Flames of War 15mm Sherman Flail Squadron (Completed)

After many months of having the last model in this unit sitting on the shelf, I finally made a move to get it painted (along with my Sherman Hybrids which are also nearing completion).

The result is I now have my two Sherman Flail 'Crab' tanks with the Sherman V command tank. The markings and decals were as accurate as I could find - Ludovic Fortin's "British Tanks in Normandy" shows the tanks without any squadron markings, and looking at some of the pictures of Flails I could find I couldn't see any standard markings (other than the turret numbers).

This book also details that during Totalise it was the 22nd Dragoons that supported the Highland Division (and as such, 144 RAC).

So, without further ado, here's the pics:

Lead 'gun' tank with spare tracks and chains... This is also one of the few tanks I have done with an extra machine gun - in this case one of the many spare Skytrex .30 cals I have.

1/72 Firefly vs 15mm Flames of War Flail

Sherman Crab Flail Work In Progress (Part III)

Onto part 3 of the series of Sherman Crab progress posts... At this stage, I have no idea how long the series will be!

Getting the basecoat on, blocking in the main colours and then using Army Painter Strong Tone on them left me with highlights to do and the dusty effect I have been aiming for.

I picked up some Vallejo pigments and set about making a mess of both models. Stupidly I was confident I would get the effect I wanted (or close to it) first time round. What a fool I am!

Next day, with a hot tap and a old toothbrush, I found myself scrubbing away.

Another few attempts with pigments, and I defaulted to using a drybrush. Another possible mistake at this point is that I've not applied decals yet. This may come back to be an issue later.

Still having issues with lighting for pictures. I also toned down the paint on the mantlet end of the gun barrel after looking at these pics.

Sherman Crab Flail Work In Progress (Part II)

Another quick update on my ongoing work on the Flail, specifically the section along the front boom.

I had previously painted the drum and chains black, so my first step was to tear up some of the foam used in the FoW blisters, dip one of the torn parts in black and dab along the front of the boom arms (where debris and explosions would damage the paint). I then repeated this with Russian Uniform Green (Vallejo Model Color 70924) over the drum and chains - making sure the black on the booms was also nice and patchy. 

This gave a suitably mottled appearance - the sections I couldn't get with the sponge I used a brush on, which also worked fine.

I then repeated the process with a small amount of Hull Red (Vallejo Model Color 70985) over the bottom of the boom arms and lightly over the chains.

Next up came some Model Air Metallic Black (Vallejo 71073) which I had picked up by accident years ago. Then some Game Color Gunmetal Metal (Vallejo 72054). All applied using the sponge method.

This is pre any washes, army painter or highlights.

Sherman Crab chains in 15mm

Not a huge amount of progress modelling wise of late (mainly because of time away and then on my return playing Wargame: Airland Battle and Civilization V: Brave New World on the PC) but my trip to the club and the very nice things said about my painting and modelling work have got me rolling again. All be it to a slow start.

Here's a quick pic of where I'm at just now:

Sherman Crabs with alternative chain.

On Sunday I picked up a very very tacky bit of costume jewellery that had a suitable gold (coloured) chain. This was to use as the flail chains on my Sherman Crabs. I would add as well that I know of someone who added a great deal to the value of his models by chopping up some chain he found outside - only to discover it was actually a gold chain!

Top chain is the Battlefront one, the gold coloured one is the cheapo fake chain. The thinner chain is around 18 links per inch. I think I would have liked around 22 links per inch, although adding it to the model would no doubt have been much more difficult. 

Monday night was spent clipping the chain into lengths and then gluing the lengths to the drum on the tank. One of the most annoying jobs I've had so far. I think superglue gel would have been a much better substance for this. Normal superglue was too hard to control and made things stick in places and ways I didn't want. Gluing non rigid chain onto a rounded surface is no fun either. I tried to think of other ways to do this, but the best I could come up with was to use a file to file small lines in the drum where the chain was to attach.

I managed, after several hours, to get the chain the way I wanted it. This was the result:

Both Sherman Crabs.

Slightly out of focus close up.

I did run out of chain to do the inside of the drum, but picked some more up today. Hopefully another line of chain will be enough, and the spare can be used as stowage or details on other models. I might loop the chain around the top from the inside to give chain a little more bulk on the drum - but also as I figured that the chain whirls away from the tank so when it stopped chain would be still twirling around.

Anyway, that's progress so far. Next step will be sorting out the 4.2" mortars then everything can get primed.

Custom orders from Warbases

Back from Wales and starting to thing about all these models I've got to paint! *Gulp*

One of the things that was waiting on my when I got home was an order from Warbases - a Scottish company that I have used previously for bases.

The laser cut wooden bases are the same size as the Battlefront ones, only lacking the sloping edges of the plastic ones. I try to group the bases by unit (so my artillery all uses the wooden Warbases bases, etc), so the difference isn't too big a deal.

So, my custom orders then. The first thing was that I liked the look of the plastic FoW movement template, but didn't want to fork out the money for an actual FoW one. Same with the artillery template. So I dropped Warbases an email, and this is the end result:

Warbases also offered to do these in clear acrylic for a little more, but I was happy with the laser cut wood. These were £2.50 for the measuring template and £2.25 for the artillery template. They very very kindly added the etched distances on the measuring template off their own backs.

Next came a realisation that the large bases I had wouldn't fit my Sherman Crabs (Flails). So again, a little custom order:

Behind you can see the regular large bases. I'm still waiting on the chain I ordered for the Flails, as I'm not convinced that the chain that is provided is the correct scale for the tank.

So, some great customer service, fantastic prices and quick delivery. Warbases comes highly recommended!