In my previous blog I was talking about recruiting the troops which make up the majority of my force.

However the centrepiece of the force is the Panther Ersatz M10. Warlord Games produce one of these in resin which is a good starting point. But I wanted something a bit more special, unique and accurate, so I've decided to scratch build my own using the Rubicon Models Panther Ausf G as the base.

Time to get scratchbuilding

Rubicon specialize in 1:56th scale kits which are designed for gaming, to be robust & easy to build, yet aim to be more detailed and accurate than other manufacturers working in this scale- namely Warlord/Italeri.

The basic kit went together very nicely, with a good fit and not too much clean-up required. I had a couple of gaps which were more my fault than anything, as I rushed a couple of steps when I should have used some rubber bands etc to hold the upper hull in place.

My principle reference model was this one from Armorama

I started on the turret using some spacers on the sides & the mantlet to which the new plasticard sheets could be attached.

The mantlet had to be trimmed down around 2mm each side to enable the new turret sides to fit correctly and for the new chin to be the correct shape & have the right gap. Now I'm not sure if that was historically accurate, more likely the turret extensions were out further from the sides.

So here is a profile view of the turret with its new side pieces attached, using 1mm styrene:

Once the sides were on I then added the back section of the turret extension. I measured and cut a strip to the correct width and left extra length to make handling it easier. Once this was glued in place I then clipped off the excess and sanded it down.

Finally I added the cross bar supports using 1mm plastic rod, going all the way across in 2 places and then shorter ones which I ‘welded’ to the top of the turret.

The front of the hull was built up in several stages with 2mm styrene spacers and then had a thin .75 sheet attached to make the final surface layer. This is when stuff went wrong, as I used a bit too much glue in applying the last layer and it melted where there were gaps underneath between the spacers. Epic fail.

So I ended up using greenstuff to re-level the whole front of the tank.

The extension on the rear of the tank is just a simple plasticard box, with some additional strips internally along the joins to provide extra strength. Then the side skirts had to be cut down to size and extensions added at the front & rear to match the correct profile.

The next stage is adding additional detail, like the flip hatch for the hull MG, the co-ax MG and top hatches, along with the raised details needed on the turret extension etc.

So here is how the Panther is looking with the main structural work compete.