Greetings Tankers!

Today I bring you updates on our frame, turret turning apparatus, and drivetrain!

I hope you’re as excited as I am for our continuing progress which, although slower than preferred, is faster than anticipated, what with all of us going to school full time and also holding jobs. As such, after 25 days of silence, we break with an update for your eager eyes to behold!

We has been working on a few external components for our tank, such as the tow hook geometry, tow hitch, and rear engine crank cover. Don’t you know, the engine was an electric start but had an option to unhinge the rear and crank it in the cold Russian winters all by yourself, great soldier warming activity!

Compare the above photo with our own work, and although some trivial differences are immediately noticeable, trust that those will be eliminated before our build time

We have not added the exhaust manifold yet, and our bolt pattern is slightly different.

On the frame, we continue to make progress, with the right half of the main frame constructed in virtual space. This was more difficult than we had anticipated, as such only half of it is completed.

Drivetrain updates!

Through the last 2 months, Nate has been puzzling and puzzling till his puzzler was sore, and with the help of our resident engineering instructor Steve (different than our Steve!, spelled with an exclamation mark) we finally figured out how we’re going to steer the tank!

Originally, because we deemed a planetary gear train too complex we decided to make our own steering clutch pack to guide our little project, unfortunately engineering an entire cluck and brake system is hard, and infinitely more complex than we had anticipated. Turns out, there’s a reason the Czechs used a planetary setup in their tank because a clutch pack would have to be obnoxiously powerful in order to do anything close to what we need.

That being said, we’ve reverse engineered how the Czech plans worked, and are moving forward with constructing that in 3d modeling.

On the PR/Admin side of life, we’re still working to cement our place in several events this year ( colored orange on the calendar/schedule of events). WWII Weekend in Reading hasn’t responded to us yet, but we’ve secured tables at 4 other events throughout the summer. Seth, Ben, Steve, and Tristan are working out scheduling per event so that we have representation as often as possible. The more we know, the more we reach out, the more we spread the good word of Project38. We’ve also started looking into setting up a Patreon for our project, as we’re spending a lot of our own money setting this up and it’d be great to start taking donations. More on that next month probably.

With that, thank you so much for reading this far! Don’t forget to spread the word about Project38, a grassroots tank project which will, with your support, birth a real live tank into the reenacting community.

May your tracks stay true, and your cannon clean.

T_Ankmann.