Bearwoodman does Ladies! To the Barricades! (VBCW Modelling Challenge)

[Bearwoodman]

As regular readers of @leadboy’s Herefordshire 1938 blog will know, it is traditional to set a Modelling Challenge in advance of the Autumn Big Game that he runs, and this year is no exception: https://hereford1938avbcwtng.blogspot.com/2024/02/modelling-challenge-2024-ladies-to.html

Moreover, this time entries from those who are unable to attend the actual battle (like me) have been formally invited (admittedly a lack of invitation has not stopped me previously, but it is always nice to be asked).

The challenge is in two parts and involves both painting up a female character from those dark days of 1938 Herefordshire and creating an “urban barricade” as a contribution towards the construction of the battlefield for the Autumn Big Game.

I have a few ideas for a suitable female personality marinating in my mind, but it was actually the construction of a barricade that caught my imagination initially. I note from studying the rules of the Challenge (I am of course a stickler for rules as my previous Modelling Challenge entry will attest) that non-attending participants are not strictly required to enter a barricade, but I thought it sounded fun and I am very happy to post the result to someone who will be there if I actually end up making something that will be of use.

I am not actually a VBCW player, in fact I have very few non-Napoleonic historical figures in 28mm scale.  So my initial thought was that a 1938 era barricade would be difficult to produce from stuff I already owned. But while admiring @TacticalPainter’s impressive work creating destroyed armoured vehicles for his 20mm Second World War games (https://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=135881.165) I realised that:

(a) a burnt out tank would make the basis for a pretty solid barricade; and

(b) that I was fortunate to be in possession of a quantity of tanks the smouldering wreaks of which were known to have been a common sight in the fields and towns of Herefordshire in 1938: the (in)famous Mk I SHODDY.


Now I have converted these cheap plastic toy tanks in the past but only for use in a Sci-fi setting (apart from one rather unusual and definitely non-military issue conversion for use by @Moriarty’s sinister VBCW cultists) so it would take a bit of thought to change the basic model to make it look a bit more period appropriate.  After minutes of research on the internet I decided that the British Cruiser Mark IV tank (see below) would be my source of inspiration.


It is a tank from the correct period and is not entirely dissimilar in proportions to the basic SHODDY.  I would not be trying to make an exact replica, just to take a few visual clues from the historical tank and apply them to my cheap plastic tank, in particular:

1. Single, smaller main gun
2. A taller turret
3. Rivets!
4. Distinctive sloped armour on the side of the turret
5. Distinctive sloping armoured mudguards

I cut away a bit of track to try and make it look like the vehicle was disabled before it was destroyed.   


I used one of the gun barrels that came with the basic SHOODY as the main armament but shortened it and removed the muzzle break.  The coaxial machine gun was made from a bit of cocktail stick.


The severed muzzle break was re-purposed as the bow machine gun – I though it looked a bit like an armoured cover for a water-cooled gun.


I also found I had a left over set of exhausts from a 1:72 model Panther tank I had made some years ago and added that.


I cut out the turret hatches and glued them open to make the tank look as though it had been abandoned.


I added some chunky milliput rivets and a few other bits and then primed it black.



Painting next!

[has.been]

Good work. I look forward to the painted example.

[Moriarty]

Hi Bear!
Determined to get our noses back to the grindstone, are you? Well, I’ll be grabbing some inspiration from the SCW, and producing a ‘washerwoman’ with clothesline and draped sheets - the resultant lack of view terrifying the enemy drivers and stalling their advance indefinitely!
May the best woman win!

[Bearwoodman]

Thanks @has.been. I will be trying some techniques for the first time so I hope it turns out ok.

Hi @Moriarty. That is an excellent idea, hanging sheets break up line of sight reducing the effectiveness of enemy snipers etc. but can also be used to conceal a nasty surprise from the opposition! On top of that the sheets themselves could be a useful canvas for political slogans, inspiring maxims or crude insults. I look forward to seeing the result!

[leadboy]

Woohoo! Bearwoodman (and Moriarty) are back ! Look forward to seeing the results !

[CapnJim]

I like what you've done so far.  Looking forward to A.  Seeing the tank painted, and B.  Seeing if/how you incorporate it into some kind of barricade... 

[Bearwoodman]

Hi @leadboy, thanks for setting the challenge!

Thanks @CapnJim!  If/how it will be incorporated into a barricade is not yet determined.  The rules of the Challenge require barricades to be submitted in lengths of 6 or 12 inches.  I had thought that a burnt out tank on its own might make up a length of barricade without having to do more, but sadly the tank is amount 4 inches long so probably does not quite qualify.  Adding an inch of barricade at each end hardly seems worth it though.  I might make it into part of a corner section.  Or lay out the tank so that it is facing perpendicular to the line of the barricade.  Perhaps the tank was knocked out while driving down a street and the locals left it where is was and built out a barricade on either side of the vehicle preventing movement past it and therefore blocking the street?

On to paining.  I am intending to use the "hairspray" method for creating a heavily rusted appearance (I understand that burnt tanks rust very quickly) so the first stage is to paint the rusted surface that will be painted over and later partially revealed.  I used orange, brown and white paints, along with some Humbrol rust coloured pigments and some brown ink.     






I then applied a coat of hairspray purchased specially for the job.  Irritatingly, despite the females in my household owning an extensive collection of varied and expensive hair products, they did not possess a single can of hair spray that I could borrow.

Hopefully this is the right kind of hairspray!

The next stage is to paint "the paint" on the tank...

[leadboy]

Looking v. good Bearwoodman ! And don't worry about the length or anything - the 6 - 12 inch length for barricades was just a guideline (in the usual way of Hereford Modelling Challenges, as you know). We can always add barrels or petrol drums and/or other scatter each end as necessary.....

[Basementboy]

Great work- love the look of this so far

[Bearwoodman]

Thanks @Basementboy, lets see how it turns out!

Noted regarding dimensions @leadboy, thanks for the flexibility.  I am considering what to do.

In the meantime I have applied a layer of paint over the hairspray.  I know that 1938 Herefordshire prizes "snazzy" three-colour camouflage schemes but given the amount of rust, scorch marks and general weathering I intend to apply to this tank I thought a simple coat of vaguely military flavoured green would do.  I also added a few spots of colour in the form of some red and white stripes (a bit wonky but hopefully the fire damage will disguise this) a blue triangle on one side of the turret (likewise) and a freehand white 6 on a red background that I copied from a photo I found of a Cruiser Mark III on display at Bovington (see below). 

I don't know what the "6" signifies so fingers crossed it is not laughably inappropriate to my poor (soon to be) wreaked SHODDY. 

[Pattus Magnus]

That looks really good, especially considering the toy you started from. Seems almost a shame to turn it into a wreck. I’m looking forward to seeing what you do with it in the upcoming steps.

[leadboy]

Ditto from me!

[has.been]

& ditto from me too.

[CapnJim]

How about a third "ditto"?

[Bearwoodman]

Thanks everyone - I am starting to feel the weight of expectant dittos!

I needed to model the thrown track and as sculpting track links is well beyond my milliput abilities I decided to cut off some of the track from another unpainted SHODDY I had in my stash and use that. 


Unfortunately the moulded detail on the tracks on a SHODDY is about as good as you would expect for a very cheap plastic toy, so I decided to try to add some "teeth" to give the tracks some visual interest.  These were made from cardboard cut up into small triangles.  Initially I added two rows to the tracks as per the picture below, but then I realised that the Cruiser tank I was using for inspiration appeared to have only a single row of teeth on its tracks and that double rows of teeth were only probably used for vehicles with interlocking road wheels. I therefore removed the little triangles I had painstakingly attached and replaced them with a single row down the middle of the track length.  It is not going to impress a proper scale AFV modeller but hopefully it looks a bit more convincing that than leaving the tracks as originally made.


I then moved on to the all important step of applying water to the tank and running away the top layer of paint to reveal the rust effect below.  Unfortunately, despite be applying lots of water and rubbing increasing hard (first with a stiff brush, then my finger nail and eventually with a paperclip) the effect did not work.  The green paint did not come away easily and if I scraped hard enough to remove the green it sometime also removed the rust paint (see the photo below).  I wonder if I did not apply a thick enough layer of hairspray? 


I will try the hair spray effect again on another model some day, but I am going to have to paint the rust effects on this one in the old fashioned way: paint on top of paint..