Ok good news, I have the whole day off tommorrow so im going to try and see just how much of the dumvee I can complete.
Ciro-I thik SF guys do actually us the M1114, but it would appear to be more likely that these werent pressed into service with SF guys until the insurgancy began. Obviously SF guys are still oprating in Iraq carrying out survalliance missions and counter insurgency op's, but with the hightened security risks and the almost certain danger of being IED'd, it would be suicidal to carry out such missions these days in the basic GMV dumvee. You should definately get concords excellent Humvees in Iraq book, its covers a lot about SF Humvees. From what ive seen reading it today(i got it in the post yesterday) the SF guys use the basic M1025A2, which is a slightly more armoured version of the M1025 and comes with a winch fitted. They also use the M1113 ECV, which is a brother of the M1114 family, it appears that initially they converted the M1113's to GMV's by altering the rear area, removing the doors and fitting basic supplementry armour doors instead, and obviously other things like the weapons mounts etc. Ive seen recently on here some pics of SF M1114's, these could in actual fact of been M1113's(im still not sure how you determine which is whihc, further reading will be required!) as they did appear to feature all the details I mentioned above. But obviously with the SF guys nothing is regulation so you will find all kinds of weird and wondeful looking Humvees. Dave Harper of VLS did some research on SF Humvee's for some up and coming trakz releases and posted some drawings of what appeared to be either M1114 or M1113's. These had been converted into gun trucks, one had an armoured box constructed around the rear area with 4 M240B's mounted in each corner, the cab ws open and it was fitted with basic supplementry armor doors(the half door type) it was also fitted with a heavy duty truck style front bumper. I can send these pics out to you if you would like. In the May Issue of AFV modeller there was a feature of Humvees in Afghanistan and there were several shots of an SF M1114 fitted with Super Swampers, it had the cargo hatch left open and a seat fitted seperately in the rear so a gunner could sit in the rear and operate either an M2HB or an M240B, the crew compartment was still seperately sealed off.
When it comes to SF Humvees its confusing ground to cover becuase of the fact that there are no standard designs available and much of the Humvee conversions are based of the needs of the guys operating them. Id say if you want to build a basic GMV humvee(Dumvee) go with the Pro Art set and add the required details which I will list when I post my build tommorrow, although I didnt use the pro art set, the details I added will be relevant if you are using the set. If you decide to go ahead and build a slightly more different SF Humvee using an M1113/M1114 as the basis some research will be required, ive got a lot of reference on the matter and would be happy to help when ever you need it.
It looks like there is some support for the OIF campaign, so if anyone doesnt get there Humvees done(obviously they would have to eb OIF related) then you can probabaly just enter them into that if and when it goes ahead. I know i'll be building more Humvees for that campaign-I love em!
Hey Gary, maybe i'll actually be able to complete a kit full stop, so far that M1025 I did ages ago is one of the only models ive ever completed for my personnal collection(ive done a load for customers) Im useless and get bord with things too quickly. So in the time its taken me to build(not paint) one Humvee you have done four, ok im handing over command of this campaign to Gary, ive been releaved of my duties
Good luck guys, you have until Sunday! After that im not sure how the procedure goes, I may have to contact Jazza who appears to of had some experiance at running campaigns.
