Finished! Sherman Crab Flails in 15mm

After far too many weeks of little progress I finally got the final touches done to my 15mm Flames of War British Sherman Crab Flail tanks!



Battlefront BR132 Sherman Crab - with alternative chains

I'm quite pleased with how the two of them have turned out, although I do really need to work on my weathering techniques.
Just to recap, when I first set out I used a 20mm (1:72) scale model as a base for how I thought a flail should look. I then tried to put this into 15mm scale. Here's a comparison with a 20mm model.

15mm Sherman Crab alongside 20mm Sherman I Hybrid Firefly

Sooo... the model I started looking at was this one:

Picture from http://rctlittlesoldiers.blogspot.co.uk/2011/03/sherman-flail-on-d-day.html - a fantastic blog and I only wish I could get my models to this standard! - I claim no ownership of the picture!

Alterations I have made to the basic FoW model (which looks like this):

Picture from the Flames of War website - again, I claim no ownership of the photo.

First I added the canvas cover around the gun mantlet (the cover between the turret and the main gun). I also added the storage box onto the back of the turret as it was missing from both the models. This came from some metal sprue parts I had laying around.

I added my own stowage, a mix of mine and Skytrex. I also was unhappy with the scale of the chains that came with the model (as seen above). So I purchased some costume jewellery with thinner chains and cut that up.

I did try weathering effect with pigments but failed miserably. I think I might use one of my as yet unused StuG models just to try out different effects.

Decals were care of Doms Decals.

Large (elongated) base came from Warbases who did a custom order for me for very little cash and with no issues.

Radio aerial is some 0.3mm fishing line painted black. I decided to do both of these tanks 'buttoned up' with no crew figures, as I guess sitting outside the tank might not be a good place to be when those drums start spinning!

I tried the yellow turret decals before realising they should have been red. Also these are pre basing.

Again, sorry for the poor lighting. One of the things still on my 'to be fixed' list. I still have the 'gun tank' Sherman for this platoon to do, and then it will be all done. Hopefully it doesn't take anywhere near as long.

The bases for these tanks were special orders from Warbases that were cheap and easy to order.

Carluke Wargames club Napoleonic battle, 7/12/13

Today at the club we had a large battle of General de Brigade with YD's 15mm French and Paul's 15mm Prussians (also to be seen here).

I'm basically stealing blog hits by posting pics of Pauls superbly painted minis!

The battle was a hectic affair with both sides fighting over two villages. It quickly became apparent that on our side of the table there was a bit of a knowledge gap with regards to the rules, so we were running very slowly. In the end the two ends of the table basically became two different battles.

On our side the French infantry brigade on the far right (led by John P) was pinned in place by my light cavalry while my horse artillery wheeled up and started battering at the infantry squares. This resulted in one square being shattered later in the game and my cavalry routing one full battalion from the table.

In the centre Bill's French brigade took the village only to be assaulted by my and Pauls infantry. This fight saw my infantry grab the village and then hold it for the rest of the game, repulsing all attempts to eject them. To the right of our village a cavalry duel developed with the Prussians getting the upper hand.

So a nice game with some amazing mini's. Really nice to see all this stuff on the table.

Carluke Wargame club 10mm Rapid fire 30/11/13

Been a while between posts again. I've been waiting on a couple of things to get my flails finished and after a couple of weeks wait my decals from Doms Decals have arrived. Not too happy with the wait this time round, but hey ho.

Hopefully the correct decals can be applied tonight and the matt varnish done tomorrow (weather permitting).

Last weekend I was at the Carluke club and we played a large game of Rapid Fire in 10mm. Myself and YD played and Germans and were pretty soundly defeated. Unfortunately this game brought forward my earlier issues with Rapid Fire. I understand there were a few people on both sides felt the same and consequently another add on for Rapid Fire has been found that fixes some of us had been unhappy about.

Some pics of that game:

We made use of blinds in our defense, but it didn't make too much of a difference. Even YD's Tiger was singularly unable to kill anything and died surprisingly easily!