1:35 Bucket 8

Number eight and the point of a whole numbered range

Why make eleven buckets when one would do? The answer lies in what real service looked like. Equipment was gathered on vehicles gradually, piece by piece, from various sources and in various states, so two identical buckets side by side are rather the exception in a period photograph. A modeler who glues four castings from one mold onto a truck bed carries that contradiction over into the finished work.

A numbered range solves the problem in the simplest way: it offers shapes that differ in proportion, height or wall profile. Number eight is one of the later additions to the sequence and, combined with the lower numbers, makes up a group that does not look like a batch delivery.

Recommendations for building

It pays to differentiate the color too. Leave one bucket almost new, another heavily rusted, a third oversprayed in the same shade as the vehicle, as if the crew had painted it at the same time as the armor. The difference between the pieces creates the impression of time, which is missing from models more often than detail itself.

• The eighth numbered variant out of eleven
• A combination of different shapes looks more convincing than repeating one

A little indiscipline in the placement serves the same purpose. Objects lined up in a row give the modeler's hand away, while slightly turned pieces at uneven distances look as if somebody had just put them down.

The last piece of advice concerns gluing. Small castings hold best when the point of contact is taken off gloss beforehand and the glue is applied to the model, not to the casting. A drop on a small part runs over the whole shape and fills it.