Luft46's Blog

This is a quick comparison between the Extratech and Ace kits. As such the min differences between the GAZ -98 and 98K are in the engine area. The larger engine of the earlier version needed a larger support structure at the rear. The later verion is more open. with no upward sweep but with a strengthening metal rectangle at the rear bottom section. Where the kits differ in terms of detail I have highlighted below.

Machingun support ring – the Ace support ring is thicker and not 2D but the Extratech kit will be able to be fixed with white glue to make it round in cross section. The four attachment points on the ET kit are in brass and more realistic than the thicker prts of the Ace kit.
Seats – here Ace wins with both top and bottom cushions. ET only supply the bottom and will need some Milliput for the back.
Skis – a bit of  both here – the ET kit has much thinner scale realistic skis but is let down by not having the two strehgtheing ridges on the triangular reinforing mount, a little sprue is needed here.
Other parts – such as the support springs, machine gun etc are cruder in moulding and the ET kit has some extra details in etched brass as you ould expect. Both kits will benefit from Little Lenses or similar fo the main light.
Neither kit supplies decals but markings were rrely used on these craft.
Unsurprisingly the ET is the betterof the two but a little ork should make the Ace kit presentble and it is the only version in 1/72 of the 98K.

Below is the cleaned up parts for the ET kit from today. Not seen in this photo is the green putty from Citadel added to the main body due to a slight sawing accident. On the top right is the rather large pile of leftover resin. Below this is the 3 saws I used in this process. The largest is used on bigger cuts such as the main body and engine. The middle one is used on most of the rest of the work and the smalleest was used on fine articles like the springs that are prone to breaking. It is actually an etched steel saw.

This is the RF-8 aerosan, being the driver and machine gunner version with a partly cowled engine. There is another similar version with a more boxlike engine mount. I got this kit recently from a friend who orders way more models than I do. It came in a box of 8 kits and 3 lots of accessories but more on that later. The Ace kit along with a MicroMir Sprengboot came from a Russian website that includes boxtops in a flat form to save on postage. NKR models used to do the same so this doesn’t worry me. The reason for its sudden elevation up the list is that the plastic bag it came in has broken and the smallest sprue of one part was already adrift in the box. Rather than lose anything it will be started now, or maybe tomorrow as dinner beckons.

Over the past few months I have commenced three kits which have reached the stage of needing primer and have then stalled. These are the E-10 tank, the BV P202 and of course the Hanomag. Tonight i will unleash primer on them. In the case of the 202 and the Hanomag there has also been a little masking required. Mostly this has been toilet paper but also a little Tamiya tape for the 202 cockpit.

I have also dug out some Aerosan kits from a few manufacturers. Two are from Extratech and two from Ace in the Ukraine. The former are resin and brass joys and well the latter are Ace kits in all their limited run glory. Because the engine is the same in both Aerosans they have been able to use two sprues twice, a la Hasegawa but not at the same  level of quality.
As both companies do a Gaz 98 with the difference mainly in the engine area it will be interesting to compare them.
Below is my reference material.

The Tankograd book is the only one on the market AFAIK. It is quite comprehensive with lots of photos including some diorama ideas.
Below is the Extratech kit of a GAZ 98.

More later!

No other hassles apart from two cycles of PSR and this is now ready for primer. As it stands I now have three kits primer ready so it is just a matter of waiting for the right humidity conditions. In the meantime I will be doing some work on the small parts. This includes a MG42 in brass in 3 pieces from Eduard and a night vision set stolen from a Pegasus Hobbies E25 kit.

This is now taking shape. Yesterday I got the top deck glued on as well as the rear. The top deck had to be done in two stages with the front sloped portion done first then a saw cut made at the pivot point where it changes to a flat top section. I super glued down the top section held down by 2 pegs given by a friend. This type are quite strong and held the parts together well – see below

Next up was cutting out the rear section and attaching this. The front gun was cut and drilled and inserted into the saukopf mantlet – certainly looks like a pigs head to me in terms of its shape. Last up was the usual run of Milliput along all the joints. And to answer a query on the Whatif Modellers forum my left over Milliput is put into the gaps around my workbench that I built around ten years ago., still plenty to fill on the front.

The last photo is the Milliput line above which is a stack of modelling magazines still to be read.

The last few weeks have seen very little modelling done. The BV P202 is awaiting primer and the hot weather lately has made that unlikely. In the meantime I have started the Kora E-10 paper panzer in 1.72 resin. The only reason I am doing this kit is that I found some rubber tracks to replace the resin ones. I also have some night vision gear for a late war panzer. I have a house spider in the bottom of my window and she is working overtime catching flies today. Anyway below are some quick progress shots. My next post will be looking at the box of booty I bought back recently from a friends place which is 6 months worth of purchases.

BV P202

And the E10