Lego RC E-100 super heavy tank by Tommy Styrvoky, on Flickr

I have been busy with my latest model, the WWII German prototype vehicle E-100. This one being my second rendition of it since 4 years ago, when I started building MOCs. This one is smaller and greatly improved scale accuracy.

more information and photos on my blog.

http://tommystyrvoky.blogspot.com/2018/02/e-100-super-heavy-tank.html

instructions 

https://www.rebrickable.com/mocs/MOC-13061/TommyStyrvoky/rc-e-100-super-heavy-tank/#comments

The process of rendering all of the animations for this video took some time, as I rendered all of this on my laptop, the end result, each frame requiring about 5 minutes at only 720p , and well there are a few thousand frames rendered for the animations, and I also completely redid my channel outro with the new PBR shaders from Meccabricks. 

Lego RC E-100 super heavy tank by Tommy Styrvoky, on Flickr

And after all of that time rendering I realized that I forgot to include the second turret hatch... 

 

This is probably one of my most accurate vehicles so far, given the constraints of lego, and the mechanical challenges. Though I am still striving to do better in the future. 

Lego RC E-100 super heavy tank by Tommy Styrvoky, on Flickr

and a comparison with blueprints from the real one.

E-100 Blueprint overlay by Tommy Styrvoky, on Flickr

 

Edited February 18, 20187 yr by Tommy Styrvoky

Great work and video  .

A bit more simple in appearances, not to many angles, but great job on the scaling!

Very good performance in the snow! The video is very well done, too.  Are you using POV-Ray for rendering? 

Overplayed in WoT  I'm joking!
Nice MoC!

Have you planned to add crane that could be mounted on the turret? Its purpose to help to uninstall side shields that covers tracks. It is part of preparation to transport so wide tanks - side shields/screens are removed and installed not so wide tracks.

BTW, E-100 transmission allowed it to turn on place - not to turn around one track. Your MoC can do the same - good thing.

9 hours ago, BusterHaus said:

Very good performance in the snow! The video is very well done, too.  Are you using POV-Ray for rendering? 

Blender with the ldraw importer tool, and the advanced shaders pack from Mecabricks.

3 hours ago, Ox1337 said:

Overplayed in WoT  I'm joking!
Nice MoC!

Have you planned to add crane that could be mounted on the turret? Its purpose to help to uninstall side shields that covers tracks. It is part of preparation to transport so wide tanks - side shields/screens are removed and installed not so wide tracks.

BTW, E-100 transmission allowed it to turn on place - not to turn around one track. Your MoC can do the same - good thing.

I didn't include the crane, as I was basing my model off of the one from the drawings from Hilary Doyles Panzer Tracts 6-3.

That's some solid work. The renders look really nice, interesting to see how the drive motors are set at an angle. 

4 minutes ago, mahjqa said:

Interesting to see how the drive motors are set at an angle. 

It was the only way to fit the torsion bars, It was a creative solution, as I previously had tried to use some reductions, though It had issues with slipping, so I removed it, and used the angled solution.

Wow, I love those renders and animations. Good job on the tank as well. I find it a bit less appealing that those treads tend to "deform" on the front. Is this caused due to front driven sprockets? I guess front driven sprockets pushes them below the driving wheels instead of being pulled from behind.

Another excellent build. Very impressive.

3 hours ago, MajklSpajkl said:

I find it a bit less appealing that those treads tend to "deform" on the front. Is this caused due to front driven sprockets? I guess front driven sprockets pushes them below the driving wheels instead of being pulled from behind.

It's just the nature of tracks are being pushed more from the front, rather than being pulled from the rear. This is dependent on where the track sag is, as on real vehicles, the track sag isn't as present, and the weight of the tracks has a greater effect, though with my model, It is because of tension, and the relative size of the track pitch being too large for the scale. There's not too much that can be done to solve this besides further tensioning them, and I didn't want to make them too tight, as that would also hinder performance. 

Here's some good footage of a German Panther's suspension in operation, this illustrates the similar setup as in the E-100, with the frontally mounted sprocket.

 

Edited February 20, 20187 yr by Tommy Styrvoky

Thanks for the explanation - if I understood you well - the actual tank also had front driven sprockets? Are rear driven sprocekts more common or not?

Edited February 20, 20187 yr by MajklSpajkl

6 hours ago, MajklSpajkl said:

Thanks for the explanation - if I understood you well - the actual tank also had front driven sprockets? Are rear driven sprocekts more common or not?

They were a lot more common in WWII though this meant that most had a power shaft running from the engine bay in the rear directly through the center of the crew compartment to power the transmission and steering gear in the front. With modern vehicles, it's more common to have the drive sprocket located closer to the motor, as this allows for easy maintenance, and it helps lower the profile of the hull. Smaller AFVs like IFVs like the Bradley, Scimitar, and M113 usually have their drive sprocket in the front, as the motor is located in the front, and this allows for room for carrying equipment and troops in the back. One of the other applications in MBTs would be the Merkava series, as locating the powerpack (engine+transmission+steering gear) in the front provides additional material for crew protection from projectiles. Other wise with most other MBTs and larger vehicles, it is common to have a rear sprocket drive, as this allows for easy removal of the engine and transmission as a single unit, also the engine is much larger, so to have a frontally mounted system would mean that the turret would be shifted to the back of the hull more.

Here's a similar powertrain layout to the E-100 in the Tiger II 

 

Also and having a frontally mounted transmission in a thick welded enclosure lead to interesting challenges to field maintenance see for example with the Panther, Tiger II, and planned for the E-100, where the transmission has to be fed through a small plate in the upper hull. 

Another case of of how impractical transmission installation on German vehicles are with the restoration of the Jagdpanther from the Weald Foundation.

Or another example with the Tiger I where you needed to remove the turret to gain access to the transmission,

Edited February 20, 20187 yr by Tommy Styrvoky

Very interesting! Thx again for your explanation.