Hi Dick,

The Model T is looking grand.

Hi Matt,

Nice work so far.

Hi Edoardo,

I like the troops in the shell hole. Will you be adding a figure for scale to the tank/trench scene?

Great work folks.

Al

Hey alan!
sure, I'll do that!
ciao
Edo

Edo: Fantastic! And I dig the trench scene too (pun intended ). I agree that a figure cowering or running for his life would really complete your trench dio

Robby: Careful what you say, I say the same thing myself and have a hard time getting through most of them lol

Matt: Good, be VERY careful about breathing any of that stuff in. Once anything like that gets in your lungs it has a tendency to stay there forever. Sounds like you have some great reading material coming in, and I expect full reviews on all of those books

Stephen: Those PE tools look amazing! I had no idea that anyone produced PE that thick, they're pretty close to perfect from what I can see!

Dick: I don't blame you! Just have fun with your kit as you finish building it. There's a good chance we may see some new tool versions in 1/48, but I don't know about any other scale.

Jeremy,

I always have my respirator on with my safety glasses when working with that resin stuff, even if I'm just shaving pour block remnants off the pieces. Even more so if sanding with files/sanding sticks or running the Dremel over puttied joins and other seams. That's some nasty stuff.

Books should be in today. Rather than full Armorama reviews, I'll probably just post the high points in the forum here. Mainly looking for coloring for uniforms and gear, as well as period photos/drawings to spruce up the Verlinden trench base. I already know I'm going to have to try my hand at Milliput sandbags. Luckily my local AMPS club meets Friday (8/10) and one of the guys does those all the time, mostly for his Shermans. As I said before, this is one of those "break out of the mold" type of campaigns. Just hope I've got enough time to finish this beast.

Hi Guys,

Quick update on my Airfix Mk1. First off, hid the crudeness of the tail wheel assembly under a tarped load made from plastic scraps, tissue, and string (with PVA glue...).




Then on with some Halfords grey auto primer for a base coat - no expense spared here!



A couple days later, I sat doewn with Humbrol paints and started adding my take on the mysterious Solomon J Solomon scheme, based on the shot of D7 in a ditch. Since it only shows the right-hand side and is poor at that, I had to do some guessing based on Solomon's post-war book Strategic Camouflage on the subject of hiding things from observation. I decided on a buff, green, and brown palette applied over grey, with the lighter colours kept high on the sides and darker colours making stronger horizontals below. Eventually the idea is to give them thin black outlines as seen in the photo of D7, but not the chunky lines seen on D17...



More to come!

Tom

I believe they are made from card stock like business cards.

So, round two with my two merry Germans. I drilled out .020" holes in their feet, inserted brass rod, and shot them.









With the Vallejo Acrylic White Primer, of course. I have some areas to clean up on them still, and I found a lighter base fleshtone (Model Color 017) that I'm going to use.





I'm thinking you guys are right about not having the sandbag wall high enough. I have the old (1973) Tamiya Sand Bag kit (still in the shrink wrap!) in my stash, but I might try my hand at using Milliput or Green Stuff to make my own. I want them to lay right, and the old Tamiya ones aren't going to really cooperate, unless I heat them up and soften them to conform. Plus they're larger than the ones molded into the top of the trench.

Matt: Good man, and I figured as much. And it's not just resin, any fine particles pose the same risk when inhaled.

I was joking about the books, but it will be fun to hear what you have to say about them!

Your figures are looking good, I like the poses. I would recommend trying your hand at making some sandbags from scratch, it tends to yield better results.

Tom: Looking great! The first coat of primer really transformed it, and the "load" on the rear works out really nicely

Stephen: Aaaaah, that would make more sense. They look fantastic.

I like having only one kit out at a time, so my campaigns seem to rotate out like clockwork! Except when I have to go to work, or I'm away from my bench for school, or my airbrush acts up again, or I can't get the supplies I need, or I'm at a particularly challenging part, or...

Hans and Franz are progressing, if not slowly:



The tunic and puttees are the same color, according to the color plate in my Osprey "The German Army in World War I (2) 1915-1917". Both are assault troops, at least I think, because of the stick grenade bags that Franz (seated) has. However, neither figure has the leather reinforced knees or seat that the stormtroopers used.

But this is almost 100 years later, and I doubt if either of these two are that worried.

The M1915 tunic is supposed to be field gray, but they were dyed a darker green than the standard tunic. I think the overall uniform colors are a bit darker than I expected them to be:



On a side note, I think I found an acceptable base skin tone for my Bavarian boys. Lighter than then first attempt, but not translucent. Figure painting is definitely an art form...



I picked up some Sakura Pigma Micron archival ink pens at Dick Blick Art Supply today on the way home, two black (0.35 and 0.20mm line), one blue (0.20mm), two sepia (0.25mm) and one brown (0.20mm). They had a good deal on them, and I think I'll use the .2mm black and .2mm blue to do the eyes. Yes it's cheating, but at this early stage in my figure painting career, I need all the help I can get.

Oh, the books. I love Osprey Publishing. I love Amazon too. And I love free 2 day air shipping even more. All three of the books I got were specifically for this campaign.



Osprey Warrior "German Stormtrooper 1914-1918" is a great history on the beginnings of the German Army assault troops. The color plates are awesome, as one is nothing but the gear they used; this alone (to me) was worth the $13 I paid for the book. Every piece of gear depicted is in this vignette, so that helps me out a great deal. Now if I could just paint some realistic wood, I'd be set.

The second book Osprey Elite "World War I Trench Warfare (2)" is a really good reference book for the trenches themselves, as well as good color plates of US, German, British, French uniforms. Kind of generalized for what I needed, but it's still a nice reference book to have.

The last is the aforementioned Osprey Men-at-Arms "The German Army in World War I (2)". The color plates cover every uniform imaginable used between 1915 and 1917. Also has good line drawings of insignia, rank structures and lots of really cool private collection photos of dress uniforms and other photos from the Imperial War Museum.

All together the three books are invaluable in helping me with this. I just wish the books could paint up Hans and Franz for me...

Matt, much improved! Glad to hear about the books too. Amazing how much a few technical pages can improve a model. Figure painting is most definitely an art form, and you're making great strides! Wish I could say the same about my figures...looking forward to the end result!

Robby: Exactly

Matt: Your base painting on Hans und Franz is looking good! Those books sound great, and I'd like to see some of the content inside of the German Stormtrooper book if you have the time

Hi all
A bit of a late starter on this one


the parts are crisp for old molds apart from the bloody rubbish tracks


its gone together a treat,,I've coated the flash on the tracks with superglue so I can trim it off when dry

Andy

Hi here is my entry.

Great choices Andy and Richard, can't have enough Airfix in a WWI campaign

Ah, you can't beat an Airfix kit, eh? Andy, at least your tracks are the "new" ones that bend around the hull properly - mine were the horrible stiff vinyl of decades past...

My Mk 1 is coming along, after some serious old-school brush painting with Humbrol enamels from tins that are well over ten years old! However, after much thought and puzzling over images, I think the outlined complex scheme on D7 (and my kit!) is more likely one of the crew "copies" of Solomon's scheme rather than one he himself painted. It's too busy for the simplified Henrique re-paints in France, but I wonder if the black outlines were a "paint by numbers" tool?





It's a bit clean and vibrant, but there's rough weather(ing) on the horizon! And I haven't even started on the tarped load yet...

Tom

Small update for tonight...spent almost all day cleaning house and organizing the spawn's toys. Challenging is an understatement, as is spoiled, but I digress.

I found a good scale representation for my fence posts for the barbed wire I'm adding:



I clipped the head off, then used an X-Acto blade and made small cuts on the four sides, snapped them apart, and cleaned up the ends. I had one with a split end, but I thought that added realism. Drilled the holes in the base, dropped in some medium CA, put in my posts, and hit the CA with accelerator, and VOILA! Fence posts. I had to be careful where to drill to avoid planting a fencepost in our not-so-recently departed soldier in the foreground.





Also got some of the miscellaneous pieces primed, but not much else.

Everyone else has got some GOOD stuff going on here.

Nice vignette,Matt Smith. But the figure's tunics have exposed buttons. The 1915 Bluse had no piping and the buttons were covered by a cloth flap and buttoned to a strip underneath. Now the 1907/10 Transitional Bluse or Feldrock had eight exposed buttons and the large "Swedish Cuffs" seen on your excellant figures. They will also be seen with red piping around the collar and the seam to the left of the buttons. You still see quite a few of them in original photos long after they were officially phased out by the 1915 pattern Bluse. Bavarian NCO Bluse will often have a blue&white checkerboard style "tresse" or tapes on the collar.The experts of Great War Militaria in Chambersburg PA. have a lot of good pictures of originals and replicas they had made for sale.

Great work, Great War Modelers!! I got back to work on my Whippet. I've finished construction and started painting with guidance from a great article by José Luis Chinchilla on the "Diorama 1914" site. The article is in Spanish, but the Google translator can take care of that. Here's the link if anyone's interested.

I forgot to take a picture of the complete model before paint, so here's the closest one I have:


Base coats:



Thanks for looking! Happy modeling!!

Chris

Those tracks really spice up the Whippet, Chris!

As for me, I've had a bit of fun with tthe paint. Added a subtle wash to tone down the colours, and then added some earth-toned mud splash on the roof (from the crew) and lower sides. (Still haven't painted the tarp yet...)

My plan is a greenish base with two fresh muddy track ruts caused by the beast, and (if I can find some) an officer figure asking directions from an infantryman. Thought I'd title it "Which way to the Mud, the Blood, and the Green Fields Beyond?" Might even add a pennant with the Tank Corps colours...









Gonna be a few days of radio silence, but more posts to come at the end of the week!

Tom

I figured I'd give Hans and Franz the weekend off from painting and turned my attention to the vignette base. I didn't think about it at the time, but there's a LOT of wood elements in the base. The floor, side walls and barrel, along with the added fence posts I put in earlier:



I started mixing up a base wood color with Panzer Aces Old Wood, Splinter Blotches II, Model Color Natural Wood and Red Leather. I varied the amounts of each to give different wood shades to each of the three major elements.



The barrel was painted with Splinter Blotches II (with added retarder) then quickly painted over with a thin sepia wash to give a bit more darker red and bring out the recesses. The barrel ribs were painted in a 50/50 mix of Model Air Black and Gunmetal. The overturned bottle (still has a cork in it) was painted with Vallejo Model Color Woodgrain. I plan on tinting some Future with either Tamiya "Smoke" or "Clear Green" before weathering/pigments to add a bit of depth and give the appearance of glass.





In front I airbrushed some Model Air Middle Stone and Sandy Brown at a 50/50 mix and sprayed it in. I will pick out the detail of our departed soldier later, so I wasn't worried too much about spraying him. The sandbags were painted with a 70/30 mix of Panzer Aces Canvas and Light Mud, then overcoated with the same mix and a bit of white added in to vary the colors. Not sure if it really came out as well as I hoped.



I picked out some items for rusting and painted them in a base of Panzer Aces Light Rust (the reddish one of the three). I'll be experimenting with rusting with these items as well.

Everyone else is making great progress. I have put all my other group builds (except the 1/48 Campaign II) on hold until I get this one across the finish line.

Chris, excellent Whippet! Very cleanly built...can't wait until it's got some paint and mud all over it!

Tom, don't forget to muddy up the tracks! You got them a really nice rusty-muddy brown, but the surface is still completely even. I bet you just haven't gotten there yet, but I wanted to make sure.

Matt, Good progress so far! Little by little, it's coming together very nicely!

Dick,
Not wanting to step on your toes, but I want to have one too, so I couldn't resist making a model T desert patrol car. I'll aim my efforts at this one with front fenders and no condenser, added Lewis Gun and slung rifle, possibly in Jordan(?). I had previously found a clean copy of this photo, but today I can only find this watermarked one online...
FOR REFERENCE ONLY-- I HAVE NO RIGHTS TO THIS!
I went with the Lindberg 1/32 scale kit also...


Terribly warped frame and braces, and being stripped, it won't have the big chunky fender/floor piece to help straighten it.
I had said I was going to miss this campaign, but I couldn't resist. The subject is too awesome.
Your research and insight are fantastic, but I doubt I'll get in as much detail as yours. I'll see what I can do with a month to go, but we'll see!
My workspace is a contrast between the little stripped T patrol car and the Leopard-based Beach Armored Recovery Vehicle project sharing the space.
Cheers!
-Sean H.
P.S. crap! Moment of panic-- the photo says Jordan 1920, which is clearly after the Great War. I had previously thought it could have been the same or similar car, but now I clearly see the rounded radiator shell too. Alright, I'm backing up to the same Claud Williams car. My mistake.

Wow, I'm just going to have to settle on accepting this page as eye candy I forgot that I have some 1/48 Model T kits so I may join our Tin Lizzy club here with an ambulance.

Tom: I don't know enough to answer your question(s), but I'm glad you chose to paint the camo pattern the way you did, and it looks great with the mud!

Matt: I'm liking your base colors so far, and the wood and bottle look especially nice. Thanks for providing the close ups so we can appreciate them!

Chris: I'm in turn going to use your Whippet for guidance. The minor details that you added really made a world of difference on that old kit, and when you see it in primer it looks all the part of a new-tool kit. Did you decide on a final paint scheme yet?

Hi Sean & Jeremy, and welcome to the club!
Sean your photo is great and is new to me. It's the 15th Light Patrol Car variant I've seen. I wouldn't worry too much about the 1920 date or the radiator type, because there were probably a lot of cars like Captain Williams' rig running around and I suspect parts from older T's were used to repair later ones, and vice-versa. The car in the picture might well be Capt. Williams' car, as he was mustered out in 1919 and returned to New Zealand, but I don't see the speedometer cable hanging down underneath. It could have been ripped off out in the desert, or the speedometer was transferred to another vehicle. The men in the photo are dressed for cold weather, so condensers wouldn't have been needed at that time of year.
The trickiest part of the build for me was the conversion to right hand drive, because there isn't a lot of room to squeeze the steering column between the frame and the intake and exhaust manifolds on the right side of the engine. The lower end of the column is supposed to fit against the steering gearbox underneath, and it never lines up right. On the last one I substituted a piece of brass tubing for Lindberg's plastic piece which was too short, and held the steering wheel in place with a sewing pin. The brass tube is closer to scale and looks better, and a drop of CA glue will secure it.
Cheers
Dick