Furniture from Frontline

I’ve had these resin-pieces (25WW23 Assorted Cupboards) from Frontline squirrelled away for ages.

They contained a lot of bubbles needing green-stuffing. Not too big a job fixing that and giving them  some paint.

Nice with these as playable pieces instead of stuff in the tin- and polymer-terrain-mountain.

BEF – Scout cars, trucks and ugly guns

First batch of 20mm BEF vehicles painted and ready for action.

First two Daimler Scout Cars from Skytrex. Really nice metal kits (They have been re-launched by 20mm Zone/Early War Miniatures with new moulds and all).

Bedford OYD 3 ton Lorries from Frontline (number B16)

Morris Commercial 15cwt Platoon Truck from Frontline (B1) and Bedford 15cwt light truck from Brittania (RVM24)

Finally three 2pdrs. They were ugly when I built them a long time ago, and they are still ugly. But they were my test-cases for the new paints. I have a couple of Zvezda ones that I plan to build shortly. They are much, much nicer.

So, what about paints then? British vehicle colours are a tricky issue, and Mike Starmer did a great job at figuring out the exact shades of the colours used.

DOA is a new company, specialising in WWII paints. They’ve used Mike Starmer's results and has produced a great set of paints for everyone interested in British armour. I bought mine from Trackpads. Highly recommended.

I used Dark Green G4 and Khaki Green G3.

The gas-indication colour patches on the bonnets are Vallejo 923 Japan Uniform WWII.

As if colours were not enough, we have the markings of the vehicles to take into consideration. The soft skins were relatively easy, as I used the excellent ‘BEF 1940 Softskins (1)’ sheet from Dan Taylor Modelworks for most of the decals. Also 'British Arm of Service Markings AD38' from Skytrex Decals and a little bit of free-hand painting.

The scout cars were a mix of ‘UK – BEF 1940 Markings’ from Aleran Miniatures and ‘BEF – set 2 AFVs’ from Dan Taylor and some free-hand painting.

All decals applied on gloss varnished surfaces, and were coated with Vallejo Decal Medium and Decal Fix, and a final coat of Matt Varnish.

The vehicles finally got a dusting with pigments.

Welcome follower Sanguemarcio with the blog Miniature Warfare, a really nice site on wargames, miniatures and terrain – beautiful stuff.

Hotchkiss H35 in 20mm from Frontline

More resin models from Frontline, this time the French Hotchkiss H35.

The pieces was placed in water and machine-wash for about an hour, to get rid of the mould release.

Lots of bubbles and pits on the models, so quite a lot of preliminary work before I could start painting. Since I bought these I have seen that it is possible to buy these tanks in plastic, and I really think that would have been preferable, as the quality is somewhat lacking in these resin pieces. 

Colours used (Vallejo unless otherwise noted):

Base coat - 978 Dark Yellow

Green stripes – 894 Camouflage Olive Green

Borders – 980 Black Green

Exhaust – 302 Dark Rust

Tracks – Citadel Tin Bitz drybrushed with Citadel Chainmail

Washed with Citadel Devlan Mud overall and Citadel Black ink on springs.

Dusted with MIG pigments – P023 Black Smoke around the exhaust and P234 Rubble Dust and P029 Brick Dust overall.

Welcome follower InChigh74 with the blog 1914-45 – modelling and wargaming WWI and II. A really nice blog.

A farewell to Donald Featherstone, who has passed away.

CV-33 in 20mm by Frontline and a give-away at Wargaming Girl

A break in my French adventures - I’ve really had it with camo for a while. This time a suitable target for LRDG, an Italian CV-33 tankette.

I tried to weather it to look like a really run down piece of scrap metal.

The model is a resin 3-piece thing from Frontline Wargaming. Descent detailing, but a couple of bubbles here and there, so it needed some green-stuff.

Paints used

Overall Vallejo 916 Sand Yellow

Rubber rims on the wheels Vallejo Panzer Aces 306 Dark Rubber

Washed with Army Painter Quickshade Soft Tone ink and drybrushed Citadel Chainmail

Tracks Citadel Chainmail with a wash of AK enamel Track Wash (a new product I tried for the first time – I’m satisfied with the result, and will continue experimenting with it)

Applied some Vallejo Pigment 73108 Brown Iron Oxide and a generous dusting with AK Pigments AK-041 North Africa Dust.

Such a tiny little thing, here in front of a Panzer II

Soon some fantasy figures.

Wargaming Girl is a really nice site by one of the relatively few active females in the hobby. A very active painter, with mainly Ancients, ACW, 30YW and SF in 15 to 28mm.

Anyway, she has just reached 100 000 hits, and is celebrating big time with a give-away every day for five days.

Day one was a box of Warlord 28mm WWII British infantry

Day two saw two gift vouchers, one from Baccus the other from Ground Zero Games.

Day three: More Warlord plastics, this time a box of Pike & Shotte Royalist Infantry.

Day four – eight 28mm fantasy figures from Reapers’ Bones series.

Day five – today – we see another box from Warlord – Spartans this time.

I’m interested in the Reaper figures, and maybe the Spartans, hopefully I’m lucky. I really need a bigger plastics mountain…

So, go over to Wargaming Girl and check out the giveaway! There is still time to participate in all five competitions. And while you’re there, check out the rest of the site also. Well worth the time!

Somua S-35 in 20mm by Frontline

Two resin Somua S-35 tanks by Frontline ready for the France 1940 front. I painted one of them a couple of years ago, and the other in the same colour-scheme just now.

The models are in two pieces, hull and turret, and very basic. The running gear especially is rather vague on the details. On the plus side – they are rather cheap.

Painting French tanks are always fun, as everything goes. I have some French magazines with lots of photos and also some assorted books on French armour as inspiration.

Colours used (Vallejo)

Base – Tan Yellow 912

Camo – Yellow Olive 892

Camo – Beige Brown 875

Lines – Burnt Umber 941

Tracks – Gunmetal metal

Wash with Citadel Devlan Mud

Pigments

Decals from Aleran Miniatures, the France 1940 set FR-2 (for H35 and H39).

Flatbed truck from Frontline

This truck comes from Frontline’s 20mm civilian range. I had a vague collection of having bought it, and searched the tin/plastics mountain. Yep, there it was, and it would really fit in with the factory I had just completed.

As I intended to use it in todays’ game I had to make a real rush-job, just had two evenings to finish it, and packing everything for the game. 

Wanted something that could have a dual role as both civilian and passable military use for future games, so no garish colours.

It served today as an improvised road-block.

Paints used:

Flatbed – 843 Cork Brown with a wash of Citadel Devlan Mud and brushed with Cork Brown.

Metal – Citadel Chainmail

Body – Citadel Foundation Charadon Granite

Tires – Black

Windows – Black with a gloss varnish

Load – Vallejo 819 Iraqui Sand with a wash of Citadel Devlan Mud

Rope –Vallejo 876 Brown Sand

Everything was brushed with a variety of Vallejo and Mig pigments.

Loading canned cabbages bound for the Kremlin.

BT-5 and BT-7 from Frontline

We need some spare Russian tanks for the participation game of IABSM at Stockholm Spelkonvent next Saturday and I had a couple of resin tanks in the box of unfinished WWII-stuff. These are from Frontline, rather simple with only four parts each (body, turret, left and right tracks/wheels) but they do need quite a lot of preparation. Bubbles need filling and in some places parts of the tracks had broken off. One of the track/wheels pieces were broken in four pieces (probably my fault), and that obviously needed some glue, and extensive rebuilding of the tracks. I removed damaged tracks, trying to get even edges, and cut pieces of plastic-card to fit. Thin slices of card were glued in place to build up the tracks.
The resin parts were washed to remove any oily residues.
I decided to paint them in different colours, mainly to be able to differentiate the different tank models from each other.

BT-5 before painting…

…and after.

The BT-5 was painted with Vallejo 978 Military Green and given a black wash. Wheel-rims black, tracks Citadel Tin Bitz with a highlight of Citadel Gun Metal. The green turned out to be far to dark, but that was partly rectified by a generous dose of pigments, MIG P028 Europe Dust and P232 Dry Mud. MIG Black pigment to simulate soot.

I have still much to learn about pigments, but they sure are fun to play with.

The the BT-7 was painted with Formula P3 Traitor Green with a wash of black. Otherwise as above, but with less pigments. I'm very satisfied with the colour of this one.

BT-7 before…

…and after.

Now, all they have to do is to survive their clash with the nazi aggressors. We’ll see…

T-26 by Frontline

First a quick view of my workspace. Crammed with paints, models, miniatures, modeling equipment and a computer. I’m working with the T-26:es shown below, a couple of Pz 38(t), some Italian 6 mm, a bunch of familiars for D&D, some odd fantasy figures and the blasted old GW giant (which I never get done), 20mm British 2-pounder that are waiting for me to mix paint for them, the infamous Finnish 37mm Bofors awaiting more cloth and some modern zombies. I’ll try to get everything on the table painted before I start another project. Maybe… probably not…

Well, first off the table are the three Frontline T-26:es we are to use in a participation game on Stockholm Spelkonvent.

They were painted with Vallejo 892 Olive Yellow and given a wash with Citadel Badab Black. Weathering with assorted Vallejo pigments.
The models were a bit of a pain to clean, they are made of resin, and rather crude. Had to fiddle with them quite a lot to get the turrets to fit. But they are relatively cheap, easy to assemble (four parts) and the result is OK.

They will be supported by this monster, a T-28 by SHQ. A lovely model I made last year.