Part 2: The Build, Completed

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I had looked forward to building the Char B1 Bis for some time before actually getting down to it. Once I began it was a treat! I had gathered a good deal of information from an excellent website, chars-francais.net and used it to add many details to the kit.

As is common with armor kits, construction commenced with the road wheels and lower hull in Step 1. There are a total of 64 tiny wheels to be cut free, cleaned up and assembled into 32 sets of road wheels. The instructions would have you leave them free to rotate in their retaining brackets when they are attached to the lower hull in Step 2. I chose to cement them in place on part A1, as no benefit seemed to be gained from leaving them free and assembly to the hull was a bit tricky with the wheels shifting all over the place. Deciding this also simplified clean up of the leftover sprue attachment points, saving time.

In Step 2 the road wheel assemblies and front and rear armor plates are attached. Careful attention to fitting the plates will result in a very neat join when the upper hull is attached requiring no filler beyond a quick wipe of Mr. Surfacer 500.

The drive sprockets and idler wheels are assembled in Step 3 using the poly cap retainers as is Tamiya SOP. I used short strips of .010" plastic to cover the seam in each, quickly eliminating the visible gap between them in a neat manner.

The main 75mm gun was assembled in Step 4, and after the cement dried the resulting seams were cleaned up and smoothed, requiring only a thin coat of Mr. Surfacer. Then the gun is installed in its casemate and the idlers attached to their sub assemblies for later installation on the lower hull in Step 5.

As described, the sub assemblies from Step 4 were installed in Step 5. In that same step the lower hull armor plates are installed, parts D12 and D15. Take care that they are perfectly vertical or they will have a toed-out aspect when the upper hull is installed. I had to adjust mine while the cement was soft enough so that is how I know.

I then painted the idlers and their surrounding structures with Tamiya XF-58 Olive Green, as they would not be accessible after later assembly steps.

Step 6 has you install the inner dust skirts and lower hull inspection hatches.

The real fun begins in Step 7. The instructions direct the builder to open 26 (that's right, 26) holes in the upper hull to allow installation of numerous detail parts later. Easy enough with a pin vise and drill. At this point I deviated from the instructions and opened the rectangular mud chute openings on each front sponson. The chutes themselves get installed in Step 8. The cut lines are molded underneath the sponson floor but the instructions make no mention of opening them. The apertures were easy to open using a sewing needle chucked in a pin vise. Several rapid runs around the perimeter of each cut the basic shape. The chutes were installed and the openings filled, blended and sanded for a smooth appearance. Based on several photos from the website chars-francais.net, I marked out and drilled a whole bunch of pilot holes to install rivets down the length of each sponson. Once done I used Tichy Train Group .035" rivets to fill them, giving a nice approximation of the detail on the original.

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I installed two mud scrapers in front of each mud chute opening. Those were cobbled together from strip styrene and Tichy rivets.

Step 8 involves installation of hull details. The rear sponson walls, parts D5 and D6, have several ejector pin marks on their outer faces that will be visible when assembled, so I removed them. The rear scrapers (parts B3 and B4) that attach to the sponsons benefit from thinning before installation, as they are way out of scale thickness. Other hull details were installed per the instructions.

The upper hull is attached to the lower hull in Step 9 and as directed, six rivets are removed from the rear deck to allow for attachment of detail parts in following steps.

Steps 10, 11, and 12 are concerned with addition of hatches and detail parts. The rear of the head light housing (part B5) was detailed with coiled wire to simulate the tensioning spring and a new adjusting handle. In step 11 I added six bolt heads and a "pig tail" lift hook made from stretched sprue to the top of part #D4, the mantlet of the 75mm gun.

The link-to-link tracks are assembled in Step 13. The molding is excellent and assembly is dead easy, only requiring removal of a small sprue attachment pip on each with a quick swipe of the sanding stick across the top surface. Then they just snap together until the right length is reached. Once assembly was done and test fitted I removed them for painting and weathering.

In Steps 14 and 15 upper hull details were added. I added several rivets and an inspection panel on the engine deck based on the information previously described. I left off the fenders until final painting to allow easy attachment of the tracks, and to ease painting of the hull sides and the undersides of the fenders.

The turret went together easily in Steps 19 and 20. I added six rivets to the top of the commander's cupola along with three lift horns made from stretched sprue. Again, the information came from photos on chars-francais.net.

Painting and Markings
I used the recommended Tamiya paint mix for the yellow ochre base coat that I applied it to the entire tank. After letting that coat dry overnight, I used Silly Putty to mask off the areas to remain ocher and shot the green using Tamiya XF-58 Olive Green. The masks came off and a few touch ups were made. The second coat was allowed to dry for a couple of days.

The next stage was to apply a couple of filter glazes to tone down the contrast and tie the camouflage together. Next day I oversprayed a light coat of Future to gloss coat the vehicle for the next phase. Once that dried I used a pin wash of black and burnt umber to pick out various details and features. Vertical streaking was added using thinned oil paints and dry-brushing.

Last year I reviewed the Miniartprint Decals Char B1 sheet. From it, I selected the markings for FLAMBERGE a two tone camouflaged machine from the 2 DCR, 15 BCC (Bataillion de Chars de Combat) in June 1940. I added decals per the Miniartprint instructions. I found that they went down easily and settled well, with no silvering. The density and opacity were great, and the decals looked lovely once dry. I touched up the decals with streaks and once dry I shot a coat of Floquil flat to seal the decals.

Mud and dust were applied using MiG Pigments (my first such attempt) and light overspray of very thin Light Earth acrylic paint.

Final details
The antenna was made from a length of .030" brass rod. That sounds thick, but the real items were quite stout. I also added a wire from the antenna base to the antenna channel on the rear deck then through to the insulator where it entered the hull.

I added a couple of larger links from an old chain to connect the kit provided tow chains to the rear clevises (clevii?) as per the prototype and wound the chains around the rear deck stowage hooks.

Conclusions
Tamiya has a real winner here. Though the MSRP is steep there is a very good value to the kit with the level of detail and the link-to-link track. It is easy to build and looks "tres chic" when done. Magnifique! Review sample courtesy of Tamiya USA.

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Part 1

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