"Aotrs Shipyards October Release: T-64A (144)" Topic

Aotrs Shipyards is a webstore on Shapeways.com, a 3D print house which had production and shipping facilities located in the USA and the the Netherlands.

So good news and bad news this month. Good news, as promised, we have a T-64 release: the T-64A (both with gill armour or with skirts) in 144!

T-64A (with gill armour)

link

(Again, this is the left-hand view as opposed to my typical right, simply because due to the supports, the left-side came out a bit better!)

T-64A (with skirts)

link

(Note: None of the skirted T-64As (or models thereof) I saw pictures (or drawings) of had the smoke dischargers fitted; so while Wikipedia says the skirts and smoke dischargers both came in in '81, I have, for the moment, chosen to go with a skirted variant with no dischargers. I may well add a turret version with smoke dischargers later.)

Photos, as usual, from the Rep 2 prototypes!

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The bad news is that that's the only version at the moment. On top of conventions, illness (today has been the first day since the start of October I've been able to put a full day's work in) and other sundry issues, the T-64 has proven to be nightmarishly difficult for various reasons – only being able to work at it in short bursts among them. It's been a long haul, with the unfinished vehicle hanging over me like the sword of Damocles!

Once again I have to thank UsmanK, who provided me with some Russian-language links which enabled me to find some better walkarounds without which it would have been even harder.

(I have now talked to my Russian-fluent mate and he's provided me with enough stuff that I can hopefully include Russian and Ukranian languages in my own search terms and find such myself next time!)

I now have a commission coming in (and to be honest, I'm quite heartily sick of the T-64 at this point!); so November's release may be from the backlog, but once I've done that commission, the next on the list is the T-62M or maybe the T-64B or a modernisation. T-62M seems slightly more likely at this point (as we could be into December, which is another short work-month) – also, as stated, I'm fed-up at looking at T-64s for the moment – but as always such plans are only ever nominal!

(The base T-64 has both a different hull (which can be modified off the T-64A) and a different turret, so that had slipped down the line somewhat.)

That said, the other good news is I discovered that the early production T-80s (1976) straight used the T-64A turret, so I have, at least got half another tank (and you can expect to see said early-model T-80s relatively soon.)

Nice looking vehicles.

Well done!

Just a head's up everyone – as someone just reported to me, for some reason, the idiot monkey coders at Shapeways appear to have done something such that the models are not displaying in WSF as recommend) as default – as they are in the model page settings – but in the much more expensive ultra frosted detail.

(So in the meantime, for the default material, click the WSF icon (leftmost) under "choose material" section.)

I'm going to chase them up right now, but unfortunately, as mentioned, this sort of thing is not massively uncommon – though more usually for us shopowners than you customers – as their web coders are… possibly the worst I've ever seen outside of the actual UK government website.

Sainsbury's they are not.

Good!
Do you plan to make versions of the T-64 with the ERA?

Eventually, yes, but not immediately. As I say, after I've done this commission, I will likely look at doing some variants (either T-62M or T-64 of some stripe with ERA), possibly around December, when my working month is a bit shorter. (As always, these are only nominal plans!)

I am getting to really dislike the T-64…! Having gotten all that out of the way, I had one of the models bounce this morning from a customer's order.

And not an easy-fix stupid error or something (or even Shapeways being awkward), but a wierd, nonsensical mesh issue that's umpteen tomes harder to track and I'm having to get the chaps at Shapeways to look at my nominal fix because I can't necessarily even tell from my end.

It's doubly bizarre, since the other version of the T-64 is apparently perfectly fine – and the issue appeared on the *turret*, y'know, the part that is *identical* on both models! But one is fine and the other was not. I don't even.

I say again, Sword of Damocles, Sword of flippin' Damocles…