googlydoogly

Since I'm gonna repaint this kitty anyway, why not add little details on it as well?

Replaced the loader's hatch with a spare Tamiya part, since the King Tiger arrived to me with a broken hatch. Added little details on the loader's hatch, including replacing the molded handle with metal ones.


Added little details, weld seams, and texturing on the commander's cupola.



Added the sighting device, and I moved the crane holes to show an earlier-produced turret.


Opened up the ends of the rear hatch hinge covers, just like the real thing.


Replaced the overly simplified poison gas detector mounts with more accurate metal cast pieces.


Added an additional gas detector mount on the the mantlet, which was missing on the Matorro and tamiya King Tiger.


Drilled a hole for the co-axial machine gun.


Replaced the chunky stock plastic track hangers with detailed metal pieces. My KT was missing one of the track hangers, and promptly emailed Mato Toys about it. They promised to send me one, but so far, nada. So I decided to replace them all with metal pieces.


And replaced the stock barrel. It was oversized due to the BB-gun feature, and a *tad* short.

smittyrob

Looking good, please explain your weld bead procedure.
Replacing barrel with metal ones always makes such a difference.

hdbeast

Looks great, googlydoogly

Your probably going to finish your KT before I will. I just can't find the time right now to get back to work on it.

Gary

blitzkrieg65

Wow,

Looking great, nice weld lines looks very realistic Did you replace the front end tow bracket holder with metal ones also, it looks like you did??

And what is going on the inside of this beast?

The Blitz

googlydoogly

Smittyrob: Thanks! I simply used milliput for the welds. I rolled the putty like dough, then score it with the back of my exacto blade.

hdbeast: That's too bad man. I understand though. Real world stuff always takes first priority. Hopefully, you'll have some free time soon to enjoy your beauties.

Blitz: Actually, I cheated. I used the chassis of my old Tamiya King Tiger. I was planning on changing the Matorro's gearboxes since they inferior to HL or Tamiya, but I decided to use my Tamiya tank instead. Simply because of the fact that the Matorro suspensions are too low. It would take way too much mod to make them accurate. I know a lot of folks here would be able to fix that, but that's beyond my capacity. Plus I like quick fixes. And my old Tamiya had the wonderful Impact suspension upgrade. It would be a shame to waste that awesome suspension.

Here's a pic of my old Tamiya tank. I always loved zimmerit-covered German tanks, so I used the zimmerit stickers that Tamiya provided, but they do not look good at ALL.

So basically, it's a Matorro/Tamiya Hybrid, with Tamiya lower chassis and RC components, with Matorro exterior. So far, it looks like a wonderful combo.

googlydoogly

Here's more progress pics. These are the spare track links from...Schumo...I think.


Added extra details around the driver and radio operator's hatches. And I also used the periscopes on the Wecohe PE set.


I replaced the Bosch headlight with metal ones from Schumo, and added details to it with Wecohe PE parts.


Replaced this part with Tamiya kit part, and re-applied zimmerit with putty.


Rear hull details, With working C towhook holders, metal armored pots, and chains for the crank holder. One of the exhaust broke while I was working on that area.

ManMachine

googlydoogly: I just love details and you have done a good job! I'm going to use milliput for some details myselfe, it's good stuff! Looking forward to see it all painted and ready.

Keep going with the details, good luck /Gabe

ostketten

Awesome work GD, it's gonna be a beauty for sure.[8D]

googlydoogly

Thanks! Spent the weekend working on this tank, and I got so into it, I forgot to take pics.

Base coat of dunkelgelb finished.


Various tool clamps (all working), tow cable holders (with working hinges), etc.





Engine deck details.


Muzzle break with locking nut.


Rear hull detail.


Now, I'm just deciding how the three-tone camo should look like. I know I want to do a s.pz.abt. 503 King Tiger around Budapest. A Kurt Knispel King Tiger would be awesome, but there isn't any picture of it, and noone even knows which King Tiger he had.

googlydoogly

Camo done!

hdbeast

What a difference, you did a beautiful camo job.[sm=thumbs_up.gif][sm=thumbs_up.gif][sm=thumbs_up.gif]


Gary

ostketten

Outstanding job googly.[8D]

chilipiper

Awesome... simply awesome!
[sm=thumbs_up.gif][sm=thumbs_up.gif]

ManMachine

Extreme makeover, what a difference! Looks fantastic, most exellent job indeed. It realy turned out as nice as I suspected. And the paintjob is nice aswell. Airbrush, yes?

JIDM

Hi Googlydoogly,
Please, let me know what did you use as the Wrecking bar and the starter(missing details in regular Matorro KT).
Thanks,
Jeferson

swathdiver

Exceptional work! Thanks for sharing! [sm=thumbup.gif]

googlydoogly

Thanks for the compliments fellas. And yep, I used an airbrush for the camo work. As for the missing tools on the Matorro, I simply used parts from my old Tamiya King Tiger.

Here's some progress pics. I aibrushed a very thin coat of buff color mixed with dark yellow, to lighten and blend the camo colors to the base color.


Here's some of the tools, painted and weathered. They'll look much better once I spray them with dull coat sealer. The tool clamps are from the Impact set. While the Impact tool clamps are not as detailed as the Wecohe tool clamps, they are much much MUCH easier to work with.


Here are more of the tools and metal tow cable from Schumo. The tow cable holders have working hinges as well. It took a while for me to bend the tow cables into a more realistic shape.




Out of all the tool clamps, this is the only one that doesn't work...because I accidentally glued it.


The C-hooks and C-hook holders.


The hull machine gun.


All I need to do now is to do the wooden jack block (I think that's what it's called), and the fire extinguisher. I also need to add a little bit more chipping and weathering in some areas, and paint over the chipped areas of the zimmerit with more yellow/gray color to hide more of the red oxide primer.