Long Time, No Post, Part 3.

A little more desert-themed stuff for Flames of War.

BF released plastic kits for various tanks for 1942 in the desert and I ended up with a few, just to see what they were like. The Grant kit contains parts British Grants or American Lees (different turrets, cupola, longer barrel for the optional M3 75mm gun for the USA). The kit goes together very well, but is short on stowage, leaving one with a handful of near-identical, 'clean" tanks. I already have a squadron of Grants, so I threw two of my three models together as Grants and one as a Lee and them painted them all differently.

The two Grants, one in Light Stone and Dark Green with black and white edging, appropriate for May to October 1942, the other in Desert Pink and Dark Green, as ordered shortly before Second El Alamein.

The Lee, US Olive, yellow turret band for the Torch landing and subsequent fighting in Tunisia and Algeria.

I've had a bunch of Crusaders sitting half-painted for nearly a decade, so this seemed like a good time get more paint on them. Most of the models are Old Glory, assembled as either 2pdr or 6pdr gun tanks. A pair of BF resin-and-metal tanks had been made up as the close support tanks with howitzers. All the tanks had been sprayed with an Army Painter primer that worked for Lightstone.

I started with the squadron HQ, to practice the camouflage pattern and figure out what order to paint details.

Since these were painted, I discovered (thanks, Tank Museum) that the objects on the back of the tank that I painted as rusty possible-exhausts are actually the air intakes and filters, so they will get repainted soonish.

Lastly, I painted up one of the old objective markers from the stash, the wrecked Crusader. Many Crusaders did not receive camouflage over the basic Lightstone, and this is one of them.

Long Time, No Post, Part 2

Battlefront released version 4 of their WW2 game "Flames of War". They've decided to start by revamping the mid-war desert range. Ah hah, I thought; a reason to pull stuff out of the stash and slap some paint on it. Well, OK, I had to add some more stuff to the stash as well, because I had a partial DAK force.

So, DAK first. BF released a new all-plastic box for a 10.5cm howitzer battery, which I duly assembled and painted:

Paints were, as usual, a mixture of Humbrol, Vallejo and Tamiya. I had a scare early on when I used a Humbrol enamel to prime the soft plastic crew figure and it reacted with the plasticiser to form a tacky surface. After a couple of weeks sitting in a corner, the tackiness had subsided but not gone completely. Figuring that I could either paint on and see what happened or spring for more crew, I painted. They turned out OK.

The plastic kit is nice and well priced, but there isn't as much detail on the figures or guns as there is/was on the older metals - details like emblems on caps, chest eagles, medals have all gone away and the breech and recoil mechanisms on the howitzers are simplified. I'm torn about this - I like the detail but I can also see how others might ignore it and it mostly vanished at table-top distances. A couple of close-in shots:

Under version 4, BF have done away with command teams, staff teams and observer teams. The battery does not feel complete without these extras teams, so out came an old metal blister pack. Much more detail on these sculpts.

Long Time, No Post, Part 1

So, I've been finishing projects (and, of course, starting many more) and collecting photos of the finished models, but I haven't updated this blog in, oh, about a year. Time to catch up a little.

First up, a handful of Reaper miniatures that found their way across the paint bench. paints are any or all of Tamiya, Humbrol, Vallejo and GW.

This mighty lad with flaming sword is from the Bones range. the plastic does make the models cheaper but they lose some detail, so I've decided that I'll only be using Bones for monsters and second tier NPCs.

Mr "I can't help my ancestry" is in metal, much sharper detail.

Another metal. There is a face under the hood, but you're not supposed to see it.

Skittles the Gnome, with stuffed unicorn. This converted mage has a habit of turning up as a slightly unhinged sidekick for player characters. Every quiet and upright PC needs a little gnomish mayhem in their lives.

This one is actually a P3 figure from their Warmahordes range.

Better late Than Never and Embrace of the Red Bear

Better Late Than Never

As a diversion from masses of T-72s (more on them later) and to test a new formula Testors spray primer, I assembled three BF M3A1 Stuarts. These models are old, early NZ production, back when the molds were new and there was next to no clean up or parts fitting needed.

The new spray primer (2982 super fine grey lacquer primer) went on well, didn't eat the resin and made a good base for the Tamiya XF-62 base colour. Some time later, I ended up with these three, the possible start of an American MW force for Flames of War:

Embrace of the Red Bear

Hypothetical 1980s NATO vs Warpac battles was our favoured era for micro-armour wargaming way back at university, so when BF announced Team Yankee I coudn't resist the lure. Figuring that most of the gentlemen grognards around here would go with the Americans, I plumped for a Soviet force. Good job I like green.

First to be assembled and painted were the T-72s. BF's model is a classic example of "you tried so hard but still fell short". The detail is crisp and, if the mass of photos on Google are to be believed, mostly accurate, although the AAMG ring has been sculpted in the wrong position. Assembly is mostly a dream, with excellent fit after minimal cleanup; again, there's a fly in the ointment: the smoke dispensers on the turret are very delicate, making them hard to get off the sprue in one piece, not accurately shaped and there is no decent mounting guide for them. Still, probably the best offering we'll have in 15mm.

Grey primer, followed by Tamiya XF-11 J.N. Green (a good match for the colour used by the Soviets in the 1980s, according to teh interwebz) and then washes, etc. eventually left me with most of a T-72 battalion:

I already had a Zvezda T-72, so this became the battalion commander. Zvezda's model is a much later version of the ubiquitous tank, with ERA all over it. Here are a couple of comparison shots:

A Soviet horde needs plenty of support. BF have given us ZSU-23-4 Shilkas and SA-13 Gophers for anti-aircraft work, along with 2S1 Carnation self-propelled howitzers and BM-21 Hail MRLs for artillery.

The Shilkas are good models made in BF's usual mixed media of resin and metal. The Gophers, also mixed media, are let down by chunky missile pods with very poor fitting to the nice resin mast. The BM-21s are nice resin models, although the control arm that extends from the lower left of the rocket pod is surprisingly crude.

At any rate, the models were assembled, primed and then treated to the same colours as the T-72s. This batch were given a matt coating with Armory spray, which decided to go "dusty", so they must've been tooling around a particularly barren patch of Germany.

There are BMPs, infantry, Hinds and SU-25 models still to come and then my Red Bear will be reaching out to embrace the decadent western portion of Germany, with a view to uniting the two halves under our benevolent care.

The Piccadilly Cowboys Go To War

15mm toys for Flames of War. All models from Battlefront, paints by White Ensign, Humbrol, Tamiya, Vallejo and MiG. That's what happens when you collect paints for forty years in three continents.

The Household Cavalry were combined into two regiments for World War 2. The 1st regiment drove armoured cars around the Mediterranean, the 2nd did the same in North-West Europe.

I have been planning a HCR force for NWE for some time, to tie-in with my Grenadier Guards and Welsh Guards forces. Interesting prospects for the use of recce forces in multiplayer battles played on large tables prompted me to assemble the assorted models that had been languishing in "the stash".

Another of the "one day I'll make it" lists has been armoured recce for Italy. So, a couple of troops have also been assembled, painted for 6th South African Armoured Division.

An overview of the sea of green, British style:

Starting with the 6SAAD vehicles, we have two troops, each of a pair of Sherman IIIs and a pair of Stuart Jalopies:

I would swear that a couple of those vehicles were painted in British SCC.15 and the rest in US Olive Drab, but the photo suggests otherwise.

Moving on, the squadron HQ is in Staghounds, one for the Old Man, one for his Number Two and one for some poor sod who has to keep the officers safe:

Those fine gentlemen have troops equipped with Daimler Dingos and Daimler armoured cars to do the actual scouting:

Each squadron had a small infantry section assigned to help with obstacle clearance and dismounted work. These lucky men rode around in American-supplied White Scout Cars:

American vehicles were usually left in their original paint until repairs and overhauls were needed, at which time a coat of SCC.15 would be lovingly applied. Two of the Whites are wearing SCC.15 and two are in US OD, which has a warmer, browner hue in the second photo.

In Italy, the recce troops could call on some heavier support in the form of a pair of 75mm Autocars (M3 halftracks sporting 75mm cannon):

In NWE this support role was filled by AEC Mk.III heavy armoured cars also touting 75mm guns: these models are still making their way across the workbench.

And there we have it for today! Coming in the near future will be the rest of this force - AECs and enough Dingos and Daimlers to fill out the troops.