My Daring project

I've been away for some time from this forum, even though I visit it weekly, though I haven't stopped from building models. I spent these last 4 months working on a daring project, I have put aside all other projects after I finished the Humvee and started building a semi scratch SPG / tank. This was a daring move for me, for several reasons, two of which are the following, I am still new in this hobby and I took the challenge of scratch building and second is that this SPG has very little documentation on it, so I couldn't find any descent photos or accurate doccumentation on it (only a schematic diagram helped me out).

A short briefing on this SPG:

The SU-26 Self Propelled Gun, was a variant of the T-26 tank, where the chasis of the T-26 was used and modified to carry a 76.2mm regimental gun on it and also had 2 x DT-4 (tank version of the DP-27). Only 14 were produced in Leningrad around 1941, of which 2 were equipped with 37mm guns (no records on this so not sure of the exact numbers)

Here are some photos of my progress.

computer image


Actual photo of when it was produced


My Project









More to follow

Starting details
Turret Detail





Canon
I tried to look for a set with the soviet 76.2mm but couln't find an adequate one so I decided to try and do it myself.







Exhaust


DT-4 machine Guns




more to follow

I tried to get all the detail possible on this from the little documentation I had

Trying out parts on turret




Starting to assemble turret


Canon with aiming device




more to follow

At this stage I mixed the colour I wanted on this SPG and started painting, unfortunately i cannot show the exact colour on teh photos since the ambient light and the camera settings vary the tone of the original colour.

Painting body(not body painting )



Washes and chipping
here came my challenge, because I had no idea on how the chipping , wearing and weathering would be on an open SPG, so I tried looking for open top SPGs and try to work on that.








More to follow

So far I'm at this stage, so I still need some body wear and mud and grim, I'm trying to figure out the best way to do this and what actually to put on it (mud or only dust)

The following are some weathering trials I was doing before applying them on teh actual model








I know its not a professional built and also lots of things could have been done better (meta toqod thares lejhom wara tinduna bl'sbalji), but with experience things get better

I mainly started building this model, because I play World of Tanks and I started to like the SU-26 SPG on it and when I tried to find a kit to build for my collection, surprisingly I couldn't find any, so I took that challenge to try and build this. These 4 months have been very challenging, but I'm quite satisfied with the result and will be finishing it soon, hopefully before this month ends

I hope you all like it.

I will post my final results as soon as it will be ready.

Well done for going for a daring project which little is known about. From my references this only made it to a few portotypes and probably never fired in anger ...

Very good built though unfortunetly have to judge only from the images on some partitions were the panels are joining looks to have some space in between, hats on on the other side for achieving a perfect row of bolts not an easy task ...


Hope Alex will jump in he is much more into scratchbuilding ...

yeah unfortunately I had some problems joining the panels, though they are touching, I will post more photos as I start weathering it, which should show it in better light


As for the SU-26 it was in battle field and unfortunately all the 12 produced went destroyed, here are some photos of it in the battle field




Self-propelled 76mm gun based on T-26's chassis supports an infantry attack. Leningrad Front, the 220th Tank Brigade, winter of 1943.

These are the only photos I found of the SU-26

these other 2 are on their manufacture state

Some work eh.... welldone ...

Conversions are always a hard job, especially availability of research material.

Never the less - a job well done.

prosit.

That is interesting never came across the field operated images, I have only seen sketches plan and factory images, thanks that is great for sharing. Have to say that during the siege of Leningrad everything that could fire was brought in for use ... was one of the worst theatres for both attackers and defenders.

well done ...

Ivan

Not a tank man but i think you did an amazing job, it looks great and your attention to detail is really high class, well done i say but then again no expert.

some more updates, I feel a little scared now doing the weathering, I'm afraid I might over do it or do it wrong.



I only posting this photo because I have to resize the others and this one too.

Sry

Looks awesome, lovely work

IMHO it looks Awesome!!!