Ender's Crafts: Patching up and painting 3d printed Tauroxes

Thursday, August 28, 2025

Patching up and painting 3d printed Tauroxes

I liked the humvee, but it wasn't quite Taurox-like enough. So I experimented with having another model 3d-printed. However, the printer kept misfiring, and I actually received 4 damaged hulls instead of 1 whole one. I decided to take it as a challenge.

Patching up misprints

The gashes and print lines aren't much of a problem on heavily weathered vehicles the way I do them; but large holes in the hulls won't do. I first tried filling it out using green stuff inserted from inside the vehicle. But it wasn't great.

So I dug into the bits box to see what I could cover up with.

That's one done. Even used Taurox bits as a bonus.

The second hull had the same issue on the other side.

I cut up a plate and glued on this techy-bit.

One hull was completely broken. I filled out the hole using plasticard.

Two layers, in fact.

Masked the hole with a power pack.

More plasticard and techy bits. Aquilas and such are also great fillers.

Two came without an underside, thinking it would increase the quality of the print. It didn't. I fixed it up using plasticard cut to size.

With that done, and all of them looking half decent, I had tracks and axles printed for all of them. Of course, the mangled undersides weren't fitting all that well. So I filled out the touch points using Vallejo Heavy Gel. Placed the axle bit. Then superglue the tracks to it. The superglue held the bits in place, while the gel solidified, giving me a good bond.

With all the tracks in place, I glued on the turrets, hatches and guns. I initially wanted to leave the backs open, but due to the thinness, all the plates were warped and had holes. So I had cover plates 3d printed. They weren't a great fit, as the insides bubbled up, but I smashed that in with the butt of the hobby knife, and placed the cover plates on. Squadron assembled!