Tamiya Char B1 bis (2007)

[Bill Plunk]

I started in with the weathering process today and what I thought would be a couple of hours turned into an entire day-long affair. There's a lot of surface area with the Char and it looks deceptively small but once I got started, I realized that the best way to approach it was in sections. I started with the hull sides first, then did the front half of the hull, followed by the turret, then the back half. Doing it this way kept me from feeling rushed and allowed each section to be done at its own pace. I'll use the right hull side to demonstrate the steps since they were followed in the same pattern for the whole vehicle.

The first step was to apply dots of Raw Sienna enamel across the entire camo scheme with a spotter brush. Once this had touch dried, I followed along with a 0 round brush and clean thinner and converted the dots into a filter coat over both camo colors. The Raw Sienna creates a nice earth tone tint as a filter and serves as the foundation for the rest of the weathering.



Once that had dried, I applied a similar spot pattern of Medium Green to the green sections only to allow for some variation in the green and to mix with the Raw Sienna applied earlier to the same end. These spots were blended in the same way, but needed a little bit more care to make sure they didn't spill over into the dark yellow areas. One of the advantages of applying this over a coat of Future is that it's very easy to clean up any mistakes with a Q-tip dampened with thinner or a brush for the harder to reach areas.



Next up was a pin wash applied with a 20/0 brush of 90/10 thinner/paint Burnt Umber enamel wash. Burnt Umber is a dark color that provides some good depth/shadow but I didn't want it to be too heavy and in some places it was necessary to come back after the thinner had dried and fine-tune it a bit to get the look I wanted. I also introduced some slight streaking in various places which will be combined with the Mig pigment treatment later on.



This same treatment was then applied to the rest of the vehicle.





As a final capstone to the day's activities, I went ahead and mounted the tow chains on the rear hull after it had been weathered. The kit instructions provide a step-by-step guide on how to drape the chains to get the desired look but only demonstrate one side...and of course, once one side is mounted, it's the second side that is more challenging to get right, but I managed after some fiddling back and forth. I'd painted the chain non-buffing Metalizer Gunmetal at the same time as I painted the track runs and they were given a Rust wash followed with Burnt Umber drybrushing and finally a Burnt Umber wash once mounted on the vehicle.



Not a whole lot remains to be done, essentially just applying a Dullcoat over the current setup and then giving it a Mig pigment treatment and mounting the tracks. Heading down the homestretch on this one.

[Bill Plunk]

Started off the final round this morning by giving the entire model a coat of Model Master Lusterless dullcoat in the rattlecan. I allowed this to sit for a couple of hours and cure up before beginning with the Mig powders.



I gave some thought to which combination of powders I would use for this one and finally settled on a two-tone approach using Dark Mud and Europe Dust. My reasoning was straightforward, France in late spring 1940 would likely have had both muddy and dusty conditions and the reference photos of different Chars seems to bear this out. I started out by applying the Dark Mud wet by brush all over the areas between the fenders and the sponsons, around the drive sprocket and mud scraper areas, and around the idler. Once this had air dried, I came back over the same areas with a smaller brush and spot applied the Dust over it so it would have a two tone-appearance vs. mixing them together and applying as one application.



Once all that was dried, I took a round stiff bristled brush and worked the two colors together while removing excess pigment at the same time.



As a last step, I took a q-tip and mositened one end and alternated with the dry end, blended and worked the effect more around the bolt heads and to create some streaks/runs from where mud/dust would have been scraped off and run down the sides. A side effect of using the q-tip is that it also buffs/fixes the pigments into the finish, a combination I think of the fine pigment powder and the "tooth" of the dullcoat finish, but the end result is it can be handled, with care, without any additinal fixative needed.



This process was repeated on the other side and the hull front and rear. I wasn't too sure how best to go about handling the hull top and turret, it kept bothering me especially in contrast to the weathered hull sides. The green in particular seemed too clean vs. the rest of the vehicle, so I opted to apply a thinned down water-based wash of the Europe Dust and let it air dry to create a thin film of dust. Once dried, it was also adjusted with the stiff bristled brushes and q-tip where needed.



In the course of all this, I'd also applied a wet coat of Europe Dust to both tracks and allowed them to airdry so it was now time to install them. This was a bit of a puzzle at first, since both the vehicle and the tracks were weathered, I wasn't quite sure how best to handle them for installation. After a couple of unsuccessful attempts with tweezers, I opted to remove the sprockets and use the old "rubberband" track method. The tracks were connected at the ends and looped over the idler, adjusted into place over the top skids and the roadwheels, then the sprocket set in the end of the tracks and carefully maneuvered back onto its mount post. The tracks runs are a tight fit, but the Tamiya grommet design for the sprockets made this the best option for installation. I also installed the clear lens for the auxiliary headlamp that was converted from a Pzkpw I-B leftover set in the spares bin.



One final adjustment was made in the form of some light drybrushing of Steel to the track faces and work was done.

Then it was off to the photo booth for the finished shots.