Finished - 28mm WW2 British Airborne Jeeps, Bikes and Carts

After much delay, I have finally finished these. And that's the last of the Airborne for now, although (as I'm sure you know) I do have a few more figures that haven't been prepped and primed yet.


Hand Carts

Motorbikes

Two Wellbikes and one 350cc Matchless bike

Woah! One of them has switched bikes!

I've left him separate so that he can be used with either bike

Signals Jeep

I will be adding radio antennae at some point

Recce Jeep with Trailer

Everything apart from the "proper" motorbike is from Warlord, the motorbike is from Foundry.


There have been some purchases...

I took advantage of  Warlord's Black Friday sale to buy the last three packs from the Strontium Dog range; I also bought their Airborne 75mm pack howitzer, 17 pounder and Polsten gun.

On Wednesday I did a little bit of shopping in town - the two Judge Dredd packs that I didn't buy initially, some acrylic paint pens, white ink and a couple of paints, a couple of portable daylight lamps, a couple of Series 7 brushes, superglue and activator, some tree armatures, some matchsticks and some triangular plastic strip.

Apart from finishing the jeeps etc today I have been doing some prep:

The horses for my barbarian warband have been glued onto bases, as have the figures for a special unit.

I've also prepped the resin Judge Dredd figures. Dredd's Daystick broke at the mid point, so I removed it at the handle and fitted a length of paperclip; I also had to pin another Judge at the ankle - I'll need to do a little bit of greenstuff work on them. I'm still debating how to do the basing - I'm considering mounting them on acrylic bases, but I'm wary about cutting them off their integral bases.

Tomorrow I'll be prepping the metal JD figures and maybe some of the recent Airborne acquisitions. I'll also be assembling the barbarian riders.

Paint Table Saturday - AHPC X Is Upon Us

Well, in three weeks' time the tenth edition of the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge will kick off and an intrepid band of 68 fools figure painters will retire to their workbenches, pick up their brushes, load their palettes, accidentally drink from their brush water mugs, and finally emerge at the end of March.

This year, in amongst working through my leadpile to get to my 1300 points target, I will be one of the Full Minions again. I've been assigned Friday as my duty day but this year it's "free fire" for submissions rather than victims entrants having assigned days.

Now, you might have spotted that my target of 1300 points is much lower than my typical output from previous Challenge editions, particularly last year when I achieved nearly 3500 points. That is because I will be largely focusing on character figures this year, rather than armies.

What do I have lined up for painting this time?

10mm Lizardmen - for James' charity project
15mm SYW Russians - there will be a small contingent of additions for this mega army
15mm SciFi - there may be some more Kra'Vak
28mm Pulp/Gangsters - I've got quite a few figures (including civvies) still left from last year
"28mm" Strontium Dog - some more figures for this project have come (or are coming) my way
28mm Barbarian Horde - a mixed foot and mounted warband for Dragon Rampant; lots of bare flesh, furs, leather and steel
28mm WW2 - there should be a small group of British Airborne hitting the ground
"28mm" Mega City One - errmm, yes, I did succumb and purchase the new Judge Dredd game from Warlord; my order arrived this afternoon:

I have opened up the packs and the figures are very nice indeed. Some of the packs are metal, but most are in Warlord's new resin. There may be some additional purchases made before (the two packs I didn't order) and during the Challenge (the second wave which will be released in January).

And now, the Workbench:

I've made progress but they aren't quite finished. That's mainly the result of my flat being horribly cold at the moment - my boiler broke down on Sunday night and the engineer who was meant to come on Thursday went to the wrong house and naffed off - I've got another booked to come tomorrow morning. However, I suspect that the pump he will need won't be on his van so it will be a few more days until I get central heating and hot water back.

Finished: 28mm WW2 British Paras Batch 4

Just a small batch this time, with some odds and ends that I bought in the past few weeks. It's not the final batch though - some figures I'd ordered in June from Black Tree Designs finally arrived on Saturday. I've also got the jeeps, trailer, motorbikes and handcarts to finish painting. And some Artizan vehicle passengers.

Foundry Paras in Berets

What's that on the kneeling chap's back?

A 2" mortar I added from a Warlord sprue!

Warlord PIAT and 2" Mortar Teams

I'm rethinking my earlier decision to sell off the Warlord paras I painted when testing out paint schemes. Although that will mean that I have more PIATs than most of the airborne battalions at Arnhem!


Crusader 6 Pounder

The gun seems to be the same one that Artizan sell, but the crew are different. If I keep the Warlord figures, this will take me up to three 6 pounders - I doubt that I'd ever get that many on the table, even in a game of "Big CoC". I now have visions of me ordering the Warlord 17 pounder and 75mm pack howitzer to add to the force, just in case...

I've also painted the crew figures for the Warlord jeeps and the motorbike riders:

You'll get a better shot once the jeeps, etc are painted (probably on Thursday).

Finished: 28mm WW2 British Paras Batch 3

And the third batch are finished, at last. This project is rapidly approaching its end (until I buy a load of armed jeeps for the Recce Troop...).

The figures are a mix of Artizan, Crusader and Foundry.


Senior Leaders

The chappie in the kilt is meant to represent either Captain James Ogilvie or Lieutenant David Strathern of the Glider Pilot Regiment, both of whom flew in wearing their kilts.

Junior Leaders

Supports and Specialists

The chap in the blue-grey trousers is to represent one of the RAF personnel who were on the ground and joined in the defence of Oosterbeek; the chap in the green beret is to represent one of the Dutch commandos who were attached to 1st Airborne to act as interpreters. There's also a chap with a Vickers K gun for the Recce Squadron contingent.

Sten Guns

The radio operator will be a forward observer.

Bren Guns

Rifles

While I had the airbrush station set up for the varnishing, I took the opportunity to prime a few bits and to put down the base colours on the jeeps, trailers etc:

That green might* look rather bright right now, but with some drybrushing, washes and a filter it will look right in the end (trust me - I've done it before!).

Tomorrow I will start painting the (for now) final foot figures for this project.

When they are finished I've got eight** vehicle crew figures to paint and then the vehicles, 3" mortar and 6 pounder.

* OK, it does
** I have another six crew figures but need to add weapons and packs to them.