Hi,

another finished project. A lot of modifications to replicate a rel vehicle. This one:


Jugoslav People Army. War in Croatia, Summer 1991, probably battle of Vukovar.

And the pictures:

HAHA Z! Fantastic dio! I especially like the laid back figures just getting up and taking care of "business". Does the Revell kit have that much detail in it?

Nice job, really funny. For the "piss-men" you can use thin fishing-line

Hi,

thanks for comments. The figures are compilation of preiser's german tankists (WWII) and Orion's Russian Federals (Modern).
Regarding fishing-line: good idea thanks! I have to think about it ....

Cheers

Most impressive dio. Well done!

First glance makes you think this is 1:35. Very nice job

Amazing. Looks like a 1/35 build. What did you use to get the JNA grey-green color?

I have some photos given to me that were taken by a friend at Vukovar. No tanks though.

From my understanding, most T-34s were TO (roughly, Territorial Militia) tanks. Also have video of Serb T-34s, one of which appears to be crewed by blue-uniformed police. Would like to do a model of that one.

Thanks! Such effect is not too difficult to obtain: you must only add small details and be careful wit the thickness of the elements which is always over-scaled due to technological limitations.





Well, I did some "research" browsing trough thousands of photos from Balkan conflict and discussing that with serbian modelers.
There are 3 ways to obtain JNA green paint:
1. use Humbroll 102
2. some people suggested that Revell SM362 is more accurate.
As for me, both are oil-base paints and since I am using acrylic paints I decide to do it my way:
3. I mixed acrylic Tamya XF-25 with yellow (XF-3) checking the effect against the photos.

Since my T-34/85 appears to be heavily weathered I added some Tamya flat white to brighten it.
That's all.



Could be that you are right. My photos show the vehicle without the crew. e.g.:

I am not sure that the photos were taken near Vukovar. One serbian modellerer has suggested that. According to surrounding and the river in the back it is possible.

I am waiting to see your model!

Cheers and thanks for comments!

Fantastic work buddy.

I did not know that they were operational T34s until the 90s that's remarkable.

Hi Zbigniew,

Nice job on your T34. I like the detailing very much. Great to see the subject changed to a 90s type. The relaxed crew is also very nicely done!



Jelger

Very nicely done, which kit did you get the gray road wheels from?

I started the Serb T-34 model many years ago with the Tamiya T-34 kit. Then DML came out with their T-34-85M kit (the NVA kit) and that took all of the wind out of my sails...

I did a lot of research into this particular vehicle, talking to JNA veterans, and so on. One was quick to point out the blue uniforms, which most likely are the blue tiger stripe police uniforms.

The tank itself has some rubber sheet standoff armor, some of which has been sheared away. On the port side of the tank's rubber sheeting, it reads in hand-painted white paint "АНЂЕЛИ" (ANGELS), with what definitely appears to be a skull (likely with bones) device below the word.

The turret appears also to have been equipped at some time with rubber sheeting, but has been lost. This has caused me to speculate that perhaps the turret sheeting also had some word, perhaps something like "СМРТ", which perhaps would be in keeping with the skull motif. Of course, we know too that the skull and crossbones symbol is a long-time Chetnik symbol.

The tank is in the overall grey-green with hand brushed camo consisting of red-brown, sand, black-green and sky blue (!) short strokes. The turret is not painted with this camo, again leading me to believe that it at one time had rubber sheeting, which was then lost. I'll add that the starboard side of the tank, the sheeting is similarly lost.

It has a mix of T-55 type wheels and the spoked wheels. Speaking of, these T-55 type of wheels, they are not T-55 wheels! They are very similar wheels,, definitely, but were specifically made for T-34-85M rebuilds. If you will notice, the hole in the starfish arms, this hole is much larger than than on actual T-55 wheels. A prominent figure in this hobby/research and I had a disagreement on this, but interestingly enough, he's come around to the fact that these are entirely different wheels than that put on T-55s since then.

Who knows when I'll get to building this T-34 again. I think about it now and again... Maybe when I'm retired or something...

Wow!. Your project seem sto be very very interesting. According to your description I had never seen any photo of this vehicle. In fact I am also considering to build one T-34/85 with rubber skirts but it will be VRS army from Bosnia.

Regarding the T-55 wheels I am really surprised. But it seems that you are right! In my model I used T-55 wheels from ACE kit. The holes that you mentioned are here relatively large so they fit very nicely.
Very good description of T-34 versions used in former Yugoslavia is given here: http://www.hrcappuccino.org/articles/misc/VerzijeT-34.htm

And I am really looking forward to see your build

I recorded footage of this T-34 and others on CNN on a VHS tape, which I still have. As the police crew were being filmed, they were throwing the three-finger Serb salute.

I would be amazed at my good fortune some months later when the very same T-34 would be illustrated in a Time or Newsweek magazine. This time it was photographed with what appear to be police, in this case red beret Special Force Police (СЈП) jumping from the deck. I recall one policeman being equipped with a Zastava M-76 sniper rifle.

Naturally, this was a posed photo, as the Special Force Police did not go into combat in red berets.

So it would seem that this T-34 was quite possibly a police vehicle, in particular as the Special Force Police did have their own mechanized and armor assets.

I still have the magazine somewhere. Shouldn't be too difficult to find.

I was never able to discover who/what "ANGELS" stood for, meant, signified, etc.

Gosh, it's been so long since I worked on this, all pre-internet, so ferreting out info was quite a lot of trouble and legwork. It would seem that the JNA/Serbs added additional tie-downs to the turret. I also recall that the small position lights that are at the edges of the hulls of T-55s and T-62s, a single small position light was also added to the top of the turret at the rear, facing rear, I'll assume as some sort of nighttime convoy light. You can see this in some of the photos in the link (nice link too, THANKS!) you provided. It would appear that some of these in the photos are missing the lens and bezel.

Anyway, you're making me think that I should undertake this once again. I did buy the T-34-85M kit. I'll need to get one of the 1944 version kits for a spoked wheel or two... Maybe the Jaguar interior too.

Zbigniew,

Have been wanting to post a message regarding your build since you first posted it but other things kept getting in the way. Sorry for the long delay. Anyhow, I like your work. It is outstanding! The texture on the turret looks to scale and the weathering looks realistic.

Thanks for posting and sharing. Looking forward to your next project.

-Eddy

Very nice indeed. Thanks for sharing. Best regards.

José.