1:25 & 1:48 Vickers Medium Mark I

**CharlieC** · #1 10-30-2021, 11:25 PM

I have the feeling the subtitle of this build will eventually be:

"The cruel tutelage of Michal Rafalski (the designer)"

This build makes sense in the series of British Medium tanks since the Vickers tank was the replacement for the Medium C tank. There was a Medium D tank of which great things were hoped but that turned into a design and requirements mess. The Vickers tank was based on a private venture tank which although interesting had a number of flaws. The private venture tank was redeveloped into the Vickers Medium Mark I and had a number of features new to British tanks:
- the engine was in its own compartment and was air-cooled making it suitable for deserts and very cold climates.
- the main armament was in a turret and the turret was large enough for 3 men.
- the tank had suspension.

About 80 of the Mark I and the slightly modified Mark IA were built and served from their introduction in 1925 until 1938.

My "cunning plan" is to build a 1:25 model, which I've wanted to do for ages and also a 1:48 to fit the series I've already built. I figure I'll have to do lots of workarounds to scale the 1:25 model down but it will be a challenge.

Regards,

Charlie

**CharlieC** · #2 10-30-2021, 11:37 PM

The frames are fairly straightforward provided you are careful and spend time figuring out how it all goes together before cutting pieces out. The frames are not completely glued together - I like to leave parts loose so I can make adjustments when the skins are fitted on.

It's nice that the model comes with English instructions. It saved me from a major gotcha. There's a small grill on the left hull side which you have to build and insert in the frame part before any assembly occurs. It's the small black rectangle in the first image. It's only made out of 8 parts. Did I say that I thought this model was going to require a certain amount of suffering? The track elements require their own little card jigs to put together - let's make that a lot of suffering.

Charlie

**rifleman** · #3 10-31-2021, 02:44 AM

cant wait to see more of this build sir

**romanmodels** · #4 10-31-2021, 03:48 AM

looking good Charlie.

**Don Boose** · #5 10-31-2021, 04:05 PM

This is a major project, Charlie! I will certainly be watching closely to learn more about building tanks in paper.

Michal Rafalski is a great designer, who hasn't been in the Forum for a while. His tank models are uniformly excellent . . . and challenging.

Don

**CharlieC** · #6 10-31-2021, 05:08 PM

I think I've run into the first iceberg...

Thought I'd better start with the hard stuff and look at the tracks. Fortunately I had a series of images of the Vickers Medium Mark II at Bovington and figured the way the tracks are modelled is going to give endless grief. (the Mark II track is the same as the Mark I). The Vickers track had a plate the road wheels ran on with a central folded part rather than a guide plate. The track element joiners were simple plates with pins and the drive was via a pair of small plates on the outside of the central part. The way its modelled I can see endless hassles with the big central block and minute parts. I think I might have to do my own design. Not sure how to scale it down for the 1:48 version yet.

Regards,

Charlie

**CharlieC** · #7 11-01-2021, 04:58 PM

Cursed by knowledge...

Thought I'd start with the turrets, in particular the 1:48 one since I can just emboss the rivets. Went together fine until I had this - "oh bugger there's something wrong here" feeling. The Mark I tank was equiped with two Vickers machine guns on the hull sides in hemispherical mountings. It was also equiped with three mountings on the turret for a Hotchkiss gun - which is a much smaller mount. The model has everything as Vickers machine gun mounts which are about 3 times larger than the Hotchkiss mounts. I've added some images to prove my case. The images of the vehicles are from a Whippet (all Hotchkiss MGs) and a Mark II side MG (Vickers).

Creative solution required I think. I believe the mounts on the turret were normally left empty and only a single Hotchkiss MG was carried in the tank and moved between the mounts as required.

Regards,

Charlie

**CharlieC** · #8 11-01-2021, 06:58 PM

And with a sudden rush of blood (in Australian) or a rush of enthusiasm (the rest)...

Finished the 1:48 turret. Cheated on the gun barrel and receiver - they are the paper shaft from a cotton bud peeled down to the right diameter. The MG mounts were simple in the end - just treated them like big rivets - cut out disks and shaped them with a ball end tool to get my guess at the right profile. The ventilator at the top of the turret at the back shows up as domed in the images - the model had it as conical - with the recent success with the MG mounts did it again with a shaped disk. One of the images has a 5cm scale cube.

While I think of it - the hole for the turret in the frame is too large for the hole in the part at the bottom of the turret - easy to fix with a extra strip around the turret plug.

Regards,

Charlie

**rifleman** · #9 11-02-2021, 11:59 AM

fine work sir

**Don Boose** · #10 11-02-2021, 12:17 PM

Excellent turret, Charlie!

Don