DAK Attack

I put this platoon together some time ago to support Fallschirmjager in North Africa. The platoon needed rebasing and repair, so here are a few Panzer IIIJ (early) from 21. Panzer Division, Libya 1942.

Holidays in France

As much fun as the kradschutzen are, sometimes the motorcycles need to be left behind and trucks are used for transport. This collection should be enough for all my early war Schutzen and their support weapons:

Just in case those pesky French put up resistance, along came the StuG section:

Word eventually reached the Yanks across the Pond and so, in 1944, they decided to try the delights of France themselves. This is a Quality Casting model of an M18 Hellcat. It's a nice enough model, but I suspect it is visibly smaller than any of the other manufacturer's offerings:

A Tale of T-34s

Some time ago I decided to start comparing 15mm WW2 models from different manufacturers, for use building armies for Flames of War.  Here are three T-34/76 tanks, one each from Plastic Soldier Company (PSC), Battlefront (BF) and Zvezda (Zv).

First of all, a little blurb about what you get and construction.
PSC and Zvezda are injection-molded plastic kits. Zvezda's model is designed to pop together without glue, although trimming with a knife and using glue give a nicer, tighter fit. PSC's model needs glue and trimming is recommended, of course. PSC's model comes with an interchangeable turret for the T-34/85 tank, which is nice.

BF's model is their classic resin-and-metal offering; sometimes you need to use a Dremel and files to clean these up, sometimes, as with this particular blister, it just falls together. Admittedly, this was an old blister from back in the days when New Zealanders slaved away in a converted warehouse near Auckland's harbour.

Prices: Zvezda was about USD2.50, PSC is 5 for USD25, BF is USD12.50 for one.

Boring stuff:
All three models are the same width. PSC's offering is 1-2mm shorter than the other two. Zvezda's is shortest while BF's and PSC's models are about the same height. There are detail changes, as the photos will show.

From the front:

Frontal view, bird's eye:

Line astern:

Line astern, bird's eye:

Trundling away from the camera:

In all five shots the models are, from left to right, PSC - BF -Zv.

Auhagen Farm, Finished

Yep, farm buildings based, base painted and flocked. The camera, as ever, as helped pick out those spots that could do with more attention, but this piece of terrain is ready for the table top.

I suppose I should make some fields to go around the farm, so that the farm has a raison d'etre.

Auhagen Buildings (2)

The farmhouse that featured in my lost post is finished, along with the other buildings from the kit:

 I decided to arrange the buildings on a permanent base. Plasticard to the rescue...

 The grey cobblestone-patterned material is another Auhagen product (this is why I discovered Auhagen's buildings - a couple of years ago, Evan at Battlefront created cobblestoned bases for stands of British paratroops; they looked so good that he explained how he'd created them and named this product on the BF forum). White fences from Atlas.

The remaining blank areas will be spackled and/or painted and flocked as appropriate. Lastly, I will need to fill the gap between the wall and the house (mea culpa; during dry-runs, assembly was faultless and gap-free).

Auhagen Buildings

last year I started looking about for buildings that would work with Flames of War. I found the Auhagen range of TT/HO scale buildings.

Here is a mid-construction shot of the inside of a farm house. Note the base plate (tan) and the window frames in the walls.

Here are a couple of completed buildings, a corner structure and a house:

I've added a plasticard base to the yellow house, the first one I built, so that there is a sidewalk in front and a small garden area behind. Eventually I will treat all the city houses this way, so that they can be moved around and arranged however I wish.

On to the inside. The roofs are glued together but not attached to the buildings, so they lift off. I've made plasticard inner floors so that my little army men can lurk in the upper storeys and eaves:

Lurking SS grenadiers:

An outside shot with a Panzer IVH and a Hanomag for size comparison:

I have left off the extra detail that could be added outside (gutters, drains, more flower boxes) and inside (paper decorative sheets to cover the windows that would represent curtains, flower pots, etc, when viewed from outside).

I like the kits and intend to add more to my collection. There's some work involved assembling them and making internal floors, but they have much more character than the ready-painted houses available from various manufacturers and they look more "to scale".