Relic

My entry for the Wings Build over at the Guild

Once, you were the best of the best, defending the motherland against all the enemy could throw at it. Cutting edge, all shiny metal, you set records and went all around the world, the sky had no limits for you. When you got older they painted you in camouflage, loaded you up with bombs and rockets and you got to see the ground at altitudes you never flew before, and you loved it. Eventually, they used you to train new pilots, but one managed to break your back on landing. They  gutted your insides, repainted you one more time and shipped you off on the back of a truck to some far away airbase. You were mounted on a concrete base, remembering the deeds of airmen of the past, and witnessed, with pride, many a parade. Conscripts cleaned and washed you on a regular basis, and you felt loved.

Then a thing called Glasnost came, no one came to wash you anymore, and with all of the troops gone, you stood vigil over a deserted airbase. The sounds of jet engines long gone, replaced by the howling winds, you feel corrosion setting in more and more and wonder how long you get to gaze up at the sky. Birds now land on your fuselage, showing no respect for your clean lines. As you weep tears of oil and rust you dream about what once was, and never will be again.....

 For my entry I took inspiration from the many abandoned airframes and monuments in the former USSR. The base is scratchbuilt, filled with lead sheets to balance the weight of the aircraft, and coated with Mr Surfacer for the rough concrete look. The MiG is an old one from Matchbox, and can be removed from the base as the base will be used (in the future) for a few other items.

Enjoy!

As mentioned before, it comes off:

And to give you an idea of the size:

Block 1: Star and Pyramid - The 6 Day War - Part 1

The first block of the 2012 Build is based on the CY6! book Star and Pyramid - The 6 Day War.

For this I have the following list as a guideline, 39 aircraft:
4 MiG-19
4 Mirage IIICJ - 2 with droptanks
1 Piper Cub - Use L5 Stinson
6 MiG-17
2 MiG-21 PFM
4 MiG-21 F-13
4 Super Mystere
4 Ouragan
2 S-58
1 IL-14 - Not made, need to scratchbuild one
3 IL-28
4 Su-7b

The items in red are not in my TD box so I've put out an order with Doms Decals, they should be here about halfway into January (I hope). 

I've started work on cleaning up what I do have, adding either magnets or nail heads to the underside of the aircraft so they stick to the magnets on their flight stands, and started to tackle the biggest conversion of this block, the IL-14.

It bears a big resemblance overall to the DC-3, but it has differences in wingshape, engines and length:

This means for me just painting a DC-3 as is won't do. So out comes the juwellers saw:

And then some pinning wire and superglue to get to the basic shape of what is to become my Il-14:

I'll need to hit it with putty and/or green stuff next to get the sape and details I want.

For this block I will need to paint 39 aircraft in 60 days. That is 8 fridays (friday being my preferred day to Blog) so 5 aircraft to paint per week. I can do that :)

Big Build 2012

Right, the Big Build 2012. Another Guild build, but not 3 weeks or 3 months as usual, but 11 months spread over 5 blocks of 2 months with the final block being 3 months. The idea is to pick a theme and complete items every 2 months for that theme. As it stands you can either just state the theme (members with no balls), state the theme and what category per block (members with balls) and state the theme, category and a fixed number of items to complete per block (members with Krupp steel balls).

If I have one problem that hinders me more in this hobby then anything else it's my inability to stick to a given theme for more then a few months unless there is a game coming up or a prize involved (hence I love Group Builds), but a year long build is going to require quite a bit of effort from me.

Even so, I've decided to go fro some Krupp steel, and with the following:

Theme: Air War 1/600th (Check Your 6!)

Block 1: Star and Pyramid - The 6 Day War - 39
Block 2: Star and Pyramid - The War of Attrition - 37
Block 3: The Falklands + Danger Zone - 40
Block 4: Breaking the Luftwaffe - Into the Reich - 46
Block 5: Breaking the Luftwaffe - Big Week - 66

For the ones that dont know Check Your 6!, this is a rulesset for air wargaming. I've based my entries on their books that I own, just stripped out the aircraft lists and taking those as a guide for the build. I'll be using Tumbling Dice aircraft and propably the occasional Odzial Osmy ground vehicle.

Oh, did I mention failure to meet the required number before the deadlines means you are removed from the competition? No pressure :)

Minefield

For the first Big Game I had in 2010 I needed minefield for NATO to defend themselves with vs the Great Russian Horde. I spent some time cutting out 10x10 cm sheets of plasticcard, basing them, painting them and eventually just finishing 2, the rest languishing in my spares bin.

10x10 Unmarked Minefield

This turned out to be a  waste of time and resources as unmarked minefield are not put down on the table....bit of a Doh! moment <facepalm>



10x10 Marked Minefield

Looks very nice, but in the end also a waste of time and resources, cause how am I easily going to carry 10 of these without damaging them, in my transport case through 2 airports? Thinking before acting isn't my forte, thats for sure.

So, how change it? Well, like this:

Simple really, in the logic that I just need to mark the field 4 signs on the corners should suffice, right?

Easy, peasy.

Made for Rapid Fire Moderns, they are generic enough to work for other systems as well. They take hardly any time to build as well, cause the bases are 20x20mm precuts, a bit of brass wire and 0.5mm plasticcard I cut out with a punch actually meant for scrapbooking. More importantly, 1 minefield now takes up 40x40mm so more fit my small scenery storage boxes and they are a lot less susceptible to damage.

I'll be making another set with other markers, and the shape is great for most common roadsigns as well.

Test succesful.

Scorpions!

Finished the first 5 scorpions. Nr 6 had a small accident and is currently in surgery (stinger came off while bending it). I'll be very happy when I finally moved in with my gf and can start using daylight bulbs again, the colour is a bit off in the pics.

I wanted them so I could have normal and giant Rad scorpions. These guys count as normal ones, no idea what to get yet for the big guys. Anyway, these are from Reaper, Dust Scoprpions, 2 per blister. Paintjob is basic but efficient: FoW German Early Grey, Black Wash, Gloss varnish. Base is 40mm.

Another Wings teaser

Can you guess what it is yet?

The Guild quick Build - Wings

Build Theme
The theme of this current build is wide ranging, any genre, any historical /fictional setting. The loose theme is simply wings...

Mimimum requirement;
there is no minimum requirement - any number of models or figures may be entered...

Build Criteria
All Guild members (inc. admins) are eligible for entry.
All entries must consist of NEW figures/models, (although terrain in photos can be recycled).
You must have made and/or painted your entry yourself.
The entry must be finished to go forward to the vote.

All entrants will be awarded a Build ribbon as in previous Guild Group Builds


Short Build timeframe;
This short build will run for a period of just over three weeks to allow as many guild members as possible,
as much time as possible, to enter.
The closing date deadline will be January 2nd at midnight, UK local time.

Pretty short, just the way I like it. I've gotten off to a headstart, but I'm keeping it vague, so this could be the only thing you see till it is finished :D

More WIP's

Received a few things in the mail this week,

A 2nd hand Cromwell MT-LBu for my Russians and 6 Reaper Dust Scorpions that I think should do well for my Fallout bits....I'll propably do 5 normal ones and 1 albino. Size wise they are a bit in between normal and giant ones, but hey, the other ones I found towered over 20mm figs and these should do fine with 15mm figs as well. Or Modhails 28mm ones.

Also in the mail this week, a SandS Bedford RL, the closest I could find that resembles the Fallout ones. I'd like to chop one up and turn it into a tractor but can't afford that at the moment, not for a scenic piece anyway, these cost 11 quid. From my stock I converted my last M35, ready to accept a SandS container pod, only to find out it doesn't match my drawings at all.....

...so I've gone back to the drawing board and started to build one from scratch. I only need the one anyway as a command vehicle for my American troops. I've found a picture of a modified SUV that is used to control UAV's that I will copy for my mercenary radio vehicle, so that is set as well.

On a more personal note, I broke my favorite pair of clippers :(

Stalker

Just a quick test to see if it works. RH Models bodies, Elhiem gasmaks, a bit of GS and a quick single highlight paintjob.

Seems to do the trick, doesn't it?

SdKfz 252 and SdKfz 253 finished

Took me a while to get these off the painting table. The pictures make them more blueish then they really are, it has been very cloudy all day, sorry for that. They really are just as grey as the rest.

SdKfz 253

SdKfz 252



Vehicles are from Minimi, cast to order without a base, decals are from Skytrex, Doms Decals and from from a scrapped plastic kit. Range binoculars on the 253 is a custom job with some plasticcard and brass wire.