15mm armoured train

[sukhe_bator]

I thought it high time that I posted my Armoured Train 'Comrade Blyukher' for my Back of Beyond project in full, to illustrate what you can achieve in 15mm...
The basis was the excellent Peter Pig resin model of an armoured Russian Ov loco and tender and armoured trucks.
This is an early set up from several years back showing the PP armoured flat wagon, artillery car, loco and tender, with a converted MG car and box car at the rear illustrating the kind of set up I was aiming for

For maximum flexibility I decided to model the flat wagons with different 'loads'. This wagon is unpainted with a Red Putilov field gun and crew shielded behind an improvised sandbag emplacement.

'Comrade Blyukher' Ov loco and tender. The tender sides have been raised and additional 'log' fuel replaces the original modelling of coal on the resin kit. Some of the insignia is incorrect and need some reworking and I have since added suitably stirring Red banners at strategic points.
 
The standard twin 76mm artillery car sporting an unusual fir tree camo scheme spotted in an Osprey book

The same showing how effective the camo scheme is in the appropriate setting

The converted MG car with 8 side and two top turreted MGs taken from a PP Austin armoured car

A converted RATIO OO/HO GWR box van kit with wheels cut down and sleeved axles to TT gauge, reduced subframe and roof. It makes a surprisingly effective 5' gauge long wheelbase carriage in Bolshevik livery

The scratchbuilt water tower based on ACW examples since the only photos I could find were the later octagonal brick towers for the Trans Siberian Railway. Early photos of the Trans Caspian railway show water towers on simpler stacked log platforms/staging.

The whole train posed in a fully developed Siberian setting with scratchbuilt station, watertower, refuelling point and village in the background

The same with loading stage/ramp and crane and flatbed for Soviet MkV tank

And in the desert wastes with stunted lineside telegraph poles etc.


The plan now is to develop an improvised second train converting the PP 'General' 4-4-0 Wild West/ACW loco and tender with added sloping armour plate sidings. The Trans-Caspian conflict which is my next project calls for a different set of lineside buildings and an improvised train made up largely of flat wagons 'armoured' with cotton bales, sandbags and planking with field guns and MGs mounted on them...

[von Lucky]

Absolutely beautiful! I have this train and it's waiting to get my Winter War project in 15mm under way.

You have inspired me to think about getting it out and least prep it. Thanks.

[sukhe_bator]

Glad to hear it - the train is an excellent model and deserves to be better publicised. There are some good camo/paint schemes out there if you look.
One thing to consider with the train is long term storage. The TT wheels are quite narrow and unless you have a snug set of compartments for storage, they tend to tip over. I opted for a magnetic strip glued to the underside of the resin model with the wheels glued onto a card strip with some metal sheet effectively creating a sabot base. This seems to work well for me. The models then sit well in a metal tin/tray when not in use without shifting around.

[OSHIROmodels]

That's a great little set up, especially as it's in 15mm 

cheers

James

[John Grant]

Very very nice. I wish mine was up to this standard.

John

[former user]

great!
I am envious....

[sukhe_bator]

My first stab at such a wholesale conversion, but my take on an improvised armoured train from the Russian Civil War period. I wanted to model something broadly similar to the early locos from the mid-late C19 with spark arrestor fitted to the funnel as for a wood burning loco and seen in early photos of the Transcaspian railway such as this
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:The_Station_of_Bahmi_on_the_Transcaspian_Railway.jpg
using the Peter Pig Wild West 4-4-0 loco and tender. http://www.peterpig.co.uk/Westernengine.jpg
Becomes this;


This was achieved by;
1. Extending out the running plate along the side of the loco with shaped plasticard.
2. Cropping the cowcatcher and building a new front and buffers using wire nails and plasticard
3. Adding 'toblerone' shaped sloping armour side panels to the boiler and an armoured skirt covering the running gear with 'inspection panels'
4. Adding side and rear panels to the tender with a revised buffer beam and wire nail buffers
5. Adding sliding armoured shutters to the cab sides
6. Adding scrap matches to the tender to recreate stacked wooden logs
This is the finished build with a spray undercoat of olive drab before painting and detailing. To add to the improvised feel I plan to paint the engine underneath and frame black with red wheels and coupling rods but have the superstructure and armour in olive drab.

[sukhe_bator]

The finished locomotive in speculative markings of the Trans Caspian Provisional Government  - No.241 'Armoured Train 'TranscCaspia'

[von Lucky]

Nice work - colours have really come together.

[sukhe_bator]

After a lengthy break I am returning to the 15mm armoured train. This time I have been creating TT gauge track sections and points for use on the wargames table culled from broken OO flexitrack and turnouts.
The turnouts don't work but the track gauge can be cut down to make an acceptable railroad for the PP armoured trains to move up and down on. I cut the sleepers between the rails next to the chair mouldings on one side and then crop the longer side so the gauge is reduced.
By cutting the plastic ties underneath the track on the flexitrack I can approximate the TT sleeper spacings.
Using 5 min epoxy to glue one rail onto a stiff thin ply base, and then gluing the other side to match,  I can recreate sections of track. A liberal application of filler around and between recreates drifts of desert sand which can be augmented with sand/gravel flock texturing followed by a liberal application of rust and sand coloured paint.

[Golgotha]

Those are fantastic and very inspirational still trying to do similar but in 1/72.

[sukhe_bator]

Golgotha,
Keep persevering - its very rewarding. I've modelled my homegrown TT track around the OO gauge set track to keep the geometry simple. I gather you can get commercially available resin versions of 1:100 scale track. I now have 2 turnouts and several sections of curved and straight set track. Given the hassle I've had with 'converting' points I may well succumb and purchase them, but the track I can recreate easily enough.
1:72nd should be a lot more straightforward. There's a wealth of talent on this forum showing you what you can do with commercially available armoured trains. Most of them have to convert 1:72nd to a somewhat larger format for 25mm. The main obstacle for me is that model railroading is relatively expensive, and paying out big bucks for a precision motorised model that you are likely to hack about for wargaming purposes rankles a bit for me. There should be a good number of 00 gauge compatible toy train sets in cheap toy shops that could be adapted as static models for wargaming. They could provide the basis for chassis for box cars etc. You could then splurge out on a more expensive but more accurate loco.
Keep an eye out for magazine part works. There also seems to be a following for static models of large trains worth hunting around for on the interweb.
Dapol also do a range of the old Airfix kits of railway wagons and locos. Also another excellent source of parts, but British types. You may have more trouble with European equivalents.
Shapeways also do 3d resin models. I have my eye on an excellent Russian Ov loco. They can scale up to 00/H0...

[Golgotha]

Fantastic suggestions will look into doing something soon thought I would start with something simple basically a flat bed built up with sandbags and a RCW machine gun team or some such... Certainly one of my main reasons for choosing 1/72 for RCW was the availability of train related models so be sad if I then did nothing in terms of creating at least an armoured train.

[sukhe_bator]

I am having some success in converting the Dapol/Airfix plastic kits to armoured train usage. I'm creating a hybrid TT gauge box van out of Dapol meat wagon and cattle wagon parts. The result looks something like the Russian box vans Cuprum posted. A suitable repaint and some cyrillic script/graffiti and I'm good to go. Both have a usable 4 wheel chassis that could be converted with low plank/log sandbag sidings. The cattle wagon has a slightly longer wheel base and stable doors and flaps that could prove useful as well as planked ends. The meat van has metal louvres at the ends. You could make up 2 short wheel base flatbeds and 2 box vans for a tad over £20 GBP

Carriages are a problem. Even if you were able to model a British pattern into a more continental looking one, at around 60' they end up being 15" long.

Russian locomotives seemed to go for a slightly smaller diameter but multi-drive wheel configuration (The Ov was an 0-8-0). I'm no expert at trains or kitbashing but personally if I had to 'morph' a British pattern of plastic loco kit to European armoured train usage I'd go for a Schools class 4-4-0 loco, or the 2-6-0 Mogul class (more European looking with more closed in cab and tender area and a shorter wheelbase). The Schools were developed in the late 1920s to early 1930s, and the Mogul in the early 1930s but with armour cladding, should still look ok. The length will be about right if not the number of driving wheels. The problem is if you go for a larger express loco kit like the streamlined Battle of Britain class or the Evening Star kits a) they are quite distinctive and b) you run the risk of the train being too long for wargaming purposes. All but the larger Dapol loco kits are around the £10 GBP mark.

[sukhe_bator]

A step by step guide to a conversion of the Peter Pig Wild american 4-4-0 Wild West loco into a generic early Russian 4-6-0 loco for use on the Transcaspian railway.
Firstly after much hacking with a razor saw to the resin moulding... (approx. 2hrs work)

The cowcatcher and domes are removed. These need not be too tidily done since they will be replaced and the entire profile of the boiler will be changed. The two sets of driving wheels have been cut out and repositioned closer together. The intervening resin blocks have been glued at the rear ready to be made up into the area to take the third driving wheel...

A rough application of green stuff to establish the continuous profile of the boiler, enlarged piston housing and a third driving wheel are roughly sculpted. The plan is to tidy up the sculpt by sanding and smoothing with craft knives and cropping to create crisper edges of the driving wheel tyre with a scalpel... (approx. 1 hour)