Wednesday, August 3, 2016

The Mighty M103 Heavy Tank!

I finally got a day where the humidity seemed OK for spraying my GHQ M103 heavy tanks. I used Testor's Olive Drab, which was a little darker than what I wanted, so I highlighted them with Vallejo Olive Green. I tested out a black wash on one of the tanks, but it look too dark. For now I will leave them as is. Three I made into company command tanks.

The battalion
 
Three command tanks:
I designate my command AFVs by at least sticking on an antenna. I will also stick in a commander if I feel ambitious. I have tried different methods of antenna making with varying satisfaction. This time I used a method by the guy who makes GameCraft Miniatures. I think it has worked the best so far, BUT the brush hairs can bend very easily, and don't spring back. 

Commander 1: side view

Commander 1: turret turned

Commander 2

Commander 3
GHQ provided these tanks with a pintle-mounted 50 cal machine gun. This is great, but it made it difficult to sick in a tank commander. The commanders themselves are an example of scale creep. Yes, it even happens at the micro level. Commanders 1 and 3 are from GHQ's American WWII artillery and vehicle crew packs. They are much thinner than commander 2. Even so, I had to cut off and extend the machine gun on commander 1 to allow him to man the gun. Commander 2 is from their more recent 3rd World Regulars infantry pack. He was much beefier compared to the other two and it took more work to fit him in the commander's copula. I should have sniped off his binocular case to accommodate the gun.  As a result, the machine gun is stuck in that weird down position. 

3 comments:

  1. Chris,

    Those are looking lean and mean. Okay, not lean, but HUGE and mean ;)

    I absolutely love the TCs in the hatches, fantastic! Can't wait to see them in Chalupastan. I wanted to use them in my Hakuna-Matata stuff, but there aren't any in 3mm (yet). So I'm going with the next best thing: the UK's "Conqueror."

    V/R,
    Jack

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  2. Thanks!

    Hopefully, you won't have to wait as long as I did for them to come out.

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  3. Nice work. You have to love the M-103!

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