peggy

Well work has absorbed what little time I have avaliable of late so here is a very quick update as to what I have managed to achieve over the past 3 weeks. First up an addition to the Japanese force the first of 2 PEGGY medium bombers:

Once again 1:285 scale from Raiden Miniatures, lovely models that require hardly any cleaning up and are all perfectly proportioned.

And the first unit for my "Funny Little Wars" Army Red force, some figures belonging to the elite 1st Bn Highlanders which will form the guard of the Army. Figures are Armies in Plastic 54mm.

Thanks for looking now back to work!

Al

MIDWAY ENCOUNTER

Today the Mini Monster and I gave the aircraft a little run out on the living room coffee table, (Its far too cold in the shed to keep a 5 year old ammused for long!).

So todays scenario would be a quick Battle of Midway encounter, seeing Nat in command of 2 Buffalo's

Who wouold be up against me controlling a flight of Val dive bombers and a second flight consisting of a pair of Zero's as the escort, how hard could it be!!

The more observant will notice that I have decided to attach labels to the bases, these are purely reminders of the basic in game stats, such as:

1.  A/C type
2. Speed (Inches) Movement phase 1 + 2
3. Minimum forward speed (Prior to perfprming a maneouvre)
4. Hit points
5. Saving throw

The day started well for the IJN, Nat as opted to fly straight at the enemy whom in turn broke Left and Right with the Vals making for the table edge whilst the Zero's doubled back onto the Buffalo's sucessfully scoring hits with both MG & Cannon fire. Luckily the Buffalos are quite resilient and saved all hits bar 1, leaving a Buffalo trailing smoke.  

At this poin Nat decided to split the Buffalo's into two individual A/C. So with the damaged plane completing a slow arc to the rear of the action it was down to the un undamaged A/C to get stuck in. And get stuck in it did, scoring 4 hits in the middle of the Val flight, even after saving 2 of these hits the middle A/C was done for and dove straight into the sea (no parachutes observed). The Zero's enraged by this act of defiance homed in for the kill.

 But in their haste both pilots completely forgot about the damaged Buffalo that was slowly arcing back onto their flight line. Bam all MGs managed to obtain the score to hit and it was at this point I realised one fatal design in the Zero, its really vunerable with a saving throw of 6+ what are the chances? let me tell you, none what so ever! and another Jap A/C plummeted seaward.

The Vals were making good speed towards the table edge and the undamaged Buffalo raced to catch them but ended all movement just out of MG range, however as the last Zero gave chase it only managed an ineffective burst without scoring a single hit. Once more the Buffalo trailing smoke and loosing Glycol managed to sneak up and hammered it with MG fire the same miserable attempt to save all three hits resulted in another A/C downed.

The US admiral was overjoyed at the brave efforts of the trusty Buffalo's, hopelessly outnumbered and outclassed they managed three enemy A/C destroyed to one of their own damaged. Sore looser? Not me!!

Nat has come on really well, progressing from Wings of War card laying to miniature gaming including multiple dice throwing and measuring. I am making some measuring sticks and turn templates to make game play a little easier for her, but there is nothing like a home grown opponent, even if she does keep winning!

Cheers

Al



New Years resolution Pt1

Well its been some time but progress has resumed at last! Like almost everyone else in the hobby a firm promise to oneself was made to finally tackle the unfinished and in some cases the unstarted projects!

First on the agenda was a pile of 1:285th scale aircraft from Raiden Miniatures:  http://www.raidenminiatures.co.uk/index.html I purchased these as the Midway Battle Set about 2 years ago and subsequebtly stowed them away in a little plastic container with all the other unpainted lead and plastic.

The sculpts are great all beautifully proportioned with hardly any flashing and the set comes with flight stands, rule set, dice and scenario sheet.

First up are the Val dive bombers

Followed by a dodgy photo of the Kate Torpedo Bombers

Zero,s painted as three flights of two

A thoroughly ficticious colour scheme I am afraid to say although it does give each seperate flight some individuality, and i like them. All the meatballs were hand painted, and below is a shot for scale. Not entirelly a tiny model however still enough for my shakey hands to find difficult!

Now for the USN contingent, these AC are still awaiting the arrival of the decals that are in the post, so i will follow up with completed shots later.

A Squadron of 6 x Dauntless dive bombers

Hellcats in two flights of two

And finally a pair of lumbering Buffalo

Below is the entire Battle set arrayed. In total it took around 3 days on and off to paint the 24 AC. All were painted in their respective vallejo base colour with either a Bronze Green/Klear or Black/Klear 50/50 wash and as mentioned I will be posting once more once the decals arrive for the USN

The rule set provided in the Battle Sets are "Thunderbolt & Lightning"and are also free to download from the Raiden site. They are very basic yet functional rule set, and I have played a couple of quick (less than 20 min) games from the basic scenario sheet utilising a half dozen AC with my 5 year old and enjoyed them. I am currently looking at purchasing the Battle of Britain set:

 Set 1 - Battle of Britain (Version 2)
Contains 6 x Ju-88A1, 4 x Bf109E, 4 x Bf-110C, 3 Spitfire I, 3 Hurricane I, 20 Bases, 2 Dice, Our Fast Play Rules & Scenario Sheet.

With the possibly of investing into Check Your 6 rules to add more complexity to the games.

Next job will be to progress/restart work on my Funny Little Wars Army Red Highland Inf Btn that was a project from almost three years ago that stalled like all the rest, along with 6mm Ancient Greeks, 6mm WW2 German & Russians for BKC, finishing the extra 10mm Russian & Germans that I bought at Harrogate last year (Still packaged) various terrain works, various 15mm FOW stuff to paint & sell on Evil Bay and some 28mm figs half completed! Not to mention the Ships that I am also thinking in purchasing where will I fit it all in?

Messershmitt Complete

Well it was a fun little project which on and off took around 6 days to construct start to finish with plenty of drying time between glues and dope. The rubber band motor has not stood up too well though as it has already snapped so unfortunately there will be no test flight for this warbird!!

So its to be hung from my daughters bedroom ceiling as a static model heaven only knows how long it will last in one piece!

Just to go over the project once more, the AC is constructed with a balsa skeleton, covered in tissue paper painted with cellulose dope for rigidity. The canopy and engine cowling are all plastic moulded as is the undercarriage wheels which are mounted on thin wire. Decals are provided in the kit and the colour scheme is purely from my overactive imagination.

I really enjoyed this build so much that the Wife has purchased me another, this one is mine though to combat my daughters and this one will fly!!!!!!!!!!!!

Germans updated

Well here they are, the first batch done! as previously mentioned these are a mixture of GHQ & H&R minis (Veh's and figures).

BKC Command teams (CO centre)

The Big Cheese himself

 Left View

Right View

 Panzer Group command

 Infantry Command's

 50mm Pak 38 AT groups

 Recce & FOO parties

75mm IG group

Still awaiting labels for the square bases and literally a shed load (excuse the pun) of infantry bases to follow up.

Cheers

The Germans are coming

After an afternoon in the Shed watching "Cross of Iron" I have decided to resurect my WW2 6mm stuff. Never happy with a result I made the rash decision to completely rebase my German collection. I took inspiration from "Ian H" who can be found on the following link http://www.iandrea.co.uk/wargames/6mm/bases0/bases1/bases1.html
So with a healthy collection of spare adhesive floor tiles lying around the shed let the rebasing begin!

Part of the urge to carry out this task was the recent purchase of some reinforcements from H&R, the majority of my 6mm stuff is GHQ and like the rest of the UK I am undergoing a period of belt tightening when the wife takes a more scrutinious look at all my purchases I can proudly inform her how well i have researched the market to obtain the lowest price possible.

The H&R minis are slightly smaller than GHQ and not as detailed in the mouldings however remember this is 6mm!

Now the bases, The collection are being based for BKC however I have decided to detract from the book suggestions and use a system of all base sizes as 30mm Sq for uniformity except for the HQs which will be circular and the Army Command as the oversize disc. I have also left space at the rear of the base for unit details etc.

Adhesive tiles are great! super, super thin and no more messy glue for the basing material. I use a drop of super glue just to secure the minis then a quick dip into the sand tub and done! These have been sprayed with Army painter Matt Black as a base and sealant and sucessively washed with a flat green & kleer mixture before a dry brush of stone grey. I will wait for the final painting to be complete before deciding to go any further as I fear spending too much detail on the base may detract from the actual minis.

Update to follow....

Fun with Balsa

The other day I took another forage into my ever distant youth buy purchasing a Balsa Model kit of a Messershmit BF109 from my local Hobbycraft.  The kit is from Guillows and as mentioned I made one of these kits along time ago when i still had plenty of hair.....

The kit comprises of 5-6 sheets of thin Balsa wood with pre stenciled components and a sheet of pre cut 1/16th " Balsa stringers. once built the frame is then covered with tissue paper and a liberal coating of cellulose dope. So afer an afternoon of shed lockdown and getting high on Balsa Cement & cellulose dope the skeleton of the airframe is coming on great guns...

The reference material is another throwback from my youth and was bought for me by my dad when I was but a mere slip of a youth. And now starngely enough "German Aircraft of WW2" (in Colour) is a firm favourite of my 5 Year old daughter. To the lower left of the image can be seen the oversize propeller and the rubber band motor that power the model.

The main fuselage is now covered in tissue paper and the motor installed, the tail plane fixed in position with random items for weight and here we will leave the project for the glue to dry. lets hope we get some decent weather soon so I can get some test flights in before I go back to work BOO Hisss............