Might I suggest that instead of mounting the electronics directly to the metal lower plate, making a tray from styrene to put the electronics in and simply use clear rtv to hold it in place. It will never come undone with clear rtv, unless someone dropped it off a building!

I have been using the small tapped brass standoffs used to mount computer motherboards to PC cases, they have a self tapping screw on one end, start a whole in the styrene with a xacto blade then test fit the brass standoff, remove, apply some CA and screw it in for good.

Next installment. Swath has the idea of the day so I mounted my electronics on a tray. Cut a piece of .060" evergreen (1.5mm). Made some paper templates to finally get the hole placement right on the first try and drilled all the mounting holes. I countersunk the plate on the bottom for all holes. IMO stand-offs are a little tricky for these boards. There is not a lot of radial clearence around the holes before you could break into a trace so I used small lengths of Evergreen tubing. The mounting screws are 2-56 countersinks. Mounted the boards and volume pot to the plate. It's extremely modular now and if I want to reconfig the elec's when I later add my gun it will just cost me a little Styrene. Now I can use double sided tape, or velcro or whetever to keep it in place but I've got to do some driving now.

I epoxied on the conv kit. Used two-part 12 minute epoxy. It was hard to control. I trimmed the original body so I could support a good fillet. It seems pretty solid but I am a little concerned that the bond will stress crack when I really get on it in the field.

A few more points on the epoxy issue. 2 part epoxy is great stuff. I find that I like the 5 minute stuff due to my ADD[sm=bananahead.gif]I had to get some 12 minute stuff because it was all that was available at first but I didn't have good luck with it. It has very low viscosity until the 20 minute mark so it was running everywhere and leaving drip marks I had to wipe off constantly before they hardened.
As I mentioned I used generous fillets. The pic's make it looke like there is smooth lap joints but in reality there is an angular cavity that I fill with epoxy.
I have used strips of Styrene to fill huge gaps due to the conv kit fit-up.

I am no longer worried at all about the strength of the upper hull due to the epoxy hardening. I am a little worried because it now weighs 84 pounds

Nice work on the electronics tray. I think this is a very good idea. I have EL-MOD components to add to this mix as well. The idea of a modular tray to share between tank chassis is a great idea. Terminal strips or plug-ins then make it very easy to swap them around. I think if you built 3 or 4 modular electronics trays, you would have all you need. I have 6 tanks, but truthfully never have more then 2 or 3 out at a time. SO I am thinking if I took this idea and built 3 trays complete with EL MOD components, I would be set. I could then keep the extra heng long boards as spares or sell them.

All Tanked Up,
These Iperial Modelbau kits (SU-85, and SU-100) are true resins. They appear to be urethane resins, and of fair quality. The SU-100 comes as a solid super structure (fighting compartment), where as the SU-85 kit which I am currently working on is made up from several flat "slab" peices that need to be built up. The castings themselves are of pretty poor quality, they are very thick, have lots of air bubbles, and my peices are severely warped. It will take extensive work with hot water or a hair dryer to get things flat enough to glue together.

For my project I opted to stiffen the WSN chassis with a 0.80 styrene plate with structural ribs added. The lower hull is now very stiff, with virtually no flex. The upper deck will come from a Trumpeter static T-34. And I'm upgrading the stock WSN gear boxes with Tank Toko metal gears and bushings. Ethan added these to his SU-122 with good success. You can see both my Su-85 and his SU-122 build at our website at www.desertarmor.com

Craig

Thanks for sharing. I was curious what the 85 kit looked like. I almost would prefer that the 100 kit came as independent panels as the fit-up is as poor as the casting quality. I like your support ribs, very nice work.
If you can post some pic's of the Trumpeteer kit and report on their quality as many of us have not seen them.

pscartozzi,
Your SU-100 looks awesome, and I'm jealous as it is moving along at a clip much faster than mine. Unfortunately my SU-85 has taken a backseat to some other more pressing and time sensative (non RC) projects.

The Trumpeter static kits are amazing with incredible detail. You do need to be very selective in what you use, as many of the detail parts are fragile and simply won't stand up to the abuse of running these tanks on a real battlefield.

I'm planning on keeping the lower WSN hull as well as using the more stout stock suspension parts. Then combine the back half of the WSN roadwheels and sprockets with the more detailed Trumpeter outside half as they have crisper and more refined detail. Likewise I'll be mating the Trumpeter upper hull which has much better cast metal texture and details, to the WSN lower. All of the engine louvers are operable, as well as the hatched and a multitude of detail parts. The fuel can tie downs and rear engine deck screening are photo-etched brass affairs...........very nice. You end only using about 15-20% of the Trumpeter kit, but the results are well worth it. Because they are made by the same company and share some parts most things can be crossed between the two with only a little adjusting and tweaking.

The retail on all three versions that Trumpeter puts out is about $140-150, but you can usually find them on e-bay for about $80. Which is pretty good considering they come with complete interiors, and complete engine and transmissions. It's actually kind of a shame most of those parts will go to waste. Of course the tracks are too fragile to run but look great for the "extra " track hung on the hull (come with ice cleats as well) and all of the pioneering tools are nicely done.

Ethan, the co-founder of our club DAK has already done this WSN/Trumpeter kitbash twice, once for his T-34/76, and again for his SU-122, both with great results. He and I started out as "small scale" modelers with the intent of building RC tanks that could actually run and battle (Tamiya Full Option) while being accurate and clean enough to pick up off of the battlefield and win awards on the contest table. So far so good, Ethan's T-34 took a Silver medal at the last show, right behind my Gold winning Tiger (Sorry had to toot my own horn, LOL)

Actually when I saw your post I thought s___, I better get movin on this before you guys pass me up. I checked out your site many times and it is top notch stuff.
Thanks for the reply and post your progress on this thread if you'd like.
One thing I don't get is that the conversions on the site have the late model wheel's. Where the heck are you guy's getting them and share the wealth!

The solid cast wheels you ask about come from the Trumpeter T-34/76 1942 model. Ethan, did as I described and mated the WSN and Trumpeter parts together on both of his T-34 and SU-122. There you go, that's the secret

First a quick note...I really appreciate the posts from the other T-34/SU-85/SU-100/SU-122 builders, It's making this a really nice thread
Anyway, enough gushy, it's time to blow stuff up. Spent some time epoxying on the different components of the conversion kit. I have mocked up a gun 'pod' for now. It's going to take some time to develop the gun so for now I'll just put in this mock-up. At least I'll hook up the LED to the recoil as per the 'Doug's Tiger Parts' method.
I also made all new metal handles for the whole tank out of 3/32 steel wire. I love their rigidity and I now do this to all my tanks. I secure them from behind with thick fillets of epoxy.
I am starting to fill the gaps with Tam putty. It's going pretty well and I am sonn ready for a first coat of plastic primer.

This just in.... Corp Diez defects to red forces. Since nobody offers a good Soviet tanker fig I used a 21 Cent figure. I'll paint off the insignia. He has the best resemblance to a Soviet tanker. Plus he loves to fight and the AS gun in the Bulldog quit working

looking good - have to do one of those one day...

What are these pieces? I know where they go but what do they do on the real tank? The WSN kit has them as simple plugs but the conversion kit metal pieces have a cable cast into them.

Pistol Port Plugs???? Didn't the King Tiger have something similar?

I seen a German training film on destroying russian tanks, when one was immobilized that plug popped out of the side of the turret, dangled by the chain and a sub-machine gun poked out and started to fire.

pscartozzi,
Those are pistol ports. The cable is used to secure the removable plug from inside the fighting compartment. For close in defense the plug can be pushed out, so that it hangs on it's cable, then a pistol or hand held weapon can be used to fend off any close in infantry attack. The cable or chain can then be used to pull the plug back into a closed position. The Germans used a similar design. Here's a good example of a deloyed plug on a Sturmtiger.

Hope this helps a little!

Craig

I am not sure where this info Link came from, I am not sure if I stumbled upon it our got it from someone at RCuniverse. Regardless,I thought I would post it with this thread. There are many close up detail shots for reference.

[link=http://www.photoka.info/su-100_2/index.htm]SU100 photos[/link]

I pretty much have the hull fitted up now. Primered and a Russion Armor Green basecoat. Nedd to install a few more items and start weathering it. Beautiful day today in upstate NY so I couldn't resist taking it out for a spin. It drives really well. Due to the smaller dia drive sprocket is is quite a bit slower. You can see at the video when I have it full speed.
Pic's belw show the progress. THe rear view shows the slight alteration I had to make to fit in the HL gearboxes. See if you can even tell.

Here's a vid of it driving
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMs3X9Z_dqo

Hi pscartozzi your SU100 looks great the speed in the video looks more scale. The same thing happened to me when i used the Imperial sturmtiger conversion kit must be the extra weight of all that resin. Keep up the good work

Cheers Ian

How was the quality of the resin casting on your Sturm? Got a pic of the finished deal?

Great video.Really good job there.
The paint on the SU really makes the standard T34 look really plastic looking.
Are you going to paint the wheels also?

I'm kinda in limbo with the wheels. I need the solid wheels without the holes. So, I'll either bite the bullet and paint these ones or figure out a way to make or modify the real wheels.

It should not be that hard to modify the standard weels - not so compicated form , and not so many bolts .....

Hi pscartozzi the casting on the sturm was very thick but well detailed hope to post some pics soon when i finish it but heres a quick taster

Cheers Ian

A little more progress this week. Made a small tray to hold the power switch and a recharging jack. Started weathering but haven't broke out the air brush yet.
I've been thinking about how to reproduce the later style wheels. Here's the pic that StrretSquid originally posted. Look at the ribs on the stock early style wheel, they are about the right height. I cut a paper template that fit's in there pretty well. I might try it with thin styrene. Not sure how to add the bolts and I dont want to cut out 80 of them.