowing how small these kits are makes my eyes goe all weird 

It's the real ale Chris! 

[rickshaw]

Looks the part!