Dragon 6253 1/35 Tiger I Late production Chapter 5: Gun mantlet and metal barrel

The breech, mantlet and barrel assembly are to be constructed first. Dragon clearly points out the mantlet and muzzle brake options applicable to each variant. The ATAK Zimmerit kit includes two of these mantlet options in resin. The command variant option is the one not included but as this variant deleted the MG, it is easy enough to cover the MG hole on either of the resin options.  The ATAK parts are a perfect match to the plastic parts, so no extra work is required. You get both a plastic and turned metal barrel and these key in to either the earlier large or final smaller type muzzle brakes. 

 

Dragon 6253 1/35 Tiger I Late production Chapter 4: Applying ATAK Zimmerit

 Skipping ahead of fitting the few interior engine components, I mulled over how best to approach adding the remaining hull zimmerit. The kit's separately moulded side armoured plates will first require fixing to the hull tub sides. Spacing is dictated by some very chunky holes in the hull tub moulding and so they fit precisely, butting up perfectly to the rear plate. Test fitting the zimmerit sheets against these side plates found that they also attach to the sides of the armoured front plate. This front plate is not added for a few more steps and is instructed to be attached to the top plate moulding. I didnt really want to add too many parts before having to handle the model getting the zimmerit down, but ideally I needed to add the armoured plate to the hull tub assembly. Checking over that fixing it to the hull tub would not disturb the build sequencing or impede any other parts placement, it was possible to add it to the hub as long as the glacis plate was fixed in place at the same time. Two glacis plates are offered. One with moulded on front track guards and one without, so you can add the PE ones if you wish.  As the front armoured plate, glacis and bow plate also require zimmerit, I could now attach it all at the same time. The side zimmerit sheets have a myriad of small square holes to open up to fit around moulded on track guard mounting studs and cable fixings. Once opened up the zimmerit fitted really well. Likewise, both front and rear sheets also mated up nicely. There is the inevitable small amount of tidy up to do and a smidgen of putty will be required to mate all four sheets as they meet at each corner but overall, I'm happy with the way it looks.

Dragon 6253 1/35 Tiger I Late production Chapter 3: Construction

The next step was to decipher the infamous Dragon instructions. Credit to them they do clearly break down the various differences for each of the three variants at each stage, but I still double checked that these were correctly picked out and made additional notes from the David Byrden website. The instructions are ahem....extremely busy, but TBH, apart from a few dubious indicators of parts placement the instructions are general pretty good. Having three variant options on many of the steps makes it look far worse than it actually is. I simply highlighted the parts required wherever a variant choice appeared to keep me on track. I believe there are a few parts mis-labelled, but these are often on mirrored parts that are easy to spot.

The first steps build up the running gear. The lower hull tub is a one-piece affair to which you first add the front tow hook extensions, torsion bars, wheels and rear plate. To take advantage of the adjustable torsion bar engineering you simply guide them through the hull and fix them into the curved grooved slots (simulating the real movement range) in small fixings added to the opposite side. This system allows the torsion bar axle ends to then compress and rebound as they would do on the real vehicle. 

Dragon 6253 1/35 Tiger I Late production Chapter 2: Choosing a vehicle to build

Knowing very little about the production history of these big cats I’ve turned to the David Byrden website. As mentioned above, for this kit David adds a few pointers to solve a few instruction discrepancies, some recommendations to modify a few small parts,  and advice on how to add a few small additions. Apart from adding the zimmerit, its pretty much all thats required.