Vintage Thundertank - A Visual Guide, Piece by Piece

ninja_cat · February 20, 2012, 9:48pm

I finally got a vintage Thundertank to add to my collection. It was in excellent condition, had both treads although 1 was broke but I am not worried about it, just happy to get a Thundertank! The only issue was a little dust and dirt. Seems to have been sitting in a basement for the last 20 years?? I wanted to bring life into this Thundertank again and purr once more! So I dismantled it piece by piece, cleaned it up and put it back together. Overall it was a pretty easy break down. The mechanics were fairly straight forward when putting it back together.

To clean the pieces I just used a bowl with hot water and a nickel sized amount of dawn dish detergent. Scrubbed with oft brisel tooth brush and rinsed with warm water. I towel dried everything then went back over with a blow dryer. For the treads, Scrubbed with the soapy water and toothbrush, then coated them with some Black Magic Tire Wet, to make them softer and prevent them from becoming brittle.

Everything cleaned up well and now I have a super clean Thundetank!

Vintage Thundertank Photo Album

Comparing the uncleaned with the clean, just showing the worst of the dirt
http://i270.photobucket.com/albums/jj99/gobygoby/Thundercats/Vintage%20Thundertank/8393ed03.jpg
http://i270.photobucket.com/albums/jj99/gobygoby/Thundercats/Vintage%20Thundertank/74cfe701.jpg

http://i270.photobucket.com/albums/jj99/gobygoby/Thundercats/Vintage%20Thundertank/29cb9083.jpg
http://i270.photobucket.com/albums/jj99/gobygoby/Thundercats/Vintage%20Thundertank/73fd9760.jpg

starrcade89 · February 20, 2012, 9:57pm

Thats an awesome post!

I always wanted to do that, I never did though as i was worried i might not be able to put it back together again.

Interesting to see all the parts that made up the thundertank, quite alot! thanks for sharing .

Lordore · February 20, 2012, 10:44pm

That’s LJN/LEGO toys!! Nice post indeed, the thundertank looks brand new now

blackiecats · February 21, 2012, 12:11am

What an excellent post! I know this will prove extremely useful to folks and offers a great insight of all the pieces that made up the ThunderTank!

and you’ve done a fantastic job of cleaning it up

ninja_cat · February 21, 2012, 1:59am

Thanks guys! I hope that anyone looking to restore a thundertank can use this guide to pinpoint missing pieces, broken pieces, or anyone who just wondered what it’s made up of. It was a fairly straight forward tear down and rebuild. Stumbled a bit on the pop up mechanism but wasn’t to. Bad to figure it out. Should have made a map when I was taking it apart.

Really goes to show you that they really don’t make toys like they used to. I would venture to bet not many toys that would be similar today would have used nearly as many pieces. And I am just amazed that toy designers could create something like this. It has to be very difficult to create, especially 20+ years ago when autocad and 3d modeling pretty much didn’t exist.

Osbert · February 24, 2012, 8:18pm

That is so cool! Thanks for sharing - it’s good to see you’ve restored it with so much care and attention. Nice work!

troy_redmond · August 10, 2012, 2:54am

oh yea

Love the tank looks brand new :liono:thumbsup:

mijafre · August 10, 2012, 7:00pm

Wow! You cleaned that up perfectly! Looks like you bought it brand new now.

Daremonger · August 11, 2012, 8:36am

Great job on the LJN ThunderTank toy!