Carter's Lasercut Tank - Sherman

Hello ! this is my Instructable to make my Sherman lasercut model.

Its scale is the same for all my models (1:18). It's about 29.8 cm long (body), 14.4 cm wide and 15 cm tall.

You can download the plans on its Thingiverse page .

You can also have an online 3D preview here.

This model doesn't requires screws, but you will need :

• Some wooden skewers (Ø3mm and at least 15cm long),
• some wooden toothpicks (Ø2mm),
• and some wood glue.

The assembly will be a bit confusing, because of the no-screw constraint, you will need to assemble it in a bizarre order.

So, ready ? Let's go boys !

First, you will need to glue the roller on a rod. This will keep the wheel from sliding out of its hole. We will cut off the excess later.

Gather all those parts, and add the drive wheel axis by the way.

I decided to give a common axis for the right and left wheel to simplify this part.

Stack all the gun slots on the hole. Be sure that they don't poke out the side sheets, i could comprise the next step.

Add the roller we assembled before and squeeze it between the two half-holes parts.

Assemble the "cross" and stack all the layers by number. Stack all the front armor parts. We will add the details at the end.

This is the instructions for a pair. Cut a bunch of toothpicks in 10 mm long pieces. Repeat it six times, it will be a bit long.

Insert the wheels on the skewers and align them on the tracks before glue them. (edit : i forgot that for the back wheels, i already assembled them before i stick them :S )

For the drive wheel : Be careful to align the teeth, i leveled it with naked eye,but you can wrap your wheel in some pre-made track.

For the top wheel : Forget the middle layer. Put a great amount of glue.

Same instructions for the StuG. For a more esthetic result, make sure to glue all the triangle teeth in the same direction. Follow the pattern to make all the tracks faster. My tracks have 33 hinges each.

And there we are ! the tank is done. You can cut some replacment tracks or wheels to add some decoration. The tank has a little problem to roll, i think the wooden axis was a bad idea. But if you keep your model on a shelf and don't make it move, it won't be a problem.