its been awhile

I know I haven't posted anything in awhile but life has come along lately and slowed much of my work down. The b-17 is coming along and I have completed the detailing of the radio compartment, and work is progressing on the cockpit and nose sections. unfortunately my camera has decided to play hide and seek without telling me first and boy can that camera hide. on another note, one which I would rather not admit to I have traded for a valhallan 40k army. I have always avoided 40k like the plague but that's mostly due to the attitude of the average player found in your local stores. I also never cared much for the figures I have seen, I HATE space marines. a friend of mine and long time 40k player showed me the Death korps of krieg figures from forge world, which I love. soon after that another friend offered up a valhallan army for trade, after looking at the figures which I had never seen before I found I really liked them. So some extra FOW items I didn't need anymore and a warhammer fantasy Empire army I had been looking to get rid of became a decent sized 40k army. I don't know how much I will play this game but I like the figures I have and I have a few friends which play and only for fun at that so maybe it will be ok.

So now that I have stepped over to the dark side I just want to know where the cookies are? I haven't gotten any yet.

Back to my roots

I have been playing a ton of Flames of war over the last 6 months and feel like I have been on Flames of war overdrive. I have decided to take a little time and once again put my Flames of war on the back shelf for awhile while I work on another project.

I got started with this type of hobby 25 years ago when I was given my first plastic model airplane. As I recall it was an old hawker hurricane kit most likely revell or monogram though I really don't remember for sure. I built many WWII aircraft and a handful of armor kits over the years. This weekend I picked up one of my all time favorite 1/48th scale kits. I dont know where its going to go when its done but I will find a place for it. For now here are some photos I took of the subject I will be modeling a couple of summers ago.

While I have a habit of starting projects and taking forever to finish (if I ever do) this one will have to be different, the amount of space this kit will take up during building will force me to finish it in a timely manner if I want to get anything else done. So  look forward to this one.

Customised turn counter

I was in one of the local game stores recently looking to pick up a magazine, I should have known better than to go to a game store with such aspirations of a small purchase. While looking over the Flames of war section I noticed a rack of turn counters behind me, there was an evil evil sign on this rack, "Free turn counter with any miniatures purchase".  Of course the word "free" messed with my head, I mean what do I need a turn counter for? I already have one and I don't need two. Of course I began looking over the flames of war models again, Whats this a box of SU-100's with the option to build them as SU-85M's, crap I have been running my regular SU-85's as the up armored 85M's. so with a magazine, a box of tank destroyers and a turn counter in hand I make my way to the counter. Somehow I don't think getting a "free" turn counter with a $60 box of models I wasn't planning on buying is all that free. I really need to stay out of the hobby stores.

not so free turn counter

So now what to do with this thing, its a nice turn counter but do I really need another boring turn counter with a shop logo on it? No I don't think I do. So I dig through my excess minis and find this guy.

Soviet PTRD Anti tank rifle.

I like these figures but I cant sell myself on using them on a late war battlefield. So here is a perfect time to use one.

Taking the turn counter out of its package I take the pointer part off and put the base aside for now as I wont be doing anything to it.

the counter is magnetic and comes in two parts making this an easy job.

 At this point I forgot to take any more pictures but then you really don't need to see what I did from here as its just like painting and basing any single figure.

I scored the top of the turn counter with my hobby knife just like I would do with any base and applied my painted figure and basing materials. I did paint the gunner up in a summer amoeba pattern camouflage as an excuse to do something different.

Here is the final result of my "free" turn counter.

One final note, I realize that the bipod for the rifle is up much too far however having it like this makes the entire figure much more stable and the rifle is less likely to bend when turning the counter.

Current project

I have been going pretty hard on the painting lately but haven't stopped long enough to take any pictures. Silly me, not taking pictures doesn't leave me much to share on the blog, and if I'm not going to share why bother. I guess the answer is to take a picture. So here is a sneak peek at what I am currently working on.

  

To quote a shirt I recently saw "Share the love, Lend Lease"

 

My soviet army is about to get its own recon Company and thus far what a pain in the rear it has been. I decided to build this army awhile ago but took a little time getting the funds to buy the needed models together. I decided to buy some Old Glory Scout cars from the command decision line as I needed 13 of them and the cost of buying Battlefront made my wallet kick me in a naughty place. Well after a month of no reply to repeated emails and phone calls to the retailer I ordered them through I gave up and ordered Battlefront through My local shop and had them in 2 days. So much for my wallet, it's really mad at me right now.

On to the building of these things. Trying to clean mold lines and flash off 52 little wheels last night about drove me nutter than I already am and I now have some nice file marks embedded into my fingers. of course then you have to get the wheels all glued on and even so the trucks don't wobble around on 3 wheels, which 3 or 4 of them ended up doing anyway, thankfully its minor. in the back row you can also see the 3 quad .50 half tracks, these aren't so bad as they use the plastic sprues for the wheels, tracks and front bumpers. I honestly prefer the metal parts to the plastic here though I do wish the quad guns were plastic as keeping the 4 guns straight is a nightmare, most of my German quad AA guns are missing at least one barrel due to breakage from fixing the over the last few years. Thus far everything is together and primed with the new Vallejo Color surface primers in Olive Drab. Detail work will continue on these over the weekend hoping to get them on the table this Monday night. They wont be done then however as I have the Soviet crew figures to fill them out with, Cant have anyone thinking these guys are fighting for the Americans now can we?