Building a 1/30th Scale Landing Craft Tank (1 Viewer)

[arnhem44mad]

Some weeks ago I decided I wanted to try my hand at building to build a 1/30th scale Landing Craft Tank to go with my King & Country Collection.


1. Before starting the drawing plans I had to weigh up whether it would be better to have either:

A ) A US LCT
B ) British (Royal Navy) LCT

To work this out I simply looked at what figures I could I could assign as 'crew' which I already owned and which ones I could buy to add as crew as well from each Navy.

The winner was the US LCT.

When I first decided to make an LCT I drew the single A4 paper coloured drawings at my girlfriends house one night. They were not to scale but just basic drawing board ideas.

The next night I decided to make a to scale model on A4 (birds eye view) of some estimated sizes. I used about 9 pieces of A4 paper for this. My girlfriend left me to it and supplied the paper, pencils, sharpener, rubber, ruler, paper, tape and a decent sized table to work with! I then realised that if I went ahead with it I would have to make it in at least 3 different sections...

Scott

 

[arnhem44mad]

2. I made the scale drawing by estimation with no figures or vehicles to use as guides for sizes. I then brought it home and sized it up. It was very good guess work but a bit off and I hadn't touched it again for a few weeks.

Then last Thursday (21st December) I went to my girlfriend's house as we were spending Christmas there. That night she gave me a small gift bag with several gifts in it:

A set with a ruler, several triangles and a protractor.
Coloured pencils
An A4 booklet with cm2 Paper

Probably my favourite and most used gift I have ever been given (and I got it a few days early!)

I was originally basing my creation on a friend's model but I realised, after researching different makes of LCT that this was not a realistic model as it had a steering wheel area which was open to the elements which none actually had. The wheel was always based in a wheelhouse which had some armour plating. There were several models of LCTs to choose from.

I have decided to try to create a Mark 5 LCT with certain charestics of a Mark 2. The Mark 5 was a US creation (the US Navy did not officially use the other models - Mark 1 - Mark 3, but there are lots of sources of the US Army being on them with Royal Navy Crewmen. The Mark 5 was based on a British plan which originally called for an LCT with a ramp at both ends to enable the LCT to be used for getting vehicles from Landing Ships (a higher class of 'craft' although the ship designation was because it did not have a flat bottom). Landing Craft have flat bottoms, Ships do not.

The Mark 5 ended up being a single ramped LCT, 117 foot long with a beam (width) of 32 feet, which could hold up to 5x 30 ton or 4x 40 ton tanks or 150 tonnes of cargo. It had a crew of 12 men and one Officer.

3rd picture is a Royal Navy Mark 2, 4th picture is a US Navy Mark 5...

Scott

 

[arnhem44mad]

3. I started using the cm2 paper last Thursday and have had a great time so far! Making the rear end of the LCT including wheelhouse, area for funnel and Armament areas and stairs as well as some of the railing.

I taped the paper to the cardboard and cut as I planned. The end result will be a to scale 1/30th model Mark 5 Landing Craft Tank crewed by US Navy personnel which will be 119 cm long by 33 cm wide. It will have aspects of an LCT Mark 2, such as the elevated armament positions to the rear and sides of the wheel house. I am aiming to have dual bofors guns on each side protecting the LCT from enemy shore fire. The ramp will also be of similair build and shape to the Mark 2's...

Scott

 

[arnhem44mad]

4. The next step before going any further building wise was to add figures to the cardboard practice model and see if they fit for size. I also had to try out vehicles to check that the loading area was wide enough for tanks...

It looks pretty good but you do need a large area to display it!

I have ordered some modelling foam so the next step sill be to begin building the final product starting with the side which I have already created...

Scott

 

[THE SHOOTIST]

Great tutorial! Can't wait to see the finished product.

 

[arnhem44mad]

Great tutorial! Can't wait to see the finished product.

Thanks mate! I recon it will be a while but I will try to post hete regularly with updates!

Scott

 

[arnhem44mad]

LCT with US troops.

Scott

 

[Bombon]

LCT with US troops.

Scott

A very interesting project!