Tiger 1321, 13. Panzer kompanie (Schwere) SS Panzer Regiment LSSAH, ZUG II, Kursk 1943.

Meet the crew of Tiger 1321, from left to right. Commander, SS-Untersturmfuhrer. Helmet (BUBI) Wendorff, Gunner SS-Rottenfuhrer Walter Lau, Radio operator SS-Stummann Fred Zimmermann, Driver SS-Rottenfuhrer Franz Elmer.
Fitting the idler spindle & brass bearing.	Here we have the track adjusters; they are fitted to the inside on the idler spindle.	Nice shot of the torsion bar suspension
	There was a 25 mm misalignment between the turret roof and the turret casting. Some filing required I think!!	"Few" Two and a half hours later, it fits. There is a small lip on the turret casting that the turret roof sits in, this had to be filed to the correct angle.
How many clamps dose it take to glue a Turret bearing???? I used Araldite rapid to fix it; it still takes about twenty four hour to set hard.	I missed taking pictures of the swinging arms; I just got carried away and forgot. Anyway it says in the instructions that the swinging arms are set to 45 degrees, a few builders put it more at 30 degrees. So I have gone half way at 37 degrees.
Well I think it looks right.		Now for some detail, the drivers armour and the ball gun.
Air in take vents; fuel vents & the engine hatch		Now for the exhaust pipes, the main pipe goes into the hull and is hollow so it can be fitted with a smoke machine later, and then the armour is bolted over the top.
	Now the heat shield is placed over the top of the exhaust pipes. Some one mailed me to say it seemed a shame to cover all that detail, I have to agree. So looking at photos of other early Tigers I have noticed they don't always have both of them on, some have just one some none at all. I may go for just fitting one.	Here we have a shot of the drivers & radio operator’s hatch's. I will not be using these, but will be using some bought from Mike Stannard. His web site can be found in my Links.
Rear mudguards fitted.	No I haven't gone mad, I rubbed it all back; then I spray it with a grey primer; then red oxide, but I tried to tint the red oxide with a light brown to help with the top colour. Doh!! Now I have a Chocolate Tiger, well reddish brown. it depends how the light catches it.	New drivers & radio operator’s hatches, these are Mike Stannard's parts, I have to say I'm well impressed.
All the levers work; there is a deluxe version of these, but I'm to tight fisted.	Mike Stannard's Loaders hatch, yes all working, great work Mike.
The drum cupola, I have only painted it to stop the hatch ring going rusty.	Now this I didn't spot until I started messing with the turret stowage bin. This is the correct position for it, see next picture	As you can see if it had been left in its original position, the stowage bin would have hit it leaving the turret unable to turn to the right.
It also impacted on the manlet and still did to a degree, that's why I have made it look damaged, but I think it adds a bit of authenticity.
Just a quick look at the Feifel air filters, I have had to do a lot to put them right.	This picture was taken by Mike Stannard. The plates were on the wrong way so I cut off the plates; then drilling and tapping a hole in the centre of the pipe; then realigning the plates; then holding it all together with a two pack glue and a countersunk screw.	"Finally" The right colour found! After weeks of mixing my young friend at Transpares managed to mix this colour, this is what I think Dunkelgelb (Dark yellow) should look like.
This colour was mixed in cellulose, using an enamel paint chip from Humbrol 94.	This is what you get if you mix RAL 7028. I should say a variant, Because every paint shop mixes it slightly different.	Unfortunately this is a one off; I know this won’t help all you modellers wanting to know how to mix it. All I can tell you is he came across it by accident.
He started with 1& a half litres of RAL 8002, and then he started adding RAL 1004. Then wile he went for diner, some else finished of the mix for him. Unfortunately for me he didn't bother righting down the amounts!!		The firing unit: I have had problems with this, the unit its self is bolted to the turret. Then you screw a tube into that through the manlet, and then you attach the barrel to the other end of the tube!! The problem is that it won’t screw into the barrel or the firing unit!! I have measured both holes and they are 20 mm, but the tube is 22 mm. So I had my barrel and firing unit tapped out to match the tube, then I use red lock tight on the threads
I tried a standard 12 gauge cartridges and they won’t fit. As you can see they protrude 3 mm, so I had some made to fit. The difference is as follows. The ones I had made are 24 mm long by 20 mm diameter and are a good fit, the standard ones are 27 mm long by 20 mm diameter and they obviously wont fit, but they are also lose in the chamber.	Well the camouflage stripes on!	Olive green RAL 6003 or Tamiya-XF58.
Hope you like it!! Tough if you don't!!	There seem to be more pictures of Das Reich in Russia, But I stumbled across this one of a LAH Tiger and use a similar paten.