Tiger I Ausf. E

Manufacturer: Revell AG.

By Michael Hatch and Stephen Hodge (photographer).

This is my second of twoRevell-Germany Tigers using Part's photoetched Zimmerit. I builtthis 'Ausf. E' as a late production, steel wheel machine of someunknown unit that could have been deployed on any front theGermans were fighting on during the summer of 1944.

Checking the parts freshout of the model box, everything looked good. One tree of partscontains the later parts necessary for a mid-production vehicleand an extra fifth tree has the steel road wheels. The otherthree trees are the same as provided with Revell's Ausf. H.

The Part Zimmerit Sheet (Iused #027) is one of the less intimidating photoetched sheetsI've seen. Use of this set looked like it would be fairlystraightforward and it was. Its was only necessary to remove somemolded on details from the kit's hull back plate. Again, you wantto test fit the various zimmerit components before gluinganything.

Before I started assembly,I shaved off the necessary details from the hull's back plate andthe molded on tools from the hull's top plate. I then put thebasic hull and turret parts together leaving off the exhaustsystem, running gear, mud flaps and guards, turret storage bin,and other fiddley bits. I filled the tow cable assemble mountingholes with crazy glue gel and sanded smooth. I then started toattach the zimmerit using crazy glue gel. I used the gel becauseit takes a minute or so to set, giving you a little bit of timeto adjust the positioning. As an alternate you could probably use15-minute epoxy. With either adhesive, you want to spread itfairly thin, place the component, and let it dry thoroughlybefore moving on to the next one. The hull side sections turnedout to be a couple of millimeters too short. I mounted mine flushwith the rear of the hull and after painting the gap at front ofthe hull's side it is hardly noticeable. I also mistakenly gluedkit part #34 (the mantle's reinforcing bar) onto the mantlebefore applying zimmerit part #19. I recovered from this bycutting zimmerit part #19 in two and trimming down the upper andlower sections to fit around kit part #34. It took an extra fiveminutes or so and was the biggest problem I had with the entireproject. I then finished off the remaining hull and turretdetails excluding the running gear. I added the loader's turretroof hatch hinges and handles to the various hatches and to hullglacis plate in front of the driver's visor. I used a piece ofthe zimmerit's photoetched frame to make a spare track holder onthe hull's lower front.

I then hand painted thebase coat using Humbrol Panzer Yellow. The mud flaps, mudguards,muffler shield, drive sprockets; rear idlers and road wheels werepainted off of the model. At this point I checked the edgesaround the zimmerit sections and the hull top were I had removedthe molded on tools from. Any gaps or pits were filled with crazyglue gel. The tracks were painted Humbrol Gunmetal and when dry,given an orange watercolour wash. When that was dry, they wererubbed down with a silver pencil crayon.

I then assembled andpainted the drive sprockets. Five individual track links weretest fitted and then glued to each sprocket. Only when I wasready to install the already painted, inner road wheels (parts#58) did I mount the sprockets on the model. At this time I didnot glue the sprockets in place, relying on the road wheels tohold them in place but allowing them to rotate. The rear idlerwheels were then glued into place, followed by the middle row ofroad wheels. I lightly glued the mud flaps and guards into placein preparation for spraying on the camouflage. Humbrol Panzer RedBrown and Panzer Dark Green were sprayed on and touched up byhand to remove any overspray. When dry, the mud flaps and guardswere removed to allow more room to attach the tracks. I cutsegments from both mudguards and left these aside until I wasfinished with the tracks. The tracks were assembled by firstplacing track part #18 off the bottom of the drive sprocket andworking back toward the rear idlers ending with track part #17. Ithen started track part #16 off of the top of the drive sprocketand worked my way back to the rear idlers again. Uneven gaps werethe tracks met were hidden on the top of rear idlers by cuttingthe individual links down to fit. After the tracks were in placeI finally installed the outer road wheels and reinstalled the mudflaps and segmented side mudguards.

I used the kit decals thatwere only slightly off register and these were applied onto wetFuture floor wax and allowed to dry for 24 hours before decalsetting solution was applied to them. The jerry cans are Levaresin, the tank commander is a soft vinyl figure and the antennawas made with soft steel wire. Spare track was taken from myearlier Ausf. H kit and from a second Ausf. E kit I bought forspares. These were attached around the turret sides and on thehull front as applique armour. I repositioned the jack into avertical position between the mufflers and added a shovel to hullglacis from the spares box. For the tow cables I cut the ends offof the kit supplied ones, drilled out their ends and crazy gluedthick thread that had been dipped in Humbrol Gunmetal paint intothe holes. This was positioned in a 'ready to tow' configurationbeing already attached to the front tow shackles.

Weathering was done withbrown, pastel chalk dust on the running gear, black on the enginedeck and dark grey on the main armament's muzzle. The molded invision ports were filled in with black paint and the faces of theperiscopes were also painted black. This gives the elusion ofdepth and makes them more noticeable. The mufflers were firstpaint with Humbrol Gunmetal and while the paint was still wet,baking powder was sprinkled on them. The excess was blown off andthey were allowed to dry. A wash of light brown watercolour wasthen applied for that rusty look.

I really enjoyed this kitand am very happy with the way the zimmerit turned out. I wouldrecommend both the kit and the zimmerit to anyone.

Like my Ausf. H, I stillplan to add wire screens across the engine compartment intakes.If I had to build this model again, I don't think I would changethe way I built it very much. I still need to practice putting onindividual track links though.

References includeSquadron's 'Tigers In Action', 'Panzer Colors Vol. 1 2 & 3','SS Armor', Osprey's Vanguard 'The Tiger Tanks', and variousConcord publications on the Russian Front.This site: http://www.panzerdiesel.com/eng/e27p6.php has some nice pictures of Zimmeriton Tiger I's and this site: http://www.track-link.net/articles/vArticle.php?aid=15 has a good history of Zimmerit ingeneral.