15mm German Königstiger

In the process of sorting some old gaming stuff out I found a bundle of old SDD models. These are 15mm metal castings that I bought back in the 1990s. It makes me think that the other metal models that I have been painting are also SDD.

This box was mainly late war stuff and included a King Tiger. Having constructed the model, I gave it a white undercoat.

The undercoat has shown that the quite severe casting lines, something you don’t always get with a resin casting.

15mm Ruins

I have some of the 15mm ruins from Ironclad Miniatures.

At this time I am using a few of them to check how certain paints of mine are working out, as well as testing out different colour combinations before I try them on the (more expensive) bigger models.

15mm Ruins

One of the conclusions I have come to is I do need to replace many of the paints in my collection.

Painting the 15mm Ruined Houses

I have the ruined row of three houses and the ruined row of four houses, from Total Battle Miniatures. Having cleaned the models, I gave the inside of the models a black undercoat and then masked the inside of the windows (with masking tape) before I give the model a white undercoat on the outer side of the model.

I then started on the basecoat of one of the houses that forms part of the building, for the brown I used a Tamiya acrylic. I intend to use a lighter brown for the remainder of the model.

15mm ruined houses

I used a thinned coat of paint, as I will be adding a drybrush and some washes.

15mm ruined houses

Once I have finished painted the ruins, I think, as I mentioned with the row of three ruined houses, I will add some additional detrius, broken beams and so on to add a little more detail.

Painting the 15mm Ruined Houses

I have the ruined row of three houses and the ruined row of four houses, from Total Battle Miniatures. Having cleaned the models, I gave the inside of the models a black undercoat and then masked the inside of the windows (with masking tape) before I give the model a white undercoat on the outer side of the model.

I then started on the basecoat of the various parts of the building, for the brown I used a Tamiya acrylic.

I used a thinned coat of paint, as I will be adding a drybrush and some washes.

Once I have finished painted the ruins, I think I will add some additional detrius, broken beams and so on to add a little more detail.

Ruined Ground

A week or so ago I mentioned that I bought a couple of wooden buildings from 4Ground. I’ve always liked the look of the 28mm ruins so was pleased to find out today that 4Ground have released some ruined 15mm buildings.

Ruined 4Ground Buildings

Ruined 4Ground Buildings

Ruined 4Ground Buildings

Some are better than others, but they do look good, they do need some rubble though to add realism.

Going to Ground

I’ve been gaming for more years than I care to remember, in that time I have seen major changes in the manufacturing processes that are used to produce the miniatures and models I use to play games with.

I remember, for example, when Games Workshop first ventured into plastic models. I was intrigued by resin models for many years, I remember been very impressed with the resin GZG scenery I purchased twenty odd years ago now. What I have noticed in the last few years is the increase in laser cut MDF models. These have looked very interesting, but did often remind me of the card Superquick models you can get for model railways. I have always liked the Superquick models and have in the past considered using them for 20mm scale Operation Sealion scenarios. Though today however I would probably more likely use the new resin Hornby Skaledale buildings and scenery. However the scenery if only part of the idea, I also need to build and paint the 20mm models to go with it… one day… I also think that kind of scenery would be ideal for a English Civil War, either the 1930s version that a Very British Civil War portrays, or the more moden version I wrote about in Wargames Illustrated once.

Going back to laser cut MDF I was up at Wayland’s Forge in Birmingham and in one of their display cabinets was some of the new 4Ground 15mm laser cut buildings made up along with some Flames of War models. I thought they looked very effective and nearly as good as the ready painted Battlefront buildings. Always willing to try something new I got a couple of buildings. I went for the ready-painted versions as I thought that would save time and the cost difference wasn’t huge.

I got the Northwest European Hotel with coarse stone walls and coaching arch and Northwest European semi-detached houses, one house rendered green the other is white.

Northwest European Hotel with coarse stone walls and coaching arch; a great focal point or objective for any 15mm gaming table.

Northwest European semi-detached houses, one house rendered green the other is white, these are ideal buildings for any 15mm gaming table.

They look quite good and seem that they will be easy to build. If they are then I might get a few more.

15mm E-50

Having posted a few of Forged in Battle’s pictures earlier I had a look back at what other photographs they had posted. A month or so back they had posted their model of the E-50.

E-50

This was a future tank design that never got further than the drawing board.

Really liking these future models. It was nice to read on their Facebook page that they are going to make a British Centurion and possibly the Black Prince too.

15mm Soviet Tanks for 1946

Forged in Battle have released some photographs of new tanks to oppose the German super heavy tanks they have already shown.

T44

The T-44 was a medium tank first produced towards the end of the Second World War by the Soviet Union. It was the successor to the famous T-34. Fewer than two thousand T-44s were built, but the design became the basis for the T-54/55 series of main battle tanks, the most-produced tank of all time.

SU101

The SU 101 and SU102 were experimental Soviet propelled artillery units developed during World War II. Were created in the Uralmash design office in autumn 1944 – spring 1945 based on the chassis of medium tanks T-44 and T-34-85 and were intended to replace the SU-100. Despite the prospects and high performance for its time, with the end of the war, it was decided to terminate further work on them in connection with inexpediency deployment of new SPG based on tanks units of war period, are not fully met the requirements of the operating time of peace.