Battlefront Afrika Korps 88mm AT Guns

Well if you're creating an Afrika Korps force for battles in the Western Desert, there's kind of one thing that you HAVE to have, and that's Flak 36 88mm anti-aircraft/anti-tank guns, full stop. The 88 is so synonymous with the DAK it would be odd to have a game without them. So as a quick couple-day project I decided to paint a couple for the game this week.

 

These are excellent plastic models from Battlefront. The crew models are that kind of soft-ish resin models you get on sprues from BF, not injection molded hard plastic.

A couple of the crew figures were standing at a crazy angle on their bases but a hot water/cold water dip and plunge straightened them out. The crew are really characterful and detailed.

 

The sprue also contained some extra bits like ammo cases and shell casings which look cool on the bases.

I painted the guns with a base of XV-88 and painted them over with a mix of Tallarn Sand blended with Deck Tan just to lighten it up a bit. I then washed with Agrax and chipped with German Camo Black Brown.

The crews were painted in my standard German way - base Khaki, wash Agrax, then tune up some random jackets and pants with lighter tones.

These should do some damage in the game on Thursday, so anyway...

Heia Safari!
 

Egyptian T-62s and BTR-60s, Israeli M48 Chaparral for the Yom Kippur War

Popping in a quick post here with some more work done on the YKW project. First up are three Battlefront T-62s. These are great looking tanks, not much extra work required on them, I just filled in the mounting holes for the snorkel at the back of the turret with greenstuff.

I took inspiration for the three-colour camo pattern from AK's excellent book, "Middle East Wars - Arab-Israeli Conflict 1948-1973" by the unlikely duo of Pere Valls and "Zachary Sex". As someone with an unusual name, I feel for that dude, I really do.

Anyway I painted the tank with Tallarn Sand over Morgrot Hide, Skrag Brown over Doombull Brown, and Death World Forest over Castellan Green, washed with Agrax and re-highlighted Tallarn. Looks OK I reckon.

These three will join nine Khurasan T-55s... speaking of which...

Here's one on the left. Notice that the Khurasan model is about 10% smaller than the Battlefront tank. I know the hull of the T-62 was "a few centimetres longer and wider" than that of the T-55 but this is a bit much. Oh well.

Next up is some motorized transport for the Egyptians - BTR-60s.

Again, Battlefront models. These are really good kits. I stuck some spare fuel cans on 'em but otherwise left them built from the box.

Love the commanders included with these.

I used the technical pen to add some tactical numbers to the hulls.

Last up is a "speculative" vehicle. After painting a bunch of Israeli and Egyptian jets it is only prudent to paint some anti-aircraft defence. I have Shilkas coming for the Egyptians (and the SA-2 SAM of course) but that left the IDF to consider. I've read that they captured Shilkas from the Egyptians during the 1973 war, but can't find any pictures of them in action. What else did they have? 

Well, I understand that the IDF did get some of the new M48 Chaparral anti-aircraft missile platforms and they were used in the 1973 war, one apparently shooting down a MiG-17. Good enough for me.

This is a 3D-printed model from "3D Battlefield Miniatures" - he also sold me the T-62 sprues. It's a really nice crisp resin print but came with one of the missile tailsections broken off. No problem, I just cut off the nose and that was a missile that had already been fired off. The missile rack was even pre-magnetized, which was nice! It's painted in Grey-Green washed with Agrax, like my other IDF vehicles.

The model didn't come with crew though, so I pinched a couple of crew figures from the Battlefront Israeli/Iranian (!) TOW jeeps I have on the painting table. Of course I built the jeeps with Israeli crew, but one 15mm crewman is very much like another, so I did a quick head swap on the Iranians with a couple of US WW2 halftrack passengers left over from my PSC project. Hey presto, crew dudes for the M48. The only thing is... the driver is hanging onto a steering wheel, but the Chaparral was controlled with levers. As you can well imagine, I'm not particularly bothered.

Til next time... youm sa'id and shalom!

 
 

Flames of War Afrika Korps leFH 18 10.5cm Artillery Battery

Next models finished in the Flames of War/Western Desert project... this is the last of the "Dietrich's Ghosts" box from Battlefront. I'd already painted the Pzkpfw IIIs and IVs so on to the leFH 18 10.5cm light howitzers.

There were four models in the box and since they're "mid-war" and not North Africa-specific, they came with metal crew in European uniforms. This was a problem! The solution: order some specific Afrika Korps crewmen from Peter Pig.

The Piggies sell their models in packs of 8, there are three crew poses. Since I had four guns to crew, I ordered two packs to give four crew per gun.

The new Battlefront bases have six round depressions to fit the round bases of their figures. Of course the Piggie models have rectangular puddle bases and all of 'em fit well in the holes except the waving dude. The hole in the base needed to be filled in where he went.

I always have a dilemma when painting multi-based models. Do you paint them separately and then stick them on the base? The painting is easier but if you've painted the base already, you have an issue with attaching them. You have to build up the groundwork around the figure bases and paint that separately. Or do you stick the figures to the base before you paint them? Much easier because you're undercoating and painting the whole works at the same time, but it can be an issue getting your brush into all parts of the figures on the base. 

 

I went with the first option - I stuck the figures on popsicle sticks to paint, glued the gun to the base and did the groundwork on the base (leaving space for the figure bases), then painted the figures and gun/base separately. The last step was to glue the painted crew to the base, then carefully fill in and paint groundwork around their bases.

Colours used: gun - base XV-88, overcoat with Tallarn Sand, washed Agrax Earthshade then Tallarn'd again. Groundwork - Steel Legion Drab or a darker tan, then Khaki, drybrushed Rakarth Flesh, Crew - allover Khaki, washed Agrax, then spot highlighted with Khaki, Tallarn, and other random khaki green/olive or lighter colours on jackets and caps.

That's it for the field guns. I still have four 88mm Flak/AT guns to build and paint plus some 50mm PaK 36 AT guns so the Afrika Korps artillery park will be amply filled.

Heia Safari!

Egyptian Su-20 Fitter-Cs for the Yom Kippur War

OK so with the recent self-escalation of the Yom Kippur War project I decided to pick up some air support for my Egyptians. The best available option (as MiG-17s are no longer available from Battlefront) are these - the Su-17 Fitter box set.

These were on sale at Meeplemart and Conscript Greg kindly picked them up for me before his recent visit back to Winnipeg. These aircraft kits are fully injection molded plastic (well except for the missiles which are resin) and are a doddle to assemble.

No Egyptian decals in the box of course so I hand painted the roundels and flag, and scribed the numbers in "Western Arabic" numerals with my technical pen.

Oh and I guess I should explain how these work for the Egyptian air force of the YKW... it's simple really, the Su-20 used by the Egyptians in-period was just the export version of the Soviet Su-17M. As far as I've been able to tell, the aircraft were identical in appearance.

I think these are pretty good-looking aircraft and they were a great deal from the Meeple-people. They'll do nicely in a YKW game. Of course I've got some Israeli aircraft done too - but they're waiting for decals to arrive and once they do, I'll get 'em posted here. Youm Sa'id!
 

IDF Magach-6s and M113 Zeldas for the Yom Kippur War

 

**Repost from the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge Blog, just because I want to keep track of this project on our own blog. If you've seen it already please click "back"**

Well I have GregB to thank once again for further hobby escalation... several years ago, encouraged by Mr. B, I built up a small force of Egyptians for the Yom Kippur War. Greg had Israelis and we had a few good games, including a game at PrairieCon that made it into the pages of Wargames Illustrated, no less! But sadly Greg now lives in Toronto with his IDF and it occurred to me I should maybe paint an Opfor to face my Egyptians, so here we are!

I was able to get a box of Israeli Magach-6s (aka US M60 Pattons with some choice modifications) from Meeplemart in Toronto. The Battlefront site recommended that the smoke dischargers be eliminated from the turret fronts as the Magach-6 didn't have 'em. That was pretty easy.

I don't have a ton of spare 15mm stowage so the turrets just got a couple jerrycans glued on. I have a bunch of resin stowage coming from abroad to stick onto the BF Israeli M113s I'm building next.

Painting was straightforward - AK Green-Grey washed with Agrax Earthshade for that lived-in look, tracks Mechanicus Standard Grey washed Nuln Oil, and some sponge chipping with Vallejo German Camo Black-Brown. A light dusty drybrush of Rakarth Flesh around the wheels and lower hull and it's done. Decals are Battlefront of course. 

Bone-dome helmets needed a little carving to look right for '73 as the supplied crew have more modern headgear with bulges for the headsets. Uniform and helmet were painted Vallejo Khaki. Groundwork is Steel Legion Drab, drybrushed Khaki, with static grass and tufts to suit.  

Continuing the new "Israelis in '73" project, here is a box of Battlefront M113s. These are literally the stock M113s the BF sell for every other army, with some Israeli crew and a set of Israeli decals stuck in the box. Now I'm not complaining, these are super little models, but they do need some work to be Israeli Zeldas - and I did some of that work, but not all of it.

The defining feature of the Israeli M113 in period had to be the gypsy-caravan look with tons of stowage. Battlefront used to sell specific "Israeli stowage" packs but these aren't available anywhere in their current sales chaos. I also couldn't find any on eBay or the other usual places. So I had to order some 15mm stowage from Redog. Pretty good stuff but took a long time to get here. 

I stuck a LOT of stowage on these vehicles but did not build the racks that the Israelis equipped these vehicles with. I figured this was OK given the small scale.

HOWEVER... what I didn't do was scratch-build the special exhaust pipes that the Israelis equipped their M113s with. You'd see it in the picture here - they extended from the exhaust on the right top of the vehicle, and down the side. Try as I might I haven't been able to determine the exact rationale for the modification. I presume that the exhaust mod was done to address the problem of the exhaust being right in front of the "family hatch" on the top - but Conscript Hugh had extensive experience riding in M113s in the '80s and didn't recall any excessive exhaust coming into the troop compartment. Maybe in the Middle East the heat combined with exhaust presented a particular problem. Anyway the special BF stowage kits came with modded exhausts and I would have loved to have those bits. Oh well. 

For crew I used the dudes supplied in the box. You get four guys with MGs firing from the hatch, two guys yelling, and a couple sets of crews for more modern M113 weapons, AT missiles or something - not relevant for 1973. It was kinda tricky to get these figures settled in the hatch, but I ended up putting a blob of greenstuff on the vehicle floor and sticking the models' feet into that.

I think the models look pretty cool with crew hanging out of the hatch.

I did build one without any crew though. For this one I cut up some spare MGs and stuck them to the vehicle deck.

The BF decal set is great, and includes a bunch of the Israeli vehicle ID tags, one of which is seen just above the chevron.

I really like these models. Now I have to get to the IDF infantry which I ordered from Khurasan. I picked them up from Pembina last week along with some relevant reading material - "Fire & Steel" (a history of the IDF's 7th Armoured Brigade) and "Israeli Tank Battles - Yom Kippur to Lebanon" both by Samuel M. Katz. I've got the first platoon of IDF infantry based and primed and they should go up fast. They'd better, because I'm hoping to run a YKW game at PrairieCon at the end of May. Shalom!

Painting Challenge Submission 2 - 15mm WW2 Russian Engineers and Scouts

Some Russian WW2 infantry in 15mm.

Happy new year to all visitors to the Fawcett Avenue Conscripts blog - many of you who are actual humans and not bots! For my second submission to Curt's Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge, my brushes continued with a painting theme seen often here in the waning weeks of 2019 - WW2.  These are 15mm Russian infantry - a platoon of assault engineers, and a squad of scouts.  The engineers are metal figures from Battlefront, while the scouts are from Peter Pig.  All of these figures had been sitting in my "primed-but-not-yet-painted" pile (i.e. "pile of shame") for at least two years - the scouts had originally been intended as a theme submission in a much earlier painting challenge, so it feels good to finally get around to them and get them finished!

LMG teams on oval bases...you can also see one of the flamethrowers on an oval base. He's by himself...nobody wants to stand too close to the flamethrower guy on a battlefield...

It is common to base 15mm figures in groups (as often seen in "Flames of War"), but these particular figures are all based individually for games like "Battlegroup", "Bolt Action" and "Chain of Command".  I enjoy WW2 gaming a lot - probably too much, as I paint the period in a number of different scales. I have found that playing games like "Bolt Action" with 15mm figures gives a great look on the table in terms of engagement ranges on a 6' x 4' table.  So while I have a lot of 15mm figures on group bases, I have been adding 15mm units that are based individually as well.  An additional advantage is that one Company-sized box of 15mm infantry from a company like Battlefront provides more than enough models for any scenario at a great value.

The eight-man squads are configured for "Battlegroup", but of course can be re-organized for any particular WW2 skirmish rules.

The downside to individual 15mm figures is that it can be difficult to work out which weapons are being carried by who (an MP40 and MP44 sure look similar at that size, for example). It also hard to see who is the officer, details which are easier to pick out on a 28mm figure, but not so much on the 15mm foot sloggers.  To work around this I use a similar basing system to one Curt has developed - senior officers (like the platoon CO) are on a hex-shaped base, NCOs are on square bases, and special weapons (in this case, the flamethrowers and the DP LMG teams) are on oval bases.   It is an easy and quick way to ID the notable infantry figures even with smaller scale models.

Platoon commander on a hex base, along with a couple of flunkies to "bite the bullet" for him when the time comes...

The metal assault engineers from Battlefront are fantastic sculpts.  They are wearing SN-type body armour, carrying SMGs and are loaded down with explosives, ropes and other combat engineer goodies used to blow sh!t up on the battlefield.  The platoon pack also provides quite a few flamethrowers. It's a great value, and the sculpts have a lot of character and dynamism, impressive considering they are only 15mm in size.  I'm glad I picked up a couple of these packs a few years ago, as these metal figures (and so many others) are now gone from Battlefront's product line up, sacrificed as the company debases itself further and further before the false god of plastic figures.

For the Motherland! Crush the Fascist invaders!

The small group of scouts are from Peter Pig's top-shelf lineup of 15mm WW2 figures.  I'm not sure why I only have five of them...probably something to do with a Chain of Command game I had in mind back in 2017.  At any rate, I tried to "pop" the green out a little more than one normally would, just to help them stand out a bit on the tabletop.

Five of these figures were painted prior to the commencement of AHPC X.  So while I have gathered 36 of them together for these propaganda photos, only 31 of counted for points, which provided another 62 "points" of painting toward my goal of 1000 points.

Stay tuned for further submissions as the Challenge continues, and be sure to visit the AHPC pages to see great work from so many participants, including Byron and MikeF. 

Random 15mm WW2 Germans

Assortment of late WW2 German infantry figures and a SdKfz 250/9 from Battlefront.

A couple of weeks ago I embarked on a clean up/purge of various piles of hobby and hobby-related stuff in my basement. It's strange...I threw a ton of stuff away, but I still seem to have too much hobby stuff.  Whatever the amount of net de-cluttering I did (or did not) achieve, the process was great in that when I do this I stumble across a number of things that I was "just about to paint", and therefore had left on or near my painting pile.  This feeling of telling myself I am "just about to paint" something can persist for some time...my assorted WW2 interests had fallen into that abyss.

The main bases are 20mm rounds, while the panzerschreck team is on a 30mm round.

I have a large collection of 15mm WW2 figures. It's not terribly focused, but for the most part it consists of mid-to-late war Eastern Front stuff, along with a nice little pile of North African stuff.  This collection started circa 2007 with a dive into Battlefront's "Flames of War".  Other WW2 gaming systems such as "Bolt Action", "Crossfire", "Blitzkrieg Commander", "Battlegroup" and "Chain of Command" have joined the Flames of War books on the shelves.

The 250/9 is a pretty small ride - must have come in handy when trying to keep a low profile while scouting ahead.

Many of these games require the infantry to be based individually - or, even if they don't explicitly require it, they still work much better with the infantry based individually. But at the same time, I do love 15mm gaming for WW2. I enjoy the "look" of the engagement ranges with the 15mm models - even ones with primarily tanks can avoid the dreaded "tank park" effect.  So in 2013-14, as we started to play some "Chain of Command", I took to doing up a number of individually-based 15mm WW2 infantry units - again mostly for the Eastern Front, 1943-45. The figures you see in these photos were meant to be part of this effort, primed and ready to go, probably some time in 2015, when I put them down to pick up...oh who knows what, but based on the blog history, it was probably something 30k...

Bases intended to not look completely out of place on a winter table, while still being OK for a summer table...

 I decided to do some "mopping up" of these 15mm WW2 forces that have been waiting so long for some painting attention. Over the past few years I have painted very little in terms of WW2 - I sure wish I had taken the time to write down some of the paints I used back then...anyway, I was able to bodge it together again.  And I'll write it down this time!

These are all from Battlefront.  The infantry are from their excellent late-war Winter German collection - now sadly no more as they sacrifice themselves to the altar of plastic figures.  These Germans were just great sculpts - very lean, and they manage, ever for 15mm figures, to look...hopeless, like even if this battle works out, they know the war is lost...I just love these figures, and I'm glad I picked them up while they were still available.

Great assortment of attire on the late-war German castings. Sadly they are no more, as Battlefront focuses now on plastics.

The half-track is a SdKfz 250/9 (I think?So, so many type of half tracks...).  It is a Battlefront model - an older mixed media, resin and metal, model (I think these can be had in plastic now from Battlefront and the Plastic Soldier Company).  I didn't try any cammo because...I couldn't remember what paints I used to use.  I settled for trying to get that German panzer yellow colour settled...the result is...OK.

It's great fun to re-connect with old projects! Stay tuned for more (or, who knows, something else entirely different, anything is possible).  Thanks for visiting the Blog, and have a great day.