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Being a modeller for quite a few years now, I decided to explore the endless possibilities that the world (through internet) offers, and come up with a series of ways of building, modelling and painting fast (but not hastily), to create the worlds I was seeing in history books since I was little. . .If you care to join me. . . This is the place to be! And, I promise you to find the way (or ways)!!

Friday 20 July 2012

Artillery & Reconnaissance: An army's foundations.

Good day!

Now that the weather has come back to normal (in terms of temperature) for the season being and since we are in the last ten days of this month, and I still have money left from my salary (that's new....), I visited my local hobby store ''Fasma Models'', and I bought two kits for my British Army. Basically an idea was running through my head, that was a creation of WW2 armies that they were going to have the basic elements an army of WW2 had in reality (in much smaller scale though). That means: Artillery, Reconnaissance forces, Trucks, A/A & A/T guns, AFV, Infantry etc...

With so many blogs in the internet related to our hobby, I had the chance to visit a blog runned by Jack - (Jacksarge's Wargames Rumblings), who lives in Australia (if I am correct). Jack among his other works, is creating a British Armed force for WW2, more especially 43rd Wessex Division, which was one of the most famous army units in the British Army during WW2. Being astonished by his work (if you haven't visited his blog, please do - link), I decided to follow his track and try to make a little 43rd Wessex Division for me.  I hope you don't mind Jack! :-)
Fingers crossed I started yesterday, with the acquisition of two kits, one from Airfix (#1314 AEC Matador & 5.5' Gun) and one from Revell (Ex-Matchbox #3223 Humber Mk II). 




Eager to start playing with my new toys (late at night - when all the good things happen usually) I managed to build Airfix's kit and prime it with its basic colours. Next post will be for the finished models, so stay tuned.

One quick question (I am asking all my friends): can you suggest any figs for the guns (crew), that may be ''budget-friendly'' (if they're in plastic, that would be even better)? I know that AB figures make some excellent figs for the 5.5'' guns, but gosh..they're a bit out of my budget. With a rough calculation, I have to give almost 80 quid, to provide a 4piece artillery battery with crews. I'd better give them for beers... :-)

Have a great day!
Cheers,
T.

7 comments:

  1. It's nice to see you finding time to paint again Thano's. I stopped by your friends blog and he does some nice conversion work.

    It's easy to spend too much money on our hobby and hard to buy something less than perfect. I'm new to this and am still trying to find creative ways to hide the amount of money I spent last week from the Hubby.

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  2. Thanos great to have you back; looking forward to seeing what you do with these.

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  3. T'I like what you have done to you Blog looking good. I'm a big fan of Jacksarge's work too. The only figures in plastic I can think of is the 25 Pounder kit made by Airfix they had 3 or 4 figures included, http://henk.fox3000.com/Airfix/1305/1/02.jpg basic poses but will work. You could try Hat's British mortar set too might get a few conversions there. The FO the guy with the map and possibly a firer http://www.plasticsoldierreview.com/Review.aspx?id=1745 the three at the bottom left. I'm sure Jacksarge will be able to assist you.

    Cheers

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  4. Hi Thanos, thanks for your kind words about my blog. It's great to see you building some more British stuff.
    I know what you mean about using AB figures for your crews, they can work out rather expensive- I have some that I purchased to go with a couple of 25 Pounders- if you're wanting to do crews for four heavy guns it would cost a packet. Perhaps you could convert some regular British soldiers, they wouldn't all need helmets, you could also have berets, forage caps, or bare-headed- there's a couple of poses in the Airfix RAF set which could work.
    I have the gun crew figures from the Italeri(Esci) 25pdr which you could have, but they are all in shorts & would need a bit of work with greenstuff or leg swaps.

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  6. If you are looking for British Artillery crews, check these out (not too expensive, and quite a lot of figures): http://www.plasticsoldierreview.com/Review.aspx?id=1873 .
    They are from WW1, but with a little bit of work you could get them looking like WW2 crew. (I will be doing this when I start my British army)

    Keep it up!

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  7. nice buy, cannot wait to see what you do with them

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