Ok,

I have taken a sudden interest in the German rail guns... Leopold, Morser Karl...

Anyway, I am doing a fairly large diorama in 1/72 scale... now before I tell you what I am putting in my diorama, please understand that I do care about historic accuracy, but at the same time I want to put whatever I want in my dioramas.

Now, The base is about 30" x 20" and I am planning on having a train track running about 6" from the back, and running straight on a diagonal to where it will end up about 10" from the back on the other side.

My plan is to have the new 1/72 Kreigslokomotive from Hobby boss pulling a morser karl transport (with the karl on it), a flat car or two, maby one with a tank , and the other empty... with another tank or 2 on the ground already unloaded. And of course I will have plenty of figures around, and probably some flak cannons.

I will also have another morser karl on the ground with it's ammunition loader preparing for battle.

Now, I also would like to put a Leopold gun in here, so, my main question is was the Leopold self propelled or would it have also been pulled by a locomotive?

Like I said, I want this diorama because I like all the subjects and think they would all look very nice in a scene together, but any suggestions that would keep my general idea, but make it more historically accurate would be very much appreciated.

Thanks guys!

Hello Brandon,

In short the "leopold" was drawn by a locomotive and not selfpropelled. Leopold is actually a name of a specific railroad gun of the K-5 series.
Take a look at this site for info on the karl gerat and the K-5 railroad gun:
http://www.geocities.com/ssvong/model/model_main.htm
It's a good starting point.

Regards,
Pascal

Uh?
Morser Karl wasn't a rail gun, just a huge self-propelled (tracked) mortar.

I know what you mean Brandon. The whole 'huge gun' armour thing is the only thing that gets me away from ships. So much so, that I also did a diorama in 1:35th of most of the big guns present at Sevastopol. I hope this can give you some ideas. The K5 'Leopold' is in a separate dio as it wasn't present in Russia.

Well... that is one awesome diorama! I hope mine will look even half as good as yours...

What did you use for your mud / terrain?

Good ole' Celuclay, laid down over the baseboard covered with PVA glue.