WIP and Winston Churchill

A work in progress post plus a single completed (sans base) personality figure.

I was unable to resist the urge to get a copy of the Operation Sea Lion book for Bolt Action, and local supplier Mighty Ape (who have a pretty good range of Warlord) also provided the launch figure of Winston Churchill with a tommy gun which provided some fun (and eye-strain) painting up. He still needs a base, which will of course have to be "green and pleasant".

Aside from Winny, I've been working on, but failing to complete some Konflikt '47 US heavy infantry, and two LRDG 30 cwt Chevrolet trucks.

Various home-life related things have meant I haven't had quite the same time or enthusiasm for painting these last couple of weeks, so the US troops are still sitting there waiting for detailing. The basic colours are done, but washes and highlights are needed, and as they are almost small walking vehicles I'm planning to use some armour weathering techniques too.

I did however get enthused to start work on my LRDG patrol, which along with some SAS sections will make a Bolt Action army using the "Behind Enemy Lines" theater selector. The LRDG portion of the army will be using LRDG Chevys from Warlord, Offensive Miniatures, and Company B; starting out with two Warlord trucks that have been waiting for quite a while.  I really like the Warlord LRDG vehicles, but they only have machine guns, the Offensive and Company B trucks will be providing a Breda and 37mm AT gun portee respectively.

The Warlord trucks, and a Jeep that came as part of the same bundle, have resin bodies with metal wheels, bumpers, guns, and crew. The trucks bodies are two part: a common front end, and two different rear sections stuffed with stowage. Each also comes with three crew: a driver that is the same for both, and front and rear gunners that are specific to the variants. The crew all have separate heads, with extras to choose from, so quite a bit of variety is possible.

The trucks went together very easily - one front section had a slightly warped under-carriage, but that was quickly fixed with some hot water while cleaning the pieces.

After assembly all were primed with Stynylrez yellow primer, the wheels were left off and painted separately. (The bumper is missing from the Jeep in this shot - I found it later in the packaging.)

I wasn't sure how best to spray the wheels, so some cocktail forks and a kebab skewer got turned into a makeshift frame with the wheels threaded on. These were first primed grey, and then painted with VMA Panzer Black Grey.

I thought I might try pre-shading the trucks, so sprayed dark (VMA Khaki No. 3) and light (Reaper Splintered Bone) on areas before applying the basecoat. It was a fairly subtle effect but is visible on the models; I still need to work on applying thin coats of paint.

The trucks were given an overall spray of VMA UK Light Stone, and then freehand camouflage patches of light blue and desert pink.  I had a hunt through my paints before settling on VMA Hellblau (RLM65) for the blue, and a 3:1 mix of VGA Pale Flesh and VMA US Desert Sand for the pink.  The first attempt at pink used a 1:1 mix, and looked about where I want the colour to end up, but once weathered would I think have pretty much disappeared, so I over-painted with the more pink mix.

Currently the trucks are getting their crews and all the stowage painted, and I'm waiting on decals from Company B with "T Patrol" markings.