Hi.. I hate these things. I'm officially classing them in the same catagory as the famous 'rubber band' tracks. Which makes them almost totally worthless.

I really bow down to you out there who seem to have that special ability to work with these things and get them mounted on your vehicles to look just right.

But not me. I've built numerous kits ever since I've gotten back into modeling here a few years ago that have these plastic link-to-link things with the kit and each and every time I try really hard to get them put together and installed as I know they must go. But no luck! Have read several articles on how to build these things and tried each and every one of them, and the only thing they all have in common, for me anyway, is that the tracks eventually get tossed.

Worked quite a bit this morning tying to get Dragon's set installed on their T-34/1940 model and after breaking of a couple small pieces from the tank and breaking and re-gluing a couple areas of the track, and still not making any headway, I just threw all of the tracks in the recyle been.

Not too long after that I put a call into R and J Products up in Washington State and ordered a set of those lovely white metal track links for this particular model, and since I also have a Dragon T-34 UTZ 1944 model in the closet, I went ahead and picked up a later-issue set for this one as well.

Yeah, I know they're not cheap, but for some particular reason or other the finished tank just doesn't look quite right sitting on a base on it's road wheels. Know what I mean? Ha, ha!

And I figure what with all the time I've spent putting this thing together and painting and weathering it, so far, I might as well 'bite the bullet' and get a good set of tracks to finish it off.

I may have to by-pass a kit or two in the mean time due to the cost of these things, but I feel the sacrifice is well worth it.

Thanks for letting me vent. I'm sure there's one or two of you out there who may have run across the same thing. At least I hate to think I'm the only innately unskilled track-builder in the crowd, which could very well be.

Take care, sgirty

I have never worked with metal tracks but aren't they link to link as well?

Stop the Madness!

Iny link tracks are not the Devil's spawn!

Are you putting them on an already painted model? They should go on at some stage of the assembly.

Maybe some nearby model club has a member that could give you an in-person 'how to' session. I'm sure you can learn to live with, no need to love, indy links.

Steve

Plastic link-to-link can be tough, yes. And the Tracks in the T-34/76 kit are pretty tough even by plastic link-to-link standards. But they are buildable:



(There's also a close-up photo in my "T-34/76 m1940" gallery.)

To be fair, I had a tough time building them. One thing I discovered was, that you need 78 links per side, even though the illustrations appear to show 76.

Randy

How do you build them completly not on the tank?
i built an HVSS sherman and the only way i could put them togheter was building the tracks around the already assemled suspension, which gave me hard time painting the lot.
and BTW Metal track are so much easy to work with,it also takes time but it's a lot more forgiving and flexible to work with
Eran

Hi ShermiesRule. Yes, the White-metal tracks are -link-to-link, but go together with wire and a tad of CA on the outside and are still flexible to work with. They do take some time put together, as I've found several links per kit need some drilling out in the holes where the wire goes through, but for me at least, they are so much easier to put together and INSTALL on the vehicle, which in the end, is what counts. And I've been successful with every set I've bought. Sag is added in automatically! Ha, ha!

Sniper, Did build them before painting the tank and had them in 4 pieces to install the very last thing, once painted, but for some reason I just couldn't get them to go together like they did before. I found I needed at least one more hand in order to try to hold them all together as the glue set and between holding the vehicle steady and holding the tracks correctly, etc. things just wouldn't work out. Maybe I had those white metal track in my subconscious mind all along and 'planned' for these not to work. Who knows, really. The mind is one strange critter most of the time.

Besides I got to talk to the man at R and J and he told me about his trip over to Finland, Russia, and Estonia here a couple years ago and learned quite a bit about the battlefields as they are now over there now. Some pretty interesting things in their own right. He even got to meet a gentleman from Finland who was a sniper during the Winter War who had over 1,000 kills to his credit! And all without the aid of a scope-mounted rifle. Now that's some shooting.

So I guess all comes out well in the end.

Take care, sgirty

I do the DML indy links and to hold the tracks in place during final assembly, I use low tack cello tape.

For glue i use a mix of testors liquid and tube glue. Kind of ends up like the Tamiya thin cement. Let dry 10 to 15 minutes and fit to running gear. Again, I use low tack cello tape to hold the sections in place until the glue is dry.

Once the glue is set, I remove the sections and paint them.

The only problem I ever had was when someone told me to use white glue to attach the drive sprockets in place while fitting the tracks, then when I removed the sprockets to glue them on, I mis- aligned the sprockets and had to re-do the tracks.

I have always added link-to-link track after building the kit, and have no real problems. Using a slow setting glue helps me shape the track. There has been one exception to adding tracks to a partially completed tank and that was my ICM T-35 which has armored side skirts. The skits were already painted and I just touched up the paint.

I guess i was like you for a long time sgirty, and stayed away from the indy tracks. then .. probably by mistake ... i managed it and I guess confidence set in. Now I would prefer them to vinyl tracks. I do like the fruils though ... the weight adds so much, especially to russian or german tanks! The last two tanks I made had both indy tracks, and Im quite happy with them.
I start around the drive sprocket, then do the bottom, then around the idler. The top can be adjusted to allow for sag and proper fit. I paint all afterwards. As I weather heavy ... I spray all in a dark brown, then paint the hull and road wheels in a base plus earth colour. Then dry brush. Then paint rubber parts and weather as normal. The italeri bergetiger was an experiment and it worked well with this method. The SU76 will be done the same way!
As somebody said above ... if a person could show you the method in the flesh ... it would hit home very quickly!
two pics of them ... Italeri bergetiger and Maquette SU76M

White glue is a good idea. Just enough to hold the wheels during assembly, then the whole unit, tracks and wheels, can be removed all at once for painting. I don't see how the glue would have caused misalignment.

Steve

Ola People

Most of you will know this technique with the medical tape for those who don`t I made a quick sketch for the IBE (I actually had this one in line for a while since I started the IBE but never managed to get it right) about how to Assemble Indy Links made easy.
Well here it is


I hope people can use this technique.

There is one subtle but very significant difference between the T-34 and HVSS suspensions: return rollers.

I can build these like this (and they aren't separate sections, they are each completely glued) because I can later fit the drive sprocket and idler wheel on, then carefully press everything into place. It helps that there are no side-skirts or other over-hanging bits to get in the way. For any Sherman, VVSS or HVSS, I'd have to do things differently.

Randy

I built the top run,from 1/2way down the idler to 1/2 way down the sprocket.I tested,and found it was necessary to shorten the axle stub on the sprocket.I left it loose as I was building the track to put it on and off.

Hi. It's really great to get all of this information on building those pesky plastic link-to-link tracks in these kits, and I do intend to give them another go-around here on the next model, as you folks, with all your great information, have talked me into it. But the post man just delivered my Fruil white metal track links today and now I remember why I liked them so much. You've got to have a set of these to know what I mean here. Ain't nothing quite like them, at least in my opinion. Of course the drawback, as there is to anything in today's world, is that they cost around $7 to $8 more than I paid for the kit itself. $32, plus s/h. Oh well, sacrifices sometimes have to be made in this hobby and it's been about 6 or 8 months since I've ordered a set of them anyway, so maybe I was due for a white metal 'fix.' Ha, ha!.

Take care, sgirty