Tarting up the Panzer Is

 As I was refreshing my early war German armour I thought I'd have a look at my old Panzer Is. Originally I thought I'd replace them with 3D prints like everything else, but actually they are quite decent models (some of the better QRF ones). They don't come out to play much, in fact they have seen more action in the SCW than WW2, so I thought I'd just re-paint them in line with my newer models.

One of the originals is on the right, it is quite a light grey and devoid of any markings. I did then that way so I could use them for both the SCW and WW2, but now I feel the need for some heraldry. The one on the left is that same as the one on the right, but I've given it a wash of Vallejo Panzer Grey which darkens it down a lot although it will lighten up again later in the process.

I went over all of them with a Panzer Grey wash, and as with the other vehicles I used various degrees of colour concentration so some came out a mid grey and others were proper Negrillos as the Spanish used to call them. I found that a bit of drybrushing lightens them considerably so better to start a bit dark.

And here are all six marching across the dining table. A sight to gladden the Fuhrers eye no doubt. Reputedly he was very keen on the Panzer I as they were cheap to make so he could have lots and lots of them. I've tried to do them in a variety of colour schemes and markings to represent the 1939 to 41 period.

This first pair are in early war grey and brown camo complete with the solid crosses the Polish anti-tank gunners so liked to shoot at. The one on the left has its crosses filled in yellow, which was more of a post Poland thing. Both have the large two digit numbers on the turret which were common in the early war period.

Unfortunately I had to paint the crosses by hand so they look a bit rough close up, but OK from a distance. Thank you Posca paint pens.

More handy aiming marks for rear shots. I did also put crosses all over the hulls but then painted them out later, for reasons which will be revealed. You can see how these two are still pretty dark but the dryrbushing has raised the colours a bit.

These two are in the slightly more subdued markings typical of the 1940 campaign. They still have the two digit turret numbers and are in grey and brown, but have hollow balkan crosses on the hull. These are quite small vehicles and being metal, there are various raised bits which make it hard to get decals on.

I ended up cutting the balkan crosses to get them behind that rail thingy, but they look OK I think. Mmmm, maybe need a bit more matt varnish on those turret numbers!

I managed to squeeze enough khaki out of my 'empty' Vallejo English Uniform bottle to do the tracks and running gear. I also painted the tyres on all the wheels, which gives me a certain sense of satisfaction, but is almost impossible to see under the mud and dust.

The last two are plain panzer grey, so more like 1941 Balkans/early Russia. Balkan crosses on the hull, but three digit numbers on the turrets, one red outlined in white the other black outlined in white..

I ended up putting the left hand side crosses a bit far back on the hulls but it doesn't look too goofy. I've got this vague idea of doing a series of games featuring our old pal 4th Panzer over the first three years of the war but swapping out the various types of vehicles, colour schemes and markings in the panzer battalions as time progresses. Well, we will see.

Finally, should the Nationalists feel like the need some support from the Condor Legion, I can swap the plain number turrets from the 1940 Panzer Is onto the unmarked hulls of the 1939 Panzer Is and add my temporary Nationalist crosses to them. That was why I painted out the hull crosses on the 1939 ones. On to Madrid! The camo patterns on the hull and turrets even match up, I might have planned that. 

Very pleased with that lot, and now I have yet another diversion from getting back to the serious business of fighting the American Civil War and the Battle of Gazala. I will write some games around the Panzer Is in due course.

That is pretty much it for modelling posts for some time to come I think. I've had some family stuff going on and not much time to do any painting, although I've been trying to keep playing some games. In times past I'd have done all these grey panzers in one post rather than four, but hey ho. My lead/plastic/resin pile  is virtually non existant so I'll mainly be doing gaming posts for a bit. I've got a medium project and a big project in the pipeline, but not right now, plus a couple of little bits which I will do at some point. 

Panzer Replacements - 2nd Company

The last of the replacement early war panzers, another light panzer company. More 3D resin print models from Battlefield 3D.

A couple of Panzer IIIs and a Panzer II.

We've seen a Panzer II F before. To mix things up a bit I did this one in grey and brown camo and just put an engimatic 'A' on the turret along with some tiny balkan crosses on the hull. 

A plain grey Panzer III H, numbered '6'. We've seen one of these before as well. 2nd Company have black turret numbers outlined in white. 

Just for a change I repeated the number on the turret bin too, and added a moderate amount of stowage - two jerrycans, a box and a tarp. They were were all washed after painting along with the vehicle tools and front mounted spare tracks.

The exciting vehicle in this lot is a Panzer III F. Essentially an upgunned E with a 50mm gun, but this one also has wider tracks, some spare track slung off the hull front, very jazzy criss-crossed pattern mudguards and supposedly a bit more armour on the hull front. The vision port arrangement on the turret looks slightly different too. It is very much a transitional vehicle between the E and the H and feels very business like.

This was a three part print, the tracks and hull/turret. In one of those 3D printing miracles, the turret is printed onto the hull, but still rotates! There is a sort of inverted plug holding it in place, so the turret can't be removed. Tbh it is a bit annoying, as I like to take turrets off for painting, and I'm sure I could have carved the plug back a bit, but it was buried in the depths of the hollow hull and hard to get at so I left it. I wonder if it is a design error in the STL as Ive never had a model like this before? 

I did the commander in an early war panzer beret (he is actually a Peter Pig british tank commander painted in a black uniform) but I did the vehicle in plain grey as when the older 37mm armed ones were upgunned prior to the Balkan or Greek campaigns they were often repainted.

 

I added a fair bit of stowage, including a fuel drum. This vehicle is likely to be driving a long way, down to Greece then off to Moscow.

2nd company has black numbers outlined in white, so this is 24. These all got the same basic scheme as the others, base coat of Sea Grey or Uniform Grey, washed with Vallejo Panzer Grey, followed by various layers of drybrushing. 

A fine looking vehicle which I can pretend is an E at times as well, as the two guns are almost indistinguishable. The lack of a turret bin is the main thing which stands out. 

I really enjoyed painting all of those, and the old metal vehicles they are replacing are safely stored in a different box now. 

Panzer Replacements - 3rd Company

 More replacement early war panzers, this time the 'medium' company of which most panzer battalions had one until 1943. Generally two or three platoons of Pz IV and a platoon of Pz II until the TOE was revised. 

Two Panzer IVs and a Panzer II. Models all from Battlefield 3D. 

A plain grey Panzer II F with the open hatch option and a PSC tank commander. I've decided 3rd company wil have plain white numbers and this is number 33.

A Panzer IV D with the very characteristic stepped hull front, short barrelled 75mm gun and the aerial deflector rod under it. A nice model with just two parts, hull and turret. Most of the stowage is moulded on already.

A fairly plain engine deck with spare wheels on either side.

Nice track droop moulded on, lovely tracks on all the models actually. The jerrycan rack is moulded on. Just number 3 on this one, and plain grey. I just couldn't bring myself to paint a Panzer IV in grey and brown. It was an absolute pig to get that balkan cross in, I had to cut it to fit around the stowage.

Yes, I did paint all the tyres on the road wheels. Although the effect is subtle, it does make a difference. At some point I'll go back and do all the desert German tanks tyres, which will be a big job. 

The other one is a Panzer IV E, which shares much with the D but is more heavily armoured. You can just see the plate clumsily welded across the drivers compartment which overhangs the hull front step to protect that section too. Unfortunately the model shares a lot of elements of the Pz IV D, particularly the very distinctive jerrycan rack, so at first glance they look very similar although it does have spare track on the lower front hull.

The engine deck is very different to the D though, with air grilles instead of plain hatches. Number 12 on the turret bin, perhaps the company CO has decided to number the tanks sequentially (typically they had three platoons of four Pz IV in the medium companies, plus a platoon of Pz II).

Slightly different arrangement of vision ports on the turret but otherwise looking very similar to the D. Same problem with the cross as on the D, thanks to that little box moulded onto the hull.

Both the Pz IV were two piece prints, just the hull and turret with the tracks moulded on, which is why the drive and idler wheels are a bit more clumsy than on the Pz IIIs. 

The vehicle on the left is what they are replacing, my old Peter Pig Panzer IVs, which I think is an F1 looking at the exhaust. A perfectly decent model and fine size-wise, just a bit crude compared to newer ones.

Battlefield 3D Sdkfz 250

 As I was getting some 15mm Battlefield 3D stuff printed anyway, I thought I'd get an Sdkfz 250 APC. I've long resisted these, using normal Hanomags for my armoured recce transport, but I seem to end up using late war panzer recce units quite a bit in various scenarios and I also had a vague idea I might use it as a stand-in for Rommels command halftrack 'Grief'.

And a lovely little model it is too. A single piece print with lovely external and internal detail. The MGs are additional and it comes with both MG34 and MG42 options. The bow MG is a pretty sturdy fix, but the AAMG is very fragile although it stuck on OK at first with a perfectly sized locating lug and hole. 

It comes with a fair bit of moulded on stowage including lots of jerrycans, a folding aerial and spare tyres so I didn't add any extra stowage.

You can see the tyres on the back. The crew are a pair of Peter Pig seated figures which tbh were a bit big but they fill the space OK. As I was painting them I realised the figure facing forward was an American! His helmet was a very similar shape to the other figure but once they were both painted it looked fine.

I went for a mid/late war three tone camo with plain white crosses. I went fairly light on the camo so it will do for desert use as well. Inevitably while painting it I managed to drybrush the AAMG too heavily and break it off. I stuck it back down much more securely at 90 degrees to the hull and braced it, so hopefully it will stay on better in future.  

And here it is with my Sdkfz 250/9s. The one on the right is Battlefront and a good match sizewise. the one on the left is QRF and is very small in comparison. The older vehicles also have the horizontal stripe camo (based on 5th SS Wikings recce battalion) but much heavier than the new addition.

And here they are with some more late war recce, a couple of SDD Sdkfz 234/1s. All looking very smart.

Panzer Replacements - HQ Company

 Next up for the new 15mm early war German armour is the replacement panzer 'battalion HQ company', as before, all the models are from battlefield 3D.

A recce Panzer II and a command Panzer III.

This is a Pz IIIe command tank with a bedrail aerial. I've wanted one of these for years and even contemplated trying to convert one, but coming up with a workable design for the aerial (in 0.5mm brass) defeated me. This one is based on the Pz IIIe model I showed in a previous post, but has the turret moulded in place. The aerial is quite fine so I stiffened it up with some PVA. Otherwise, the tracks are separate.

I went for an open hatch option (much easier than trying to cut down the Zvezda cupolas and adding hatch covers!) as it is a command tank, and loaded up the rear deck with stowage - some cases and an oil drum, all Skytrex. Loading the deck up seems to have been a popular past-time with command tanks.

I gave it HQ markings in red and white but didn't bother with balkan crosses as they are virtually inaccessible behind the  additional aerial rails (beautifully printed as always on a resin 3D print with nice separation). If you look carefully you can see that even the grab handles on the turret top have gaps under them.

I did this in grey/brown camo based on the famous colour photo of one of these crossing a river in Russia in 1941, you can see bits of the camo on the mudguards etc. I expect it will get used as a normal gun tank in early war games, and it can join my very old SDD Panzerbefehlswagen 1 as a dedicated command vehicle as required. 

The 'recce platoon' is a Panzer IIa, and what a beautiful little model it is. A two piece print, hull+turret. The 20mm cannon is a fair bit smaller than on the II F, I wonder if it was just mounted differently with more of the weapon inside the turret, or if it really was shorter?

It is a fair bit smaller than the Pz II F, and from the back looks more like a Panzer I. I did this one in grey/brown too and for both vehicles did pinwashes on some of the details after the main paint job.

You can see the lovely track and other detail on the side. It has a very pre-war feel to it, the Pz II F looks far more modern. It reminds me a bit of a Renault 35. As the hull sides are so low it was common to put all the markings on the turret, so I put the crosses and turret numbers on there. Strictly it should be a solid cross for a very early vehicle, but I don't have any solid decals and I didn't fancy painting them.  

Here it is next to one of my (QRF) Panzer Is, you can see how small the Pz IIa is but still a bit bigger than the Pz 1. Having done these new vehicles I'm minded to go over the Panzer Is again with a new paint job. I'm not planning on replacing those at the moment.

Panzer replacements - 1st Company

 I've occasionally ruminated in previous posts about replacing some of my older vehicles with more modern models. Replacing them means it wont take up any more storage space as I'll dispose of the old ones, but I'll have the fun of painting more tanks. As regular readers may have gathered, I like painting tanks.

I finally got around to doing something about it, and ordered some more toys, vaguely structured as an early war panzer battalion in Command Decision terms, even though I rarely play 1 base = 1 platoon games any more. It is just an easy organisation system and scales up and down fine for operational and tactical games. Essentially they are one for one replacements of the existing models I bought decades ago though. 

So here is the '1st Light Company', a platoon of Panzer IIs and two platoons of Panzer IIIs. I've got some old Panzer Is too but I'm not replacing those yet.  Early war panzer battalions had two or three light companies with a mix of Pz I, II and III, plus a medium company. These are all resin 3D prints from Battlefield 3D, and I endured the usual six week long wait from order to delivery, but it is always worth the wait as the models are exquisite.

First up is a Panzer II F. A lovely crisp little model, and sized well. It is a similar size to my old Peter Pig Panzer IIs and somewhat bigger than my Zvezda ones which are notoriously undersized.

It is a two piece print, just the hull and turret and very little clean up required, just a few stray support struts. I was a bit anxious about the 20mm cannon and coax MG as they are quite thin. The resin is fairly springy, but I stiffened them up with some PVA which didn't noticeably thicken them.

Lovely crisp detail on the engine deck. I ran some pinwash into the air grilles after the main paint job. As it is first company they all have similar numbers - red outlined in white. For some variety I just put 131 on the turret bin for this one. I also added a rolled tarp on one of the stowage boxes (from the Skytrex vehicle stowage pack).

Otherwise it is pretty plain although the tracks contrast pleasingly with the hull colour, just like the Bovingdon one. I did paint all the tyres, and although it is hard to see, it lifts the model considerably. That balkan cross behind the aerial rail was an absolute pig to stick on. Once of the nice things about resin print is the level of physical detail, but they do make some modelling jobs hard. 

Next up is this lovely Pz IIIe. It is beautifully modelled and has managed to capture that rather fragile pre-war look. This model had separate tracks and turret,and  I went for an open turret hatch option. the commander is a spare PSC one. Well, it was supposed to be a platoon commanders tank irl.

I added a couple of jerry cans on the rear engine deck and highlighted the tow cable with Boltgun Metal and Nuln Oil. Fairly obviously I've also done this one grey and brown camo! This was the official scheme from July 1937 to July 1940 but it persisted into the Russian campaign as older vehicles were only generally repainted when refurbished. I wanted to do a few of my early war vehicles in this scheme as even the Bovingdon Pz II is in grey and brown now. Because both tones are very similar, it doesn't show up well in black and white photos.

Turret number 113 for this one, still red and white.

Finally we have a Pz III H, a much more business like looking vehicle. This has got more modern drive and idler wheels than the Pz IIIe, it also has spare track slung on the lower front hull and very obviously applique armour on the hull front and mantlet as well as a turret bin. It is armed with a 50L42 gun, but with the fine detail 3D print it is very hard to distinguish from the 37mm gun on the E.

The engine deck is different to the E and it has wider tracks and spare wheels mounted on the fenders. I added the oil drum.

I did this one in overall panzer grey, turret number 124. The base colour for all the vehicles was similar - undercoat black, spray the upper surfaces white then a base coat of either Humbrol Sea Grey or Coat D'Arms Uniform Grey followed by a heavy wash of Vallejo Panzer Grey diluted to various thicknesses to vary the coverage and overall tone. I was after a range of greys, which I did achieve, but the weathering tended to blend them all back into a more uniform tone.

This is what they are replacing, my old Peter Pig Pz III and Pz IIs. Perfectly fine models in their time (I bought these in the late 90s when metal 15mm tanks were £3.50!), but just a bit crude compared to modern ones, particularly the running gear. They have seen long and sterling service, but time for an upgrade.

Sizewise they all match nicely.

I'm very pleased with those and I'm looking forward to getting them into action soon. More replacements to follow!