M51 Isherman

About the vehicle:

There are probably a couple of variants of the up-gunned shermans used by Israel around the 60's. One of these is the M51 Isherman. It had a French 105 mm main gun and diesel engine added on to a cast hull sherman with the HVSS suspension.

Why I built this model:

Anyone who has ever read the Sheperd Paine's book "how to build dioramas" would have probably been inspired the tank transporter diorama featured towards the end of the book. This to me is one of the best dioramas I have ever seen to date. The HVSS suspension on the cast sherman hull and the modified turret with the extra long gun epitomizes the look of what a tank should be. Plus all those lovely equipment on the side of the hull is simply irresistible. Shep's conversion was in 1/35 scale. I decided to do this in 1/72nd as I have not seen anyone try it yet.

About the kit:

You can see the box art for the 2 kits used in this conversion. The Esci sherman kit is magnificent, with partial interior detail composed of the transmission and an aircraft type radial engine. The hatches can be built in open or closed and the 50 cal MG is one of the best at this scale.

The Hasegawa kit is fairly decent and matches up well with the Esci kit in terms of size. Now that I have the two main ingredients, it was time to do a little cooking!

Parts Breakdown:

The main reference was Shep's article on the Isherman in his book "modelling tanks and other military vehicle". He provided a great set of drawings in 1/70 scale. These were shrunk to 1/72 scale on a photocopier.

The side view pic of the model on the right shows the parts breakdown. The blue toned parts are from the hasegawa kit, the orange ones were scratchbuilt and the normal colored ones are the Esci kit. The HVSS road wheel bogies were attached to plastic tubing that was glued to the Esci Hull. The drive sprocket should probably be moved forward a little bit but I did not bother to do this. I think I may have shortened the tracks to get a better fit and then used staple wire to join them together. The tracks from the hasegawa kit were of the vinyl type and the paint will come of if you rub it too hard.

Scratchbuilt parts:

Turret details: The main gun plastic tubing was tapered slightly by mounting onto a motor and sanding it to shape. I had tried to make the muzzle break by vacuforming plastic sheet but I ended up carving a piece square plastic rod to get the right shape. Some plastic strip was added for additional detail. The gun mantlet was from the hasegawa kit with a bigger sleeve added using copper tubing. The rear counter weight is epoxy putty, the side loader's hatch is from ESCI. Copper wire lifting hooks were added along with plastic rod smoke grenade launchers. The spare track links were cast from the extra pieces cut off to shorten the track.

Hull details: these were scratchbuilt using plastic sheet and cast using one piece latex molds and plaster of Paris. The plaster cast pieces were sealed with Gunze surfacer to prevent chipping as the plaster was very delicate. Jericans were converted from the ones found in the hasegawa camping ground set (if I recall correctly). The engine deck is more plastic sheets and the screen was from the material used in silk screening t-shirts (a nice fine mesh). Spare road wheels were cast from the hasegawa wheels and the shovel is from the Esci kit. Periscopes were added to the drivers hatches.

Painting:

I made a mixture of dessert yellow, dark yellow and a little white (tamiya acrylics) for the base coat which was airbrushed on. A lighter version was then mixed and airbrushed on the horizontal surfaces to simulate fading paint. Scuffed with silver, washed with dark brown oils (thinned with turpentine) and finally dry brushed with more oil paint.

Tank Transporter:

Like the sherman the transporter is a WW-II vintage and the kit is from matchbox. It's 1/76 scale and so the Isherman looks a bit big on it, I don't really mind. I was thinking of scratchbuilding the dragon wagon but maybe not. I do have the plans from sheps book, hmmm...