Yesterday wasn’t of the luckiest days. After having finished a lot of details on the Abrams, I have decided to put a primer on wheels and turret. As I am using Tamiya can primer, if weather and outdoor temperature permits I prefer to apply it outdoors. So I have picked up the mentioned parts and as I was walking out of the front doors, the turret has suddenly slid off the piece of styrofoam I was carrying it on and fell about 4 feet on the concrete stairs. The feeling of despair was indescribable.

As if that wouldn’t be enough, as I have started to try to collect all the pieces that were left scattered around, it started to rain (in addition to the fact that since this was at about 8.30pm it was dark outside). I guess neighbours must have been wondering what is it that I was attempting to do…

Luckily, I was able to recover almost all the pieces of the turret. Forensic examination of the wreckage revealed that the turret must have hit the ground with the right rear corner, composed of the photoetch stowage basket. This might have saved the turret as the photoetch absorbed much of the initial impact and though the basket ended in about 3 pieces, it saved much of the plastic parts from destruction. The plastic part of the stowage basket did not fare much better, but since I have found all the pieces I was able to put it together without any material damage. Rest of the small pieces luckily survived the fall, the coax machine gun broke at the base, but can be attached easily. The only missing piece at this time is the photoetch grill for the auxiliary power unit fan, which I can live without.

At the end, it wasn’t so tragic as it first seemed and around midnight I had most of the turret fixed to its previous stage.

I can tell next time I am carrying things around, I’ll make sure to pay more attention to what I am doing….

• See previous part
• See next part
• Back to main log page