Armor/AFV: Softskins
Softskins group discussions.
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Special Forces GMV Afghanistan
RobH
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Posted: Monday, October 27, 2014 - 12:34 AM UTC
I'm subscribing and getting notifications, although I'm partly loathe to tell you because everyone for who it's working for will get told about my email.....

so better put in some content......

interesting build so far....I have 2 Legends GMV conversions to do...... so very useful

young_sven
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Skåne, Sweden
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Posted: Monday, October 27, 2014 - 02:24 AM UTC
I haven't subscribed in the system since i would prefer only to get notifications when the author (i.e. you Mario) makes updates.

Nothing against everyone else, but I don't want my e-mail to explode like it does after commenting someone's post on facebook, i.e. 100 messages such as "the post you commented on has now been commented on by somebody else" haha.

Is it possible to subscribe so notifications are only sent when the author makes an update?

Short answer Mario - I am following your build "manually" without notifications :-)
Maki
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ARMORAMA
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Posted: Wednesday, November 05, 2014 - 09:29 AM UTC
I thought all the surgeries performed so far fixed the issues of fitting the Black Dog resin piece into Tamiya Humvee. Boy, was I wrong.

Dry fitting the roof revealed more problems. The large resin piece sits way too high... it blocks the perfect alignment of the roof and obstructs adding the roof communication units.





So, I started removing new portions of resin:



and replacing it with some resin bits from my spares box:



There is still a lot of work to be done in order to get everything aligned perfectly, and I'm getting pretty frustrated... Is the Black Dog resin piece worth all this trouble? I wonder how much of the original piece will be left after I'm through with it.

Now it seems the Legend conversion with some extra stowage would be a much better solution for the cargo bay.

Mario
Trisaw
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California, United States
Joined: December 24, 2002
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Posted: Wednesday, November 05, 2014 - 01:41 PM UTC
Mario, is the resin trimming really necessary? If you look at the BlackDog box art photo, the side slats, canvas roof cover, and all the extra gear on the side really hides the back pillars from view, meaning the viewer would not have a clue if the roof is resting on pillars or on the gear itself.

I would think that all that resin gear would hide a lot of the issues with construction. If the cargo doesn't fit properly, then perhaps there would be gear to cover up this fact.

I know that this may sound like a cop-out, but the box photo seems to suggest that the fit issue isn't really a problem since it's all hidden under vast amounts of gear.
Maki
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ARMORAMA
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Posted: Wednesday, November 05, 2014 - 09:54 PM UTC
Pete, I'm not sure if I'll use Black Dog roof or not. I know the rolled canvas pieces on the side and back of the roof could hide a lot, but that's just not the way I want to do this project.

Mario
Stefan1580
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Berlin, Germany
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Posted: Wednesday, November 05, 2014 - 10:41 PM UTC
Hi Mario,

very nice build so far and i am sorry for you about the big Problems you have with that nice looking Black Dog conversion set.

Here is a link to see the Problems if you use it with the Bronco M1114 kit!

Humvee GMV

i had the Black dog set one on my list too but after that and your Problems i will change to the Legend Productions one. It cost about 30€ more in my local shop than the Black dog one but i think it is worth the Price when i see these Problems.

To cut away half of the Resin bits to realize an good fit is a shame to black dog. Why has nobody try out it by black dog before they release this total noncomforming product.

i have the Pro Art Models conversion set and it is OK but i won´t buy it again. The Lengend one offers much more pieces, looks briliant, has high Quality and there are parts included for the Academy kit if you have one in stash too instead of the Tamiya one.

So many thanks for your wip and make the best of it.

Bye, bye

Stefan
andrekidbsb
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Distrito Federal, Brazil
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Posted: Wednesday, November 05, 2014 - 11:22 PM UTC
I had the same problem. The blackdog's stowage didn't fit under the Hmmwv roof and I sanded the "camelbak"to fit it.
I don't understand why they didn't test it before sell it.

I'll post some photos tomorrow.
Good Luck
Maki
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ARMORAMA
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Posted: Wednesday, November 05, 2014 - 11:50 PM UTC
Stefan, thanks for the link. Actually I saw that build, it was the only example of using Black Dog Humvee conversion I found on the internet.

I don't know how is it possible the Black Dog piece has so many fit issues. The problems keep piling up wherever I turn to... I thought I may have not positioned the piece correctly when I started fitting it to the cargo bay, but I'm pretty sure that was not the case.

As for Legend conversion, I got it for about $70 at Lucky Models (free shipping) which is 7 euro more than I paid for Black Dog. Just a thought...

Mario
Maki
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ARMORAMA
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Posted: Wednesday, November 05, 2014 - 11:55 PM UTC
Andre, thanks for your feedback. Yes, the camelback is too tall and has to be removed to fit the roof... Now I'm pretty sure the problem is in the Black Dog piece.

Mario
BobSolo
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Posted: Thursday, November 06, 2014 - 10:10 AM UTC
I would have probably chopped a bit out the roof to make a "SF custom" I like what youve done to correct and cover the mistakes, must have took time but it looks good.

To me some black dog guns look "floppy", similar to this item, it looks like they were taken out of the mold too early before they had set, or maybe the mold was not ridgid?

Anyway congratulations for sticking it out with the blackdog kit, seems like a bit of a nightmare to have done so much to it allready and its still not right, keep at it, your doing great so far! Just try to imagine it all painted up nice, it will be worth it in the end.
grimmo
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Queensland, Australia
Joined: January 17, 2006
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Posted: Tuesday, November 11, 2014 - 04:38 PM UTC
looking good so far! the black dog stuff looks good. but what it with the roof? I thought the hummers had hard tops, not canvas roofs.
kubisz
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Wojewodztwo Slaskie, Poland
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Posted: Tuesday, November 11, 2014 - 05:12 PM UTC
Matt, sometimes in GMVs metal roofs was covered with canvas.
The3rdPlacer
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Florida, United States
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Posted: Monday, November 17, 2014 - 10:38 PM UTC
Looks nice Mario, with all that resin you wont have to worry about it blowing off the contest table!

Ryan
Maki
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ARMORAMA
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Posted: Friday, November 21, 2014 - 09:15 PM UTC
Thanks for the encouragement guys.

Here is the progress... Another major surgery performed on the other side of the large resin chunk. All the removed items were replacedthe by some pieces from my spares box.



Now everything fits the cargo bay perfectly...





the crossbar can be installed...



and the roof as well.



I think this is it regarding the Black Dog piece. Finally.

Mario
Trisaw
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Posted: Friday, November 21, 2014 - 10:36 PM UTC
Great work, Mario! The corrections look really good!
BobSolo
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Posted: Saturday, November 22, 2014 - 01:01 AM UTC
Yes great work indeed, looks awesome!
Maki
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ARMORAMA
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Posted: Saturday, November 22, 2014 - 01:15 PM UTC
Thanks guys. Hope to show you more progress soon.

Mario
MakiWawa
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Warszawa, Poland
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Posted: Wednesday, December 17, 2014 - 01:44 AM UTC
Hi Maki,
I have the same set and gladly I will look, like for oneself with it to advise. With Kubisz we work actively on the Humvee Forum, and I have over 30 humvee's in my collection. Great job
Maki
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ARMORAMA
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Posted: Wednesday, December 17, 2014 - 01:45 PM UTC
Hi Piotr, thanks for your comments. I have been working slowly on the roof and some other Humvee parts and it seems there is a lot of fine tuning necessary all around. I will post some progress this weekend.

Mario
MakiWawa
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Posted: Thursday, December 18, 2014 - 01:46 AM UTC
Why didn't you use the roof from the set? The inside looks curiously, although the front not very exactly fits the frame of the front window. In January I will be building dumvee with using this conversion, so willingly I will use your workshop
Maki
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ARMORAMA
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Posted: Thursday, December 18, 2014 - 02:52 AM UTC
The Black Dog roof looks good, perhaps a bit simplified. I finally decided not to do the canvas roof and cut the roof from Tamiya Humvee instead.

Mario
Maki
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ARMORAMA
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Posted: Friday, December 19, 2014 - 05:43 PM UTC
Some work on the roof. There were some issues with Legend's turret ring, but with the help from reference photos (thanks Rob!) I think I managed to make the best of it. It is still far from perfect though. A lot of things are still not attached to facilitate painting:



I scratched roof plates from sheet styrene. Legend provides two of those in PE, but I wanted the BFT CPU also attached to the roof so I had to make one additional plate... then I decided to do them all in styrene. Bolts were added as well. The tape (have no clue what it is for) and tie downs were attached per reference photos.



Here's how it all looks now:



Again, the tape and tie downs. Tie downs are an amazing resin bits from Arms Corps Models. Jason did an absolutely wonderful job on these and they look much more realistic than PE tie downs:



All GMVs I have seen feature the tapes attached to this portion on the vehicle. It seems there is a lot of duck tape (is it duck tape?) all around the GMV.

I also started to assemble the side walls of the cargo bay:





These will have to be cut to length before attaching them to roof crossbar support.

Mario
Neo
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Posted: Friday, December 19, 2014 - 08:08 PM UTC
Mario,

Your doing a great job on this, love all the xtra detailing.
I building similar one now, but not w/ half the work of yours...
Humvee Envy ! LoL
BobSolo
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Posted: Friday, December 19, 2014 - 11:42 PM UTC
Great work, the details really make it look real. The tape looks like an anti-slip/anti-bump strip of thin rubber bonded on in this picture http://www.hmmwvinscale.com/photos/GMV-S-SOF/GMV-S%206.jpg see how it covers the rivet and goes round the back too. Imo it has to be anti slip/bump if its on the edge of a roof where things thrown in the back could hit it and also spent ammo cases thrown down from the roof into the back might damage the roof. This GMV appears to have a much thicker rubber strip attached instead http://www.americanspecialops.com/photos/special-forces/gmv-afghanistan.php which again i think is for protecting the body work when loaded with kit hanging off the sides.

Cheers Bob
Trisaw
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Posted: Saturday, December 20, 2014 - 12:36 AM UTC
Great work, Mario! The extra resin bits are really what is making this GMV special. I didn't even know that these items were offered.

When you're finished, please make a list of the manufacturers you have used and where one can get them. I'm sure there might be some modelers who want to follow in your footsteps.