Carden Me?

Having a sort through the lead mountain is always a joy, forgotten pieces are revealled with all the excitement from buying them in the first place. This Carden Loyd universal carrier is made by Reiver Miniatures and I picked it up at Salute 2011 while having a natter with Red Rich who’d put on that year’s VBCW game.

It’s a crisp solid metal casting and surprisingly solid for such a small model.  It’s few pieces, the chassis, the lid, two tracks and a Vickers HMG. The chassis has a couple of notches so you physically can’t put the tracks on the wrong way around, a smart touch. The Vickers doesn’t have an ammo box, but it’s simple enough to add one and yes it really does go on at that jaunty angle. Not so with the tripod which usually goes on the driver’s side of the “bonnet”.  It would be a folded one and I don’t have any of those in my scraps box so I left it off.

I’d rather not base vehicles like this but I did think it’d get whalloped in game so a base was a must.  I used the ever wonderful milliput for the ground so I could press the models tracks into it and have trackmarks, if you’re doing this it’s best to do it with the bare metal piece, but if you only think of it after painting you need to get both pieces damp to avoid problems.

I wanted to put a few pieces in the stowage bins, so I used various pieces from the Warlord Games plastic British sprues plus a white metal petrol can.  I’m pleased with it, should I do another one I’d do it with the lid propped up and a full crew.

Pull the Udder One

A short post with some poor photos of the Warlord Games dead livestock which I enjoyed painting as the Ayrshire breed, spurred on by them re-releasing them while I still had an unopened blister packet from the original release.

When I first saw these I thought they were a must have. The first dead cattle I recall seeing in a war film were those in Saving Private Ryan during the radar station scene. I’m not certain that was a cinematic first, but it’s what they reminded me of, well that and how many animals get slaughtered during war without much notice.

Driller Killer

This beast of a machine was bought over a year ago as a secret weapon for VBCW, so wishing to keep it a well guarded secret I undercoated it and tucked it behind something on a shelf so no one would know about it until it appeared on the gaming table. During a inreasingly rare fit of tidying I recently found it and set about doing it justice, half from shamefully having forgotten about it and three-quarters from it being an impressive model.

This is a Ramshackle Games piece, who on their website rather unenthusiastically call this a Boring Machine. It has a distinctive VSF feel to it, rather than looking practical it suggests it would drill into the earth up to the hull and then briefly halt before the sharp ends locks solid and the body spins furiously around shaking the passengers to death. This makes it perfect for Very British Civil War.

I’m reasonably happy with the paintjob, although I do think it now needs a red band around it with a large “DANGER” decal. The secret is out now of course, so the idea of the ground trembling during a game is likely to bring forth realistic expectations, but at least it means it’s about to hit the table and no longer sit on a shelf.

 

In the Navy

Recently I traded with the cosmopolitan  Akula for the remnants of his naval forces from his VBCW project. Some of you might recall how he built an eight foot long aircraft carrier, thankfully that wasn’t part of the deal. I originally thought it was just a few figures, but it turned out to be an entire navy plus a couple of Torpedo Boats by PMC games.

A few pieces have been added, namely a splash of brown paint to bring the decking to the fore, a ships wheel, decal numbers, a lifebelt, a cleat on the bow, and to gun them up a little with a rack of three depth charges. I did look into getting a couple more PMC nautical pieces but it proved fruitless.

Of course two boats do not a navy make, so I’ve started on a midget two man submarine, which can be seen in it’s current state below. I’m still sourcing torpedos for it but expect to see a post about it once finished. The base structure is a toy submarine, Micro Machines perhaps, with the main conning tower hacked off. The fore structure had enough room to cut a window in so expect a face to be peering out of it.

I’m also going to scratchbuild a Clyde Puffer having finally tracked down some basic plans which were free. All will be kept clean of flags and nation marks so they can be used in a variety of game not least both VBCW and WW2. Full steam ahead!

Build it and they will come

It’s been a busy few weeks at 6mil Mansions working on three new models starting with the RV/Motorhome above made by the talented Crouchie. It’s an iconic vehicle most recently associated with the “Walking Dead” series, although my commissioning it was driven by only recently seeing “Breaking Bad” which I enjoyed immensely. If you’d like one, and we’d really like you to buy one, there’s more details here. Folk in the U.S. can get one from Brent at Company B. Brent has a great forum presence over at LAF being always willing to share how to do things and he’s greater to work with. Even before he had received the first shipment he’d produced some decals for this model, including both US and UK number plates. What a star!

Secondly here’s a set of city ruins, inspired by Akula’s need for some govermental looking ruins for his “Planet of the Apes” project which we’ll see at Salute 2013. I hope they’re good enough as his project is quite stunning in it’s scope including as it does the Washington Monument, the Lincoln Memorial and a Subway station complete with rusted wrecks of trains. His only problem is finding enough figures as he’s using out of production Eureka apes via forums and ebay. Should you know anyone with any for sale please get in touch. These ruins can be seen over at the Slug Industries site.

Finally the pentultimate Hesco piece in the shape of this command bunker. It’s a massive piece and the mould only just fits in my vacuum chamber. It’s hollow cast to keep the costs down, which is a wise move as there’s been an out-of-the-blue price hike in resin.  The roof lifts off this little beauty, and has an interior ripe for detailing. Not that I’ve had time to do that yet.

He ain’t heavy, he’s my loader…

Here’s a couple more Afghan support weapons by Eureka which I picked up at Salute 2012.   They’re the usual joy to paint, even if my photos aren’t very good. The recoiless rifle is on a very big base, and there’s a big space near the loader because the ammo box wasn’t in the bag.

Thankfully Nic at Eureka was happy to send me one all the way from Australia, not that I’ve had time to paint and add it. The weapon was a little tricky to get together right but plenty of testing was the way to do it, with gentle tweaks to get the legs of the two-part tripod the right height.

Here’s the Eureka Afghan mortar, which has one figure sculpted so you can set him up with his hand in the ammo box. Well I was impressed. A much tighter fit on the base which I prefer.

Again a slightly tricky assembly of the weapon with three pieces which have to be glued simultaneously as I see it. Should you glue the tube into the base plate seperately it might not fit onto the bipod without being too splayed. Tricky but not impossible.

Again a fine example of the brilliance of digital photography is the small hair on the base plate while making everything else slightly blurred. The hair has since been removed, imprisoned and under going severe interrogation.

Not a Tankless Task

A great weight has been lifted off the shoulders of the workers at Slug Industries seeing as we’ve finally got our latest, and hopefully greatest, model finished. Not a simple one this, with around forty hours on the build alone, seperate moulds for components, and the hot weather mucking up the paintjob on the first cast, but only after full highlighting. In other words a bit of a pain.

Here’s the first paintjob shortly before a lot of the surfaces simply started to crack. A few attempts at repair later and other cracks and flakes appeared. Casting another and painting that proved to be quicker.

The rear door which shows the riveting quite well.

The armoured radiator, which looks flat although it’s made of semi circular tubing, and the Dambuster style headlights. The idea being that they’re adjustable, so you could set a rang to them and when the merged lights lit up a target it’s at the predeterminde range. Probably worth a +1 on any dice roll – if it’s at night.

The first wheel layout. Ending up putting two extra pairs in after Orkdung over at VBCF quite rightly pointed out how it looked under powered. Figure gives a sense of scale.

 

Even more Bazaar

Filling out the Jihadistan project gave me the chance to paint these rather brilliant Eureka miniatures‘ middle eastern civilians. There’s also a couple of stalls but I haven’t quiet figured out the best way to base those so they can wait.  It’s easy to assume how simple figures are simple to sculpt, and the burqa clad ladies might ecourage that train of thought.

However I already have a couple of burqa wearers and they’re simple figures simply done whereas these have been much better made. Each figure has a distinct attitude in it’s carving making them look more like a moment frozen in time.

They’re also rather timeless, with the exception of the woman with carrier bags, so could fit in an ancient scenario right up to the modern day. Although I wouldn’t buy anything from the traders I’ll be knocking on Eurekas door again.

Crouchie’s Workbench

En route to Dover model shop  the other day I pooped in to see Uncle Crouchie to deliver some resin cats to him and got the chance to see what everyone’s gaming Uncle had on his workbench, well his dining table.

First off this delightful light tank whose name I’ve forgotten. He did tell me but my knowledge isn’t as broad as his especially when it comes to the obscure which he builds a lot of to our delight.

Hopefully this is due for production, but we’ll have to wait and see.

This charmer is an early WW2 Belgian motor trike. Crouchie tracked down a couple of photos during an exhaustive search and from those he started this. The motorcycle is an adaption of his combination for the Belgians.

The bad news is how this isn’t for production, it’s just for his own use. A shame not least beacuse I imagine the VBCW crowd would snap this up.

Tanks for Everything

Biased I am, due to having cast these up,  but I think this is a lovely little tankette perfectly suited for VBCW even though it’s a yet to be released model for Akula’s Armies so meant for WW1 Fantasy.

It’s a seven piece resin kit inspired by French FT light tanks and built by Uncle Crouchie who was the man behind BEF miniatures.

I enjoyed both casting building and painting it but I’m not sure how many might be available so if you’d like one I’d suggest chasing Akula via the link above.

I’m going to have to scrounge another off him myself as I’d like one for my Anarchist band.