Hey all, just back from a short Christmas vacation to Wisconsin. I hope you can help me find a couple ideas.

My brother-in-law gave me some money to tie some whitebass flies and build him an artillery piece. The flies are no problem -- what I need are artillery recommendations.

I sent him a built Italeri M101 105mm howitzer to add to his collection last year and he was very happy. This year, I saw his collection and noticed that most were old toy cannons -- my 105 kind of stood out as being a bit different. I think his interest is mostly in old stuff, i.e., Napoleonic-era, Civil War, etc. -- muzzle-loading beasts from the black powder days. My knowledge is mostly WWII, so that's why I'm asking for some help.

Scale isn't a factor -- but I think bigger would be better. Any Ideas? Imex? Verlinden? others? I want to give him a centerpiece for his collection.

Verlinden do a good selection of American Civil War cannon, plus a few Naploeonic thrown in for good measure - try Squadron, they have a good selection of Verlinden pieces.

Hollowpoint -

Take a look at the "Squadron" catalog there are some great examples of Civil War artillery pieces, emplacements, etc. from Seige mortars to Columblad, Dahlgren naval guns and fantastic looking HMS Victory gun deck section from Verlinden. Cottage Industry Models, Ltd (in same catalog) has some great naval deck guns. All these i believe are 54mm or 1/32nd scale though I did see a 120mm Naval gun I believe from Verlinden also. Historex has plastic (54mm) Napoleonic artillery pieces (4, 6, 9,12 pounders) with crews, limbers, etc. that build up very nicely. Hope this helps some.

Blade48mrd

Hey Bob here a a few scale connon web sites
http://www.collectorsarmory.com/civil_war_cannon_and_limber.htm
http://www.historicalweapons.com/cannons.html
http://www.swords-n-stuff.com/d-420.html
http://www.wrmgraphics.com/page42.html
http://www.firstlineindustries.com/mincan.html
They look like some nice pieces and though there not a plastic kit i think thier a nice addition to the collection. Looking at some of the price's they seem to be fair.

If you do an eBay search, Palmer did a series of towed artillery piece from history in various scales. Among them were the WW1 75mm field gun, Revolutionary War cannon, Civil War cannon, Gatling gun and a naval cannon (like you'd see on a pirate ship or man o' war).

These were also reissued in Life-Like boxes and I think Revell issued them in the early 1980s. Squadron reissued several through their Encore series.

I've got the old Palmer issue of the WW1 field gun. Fairly old, crude model, but can be built up nicely.

Thanks, guys. Lots of ideas there.

Has anyone built any of the kits from WRM Graphics? It was one of the sites Mother suggested: http://www.wrmgraphics.com/page42.html

I'm particularly interested in the Parrott ...



... and the 3-inch ordnance rifle (I have a real one of these sitting in front of the building where I work).



I wonder about these kits because the prices seem rather low.

Why don't you just build him a Tamiya 88mm gun. Its big and I think he would like it...a lot!

~Chip

build him the gun that the marines love most......yes the 155mm .......boom :-) and its big

If you want to continue with the WW2 theme and want a centerpiece, why not build a DML Morser Karl for him?

Other smaller suggestions could be the 1/144 line of Leopold guns or Morser Karls by DML.

You said: "...... I think his interest is mostly in old stuff, i.e., Napoleonic-era, Civil War, etc. -- muzzle-loading beasts from the black powder days......"

And I was listening.

I've got many ideas I could suggest Bob, but none I can really come up with in kit form. Most of the examples I can think of would require scratching......
But the 'upside' is, that it wouldn't be too difficult.

Tread.

If the interest is on the Napoleonic era, I would go for a wood & brass kit. Quite a few of the wooden ship manufacturers make these as well. The Italian firm Mantua springs to mind but can't think of any others (only one cup of coffe so far this morning... )

Hinchliffe used to do a fair range of artillery models ranging from the War of Independence to WW2. They were in white metal & were 1/32nd scale. You may find the odd one on ebay. They were considered good, well detailed kits in their day, & being metal, they "sat" well due to their weight. There were limbers & caissons as well. Good luck.