Show Report: Bovington Tank Museum Model Expo

Nicely executed turret numbers on a Pz IV at Bovington.

NB: I drafted this post mid-February, but never got round to completing it, 'cause of the ubiquitous demands of the new home. Sometimes I will schedule such belated posts so as to appear more chronologically correctl. In this instance I decided to let it appear out of sequence.

I drove down to Bovington Tank Museum yesterday, with my modelling pal Paul. It was a bit of an epic trek for a day-trip, at about three and a half to four and a half hours each way! February 11th saw the Museum hosting a Model Expo, with large numbers of modellers showcasing their handiwork, and a smaller quantity of traders helping us part with our lolly.

The Tortoise: a hard-shelled monster!

A Sherman 'Crab' flail tank, one of Hobart's Funnies.

One thing I noticed, and it almost makes me feel guilty admitting it, was that I was less interested in viewing the models exhibitors were displaying than I was in viewing the real tanks, or buying books and kits, etc. Given the efforts modellers put into their craft this struck me as kind of tragic.

The only decent pic I took of any models, was this one of a lovely SturmTiger.

Having said this, I did take a look at most of the models on show. But for the great majority it was the most cursory of glances. This disparity was echoed, somewhat ruefully, in a notice on one stand that read 'hours to make, seconds to destroy'!

And my interest in this aspect of the show was reflected in my photos: lots of pics of the museum's exhibits, hardly any of the models. I do regret not photographing or filming the larger remote-controlled tanks. The 1/6th scale stuff - Action Man on steroids! - was pretty amazing.

Nice waffle-pattern zimmerit, and useful detailing stuff: logs and stowage, etc.

Visits to museums are ace for scoring some interesting detail ref.

I've not seen a Stug in uniform green like this elsewhere.

Of course, I over-spent. My haul of kits was gratifyingly large, and included four Armourfast Panzer IVs, a Trumpeter tank transporter, a Zvezda gun and crew, and quite a few planes, including some by the defunct British company Frog, a brand that's new to me. All WWII German, all 1/72.

Book-wise, I bought some highly specialised reference material, including Valiant Wings titles on the Blohm & Voss Bv 141, and Dornier Do 17Z, a mag on 'Secret Bombers of the Third Reich', and a few misc second-hand titles, on Stukas, the Luftwaffe and WWI warplanes. One of these was a larger than A4 hard book dedicated to the Ju 87, or Stuka, which had some lovely three or four page spreads.

Pz III.

Pz IV sans tracks.

The only hobby accessory I purchased was some 0.4mm masking tape, for masking canopy frames. I wish I hadn't bothered with this, as it happens, as I'm not sure I'll use it for the purpose I bought it for: I want to mask the 'glass' panels, not the metal frames! Doh!!

Paul had advised me to invest in some adhesive foil for this job, but I couldn't find anyone selling any. Just goes to show how sometimes a fog descends on my brain at these events. The urge to spend overpowers ones critical faculties. I think our hyper-materialist culture ingrains in many of us, myself included, the sub-Descartesian pseudo-philosophy; 'I spend, therefore I am'!

Hetzer? Nice camo'!

A nice view of three different camo' schemes.

Jagdpanther road wheels and track... awesome hardware.

SdKfz 234/3, with insignia of the 16th Inf. Div.

Russian KV-1

Aah... the almost cute, and ironically named, Goliath. [*]

An early war (Pz I?) German command vehicle.

It's hard to credit that a vehicle such as that pictured above could be part of the 'armoured might' of blitzkrieg. It looks more like a tracked pram or bathtub than a tank! I do like the stencilled tank ID, in white outline. And the early war gray-brown camo is cool.

As mentioned above, I overspent, as is my usual MO these days. This time I bought loads of aeroplane kits: the Mister Kit Fiesler Storch was one of several different models of this gangly plane for sale on the Valiant Wings book stall. I love the Roy Cross artwork on the Airfix Fw 189. A beautiful painting! One of these is a recurring baleful presence in the superb film Come And See, reviewed elsewhere here on't blog.

Love the old Airfix box!

Me like Me 110s.

I bought three Me 110s, bringing my total of these fab looking 'Zerstorers' to four (two by Edouard, One a frog, and one (?)). The Do 17Z and one of the Me 110s are by Frog, a manufacturer I'd not encountered (or even heard of) before. I covet one of their Arado 234 Jet Bombers. But the stall which was selling the Frog kits didn't have that particular model. Like classic Airfix of yesteryear, the  Frog kits often have lovely box artwork.

Some land based stuff!

In my more normal land warfare niche I bought a Trumpeter Tank Transporter, and two sets of Armourfast Panzers. The latter filling a bit of a gap in my German armour collection with some medium Pz III and IV tanks. And finally, in terms of kits at least, I bought a rather lovely looking Roden Opel Blitz Tankwagen. I also bought a few books, mostly Luftwaffe ref. Rodent are another brand that often have fab box art, something I always appreciate.

My swag from the show is shown in the pictures above and below. What I really need to do is to start in on building stuff from my ever-increasing stockpile.

Bought this to help with my Airfix Bv 141

... and this for help with my Frog Do 17Z

The Valiant Wings titles are superb, being packed with more info than I ever realised I could want to know, including lots of great photos and a good number of colour illustrations. Somewhat to my own surprise, if I'm 100% honest, I found I really did want to know all the minutiae! It seems madly extravagant to me to be buying books like this that cost more than the models themselves. But it gives me so much pleasure, perusing them, and using them to help build my kits, that I just go with it.

It was a good day out, despite a number of Bovington's German Tiger tank variants I would've loved to have seen not being on display. I made up for this loss by spending yet more money, acquiring some nice green Dad's Army socks, and a Tiger Tank T-shirt from the museum's gift shop!

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NOTES:

[*] Of course no weapon intended to maim and kill can really be thought cute. Very tasteless of me.

1/76 WWII - Airfix Sdkfz 234

I got this model in my cache of much reduced Airfix kits from the local HobbyCraft store, and built it at the same time as the Kubelwagen and Sdkfz 222. Like those models it's really very primitive, and even has some real howlers, detail wise. But again, like the other kits, it's been fun to build, and perhaps even more fun thanks to the need to modify it.

A pal of mine has loaned me the above book. I've yet to start reading it (I'm in the middle of several WWII titles, inc. Anthony abeevor's new book, Ardennes 1944), but having been lent the book, and then seeing the reduced Airfix kits... well, I just had to get them! This is a very old kit, dating back , I think, to 1964. The rather attractive cover art dates from the mid seventies.

The kit contains two small and one large sprue, some simple decals, and instructions. I had a look inside all three boxes when I got home, and went with this as my first build, as the green styrene provided a kind of continuity with the rent AMC SturmTiger.

Unlike most kits this build started with the gun, not the running gear. As the pic below shows, a delicate detail of the gun mechanism was rather bent and misshapen, so the first bit of modification was scratch building a new metal replacement; something a lot sturdier! I also opened up the recoil groove and a hole in the muzzle, before assembling the pitifully oversimplified gun mount.

After putting the gun together and mounting it on the inner fighting compartment baseplate, the next step is to assemble the bodywork. This lead to a thoughtful hiatus, as I considered how to approach painting and detailing the internal areas. Having laid out the parts (pic immediately below), I then concentrated on adding bits and bobs to the baseplate and inner sides. 

Detail I added included a driver's seat, from a Plastic Soldier a Company kit (Pz. 38t & Marder Variants), some ammo (from a Hasegawa JagdPanzer kit), for which built a simple rack from plastic card, scratch-built door handles for the two lower mid hull exit hatches, a 'bin' type box on the left side (based on picture research of Sdkfz 234 interiors), some Whermacht personnel gubbins (another useful PSC part), and some structural stuff around the gun and as a frontal plate for the fighting compartment. 

I even spiced up the very dull floor with various bits and bobs, inc. a mechanical doodad (cut up from bits of another kit) which I think might be the top of the transmission housing, or gearbox (again based on photographic ref.). I have to say that I find this part of model building - even if there's a whiff of silk purse and sow's ear - extremely satisfying and pleasurable!

Once this detailing was competed I hand painted it all using Humbrol enamels. Various layers of different washes, and a bit of dry-brushing, helped weather it all a bit, and bring out the detail. I was pretty slapdash about this, I have to confess. But I feel it looks okay, if admittedly not up to the very high standards of many of the modellers whose work frequently spend ages admiring whilst making my own modest little models.

After taking rather too many pics of the resulting fighting compartment and gun - I guess this means I was pleased with result? - it was time to get back to the build. And, finally, it was the turn of the running gear. I'm not sure if this is correct, but I have vague recollections of reading somewhere that the development of wheeled vehicles of this sort, by the pre-war German army, was as a result of some clause in the Versailles treaty. By having wheeled armour sporting guns, the Whermacht could get around energies upon tracked tank numbers. Can anyone confirm this, or elucidate further, perhaps?

Whatever the truth of the above idea, it is certainly true Germany was the pre-eminent multiplier of military design ideas. I think this is a key reason behind my obsession with WWII German fighting vehicles; there are so many, and a lot of them, such as these '8-rad' types, also happen to look real,y cool. Below is the kit with wheels gluing in place. I used my kit-cleaning toothbrush to rest the model as the glue set. I have seen that many modellers build little rigs and formers for this sort of job. I'm cogitation slowly on how I might develop an adaptable approach to such a useful solution myself.

Pictured below is the stage of the build where one comes to the 'big mistake': the 234 variants, which include the popular 'Puma', actually had a single long mudguard arrangement on either side. The double pairings of sharply angular mudguards that Airfix went with - possibly the result of referring to an incomplete vehicle in a UK collection? - hark back to earlier vehicles, like the Sdkfz 231 series. Still, I don't mind this too much. As already mentioned, the multiplicity of designs, and the near Krakatoa-like continual eruption of innovations not German vehicle design, mean this could be a hybrid or experimental prototype. Whilst inaccurate to the informed eye, it still looks quite plausible, I reckon.

Pictured above and below are a few images of the drivers vision hatch, which I decided to modify a little and model in the open position. I had wanted to be a diver figure into the body of the vehicle as (and may still do so), but at present it's still a 'situation vacant'!

I quite like the trio of figures supplied with this model, and I might well use them. Though quite how I don't know! In the pic below one of the crew offers some fraternal support to another, who certainly appears to be a little off balance, perhaps on account of the unaccountable neat circular hole in his back? The commander stands atop the rear engine deck, scoping the field of vision with his binoculars.

And finally, for now, some pics with further added detailing, on the outer vehicle surfaces. The mudguards as spliced were way too sharply defined. Looking at pics of actual vehicles (be they Sdkfz 231 or 234) they all had a far more pronounced softness or curvature to these edges. So I filed these down a bit, using sandpaper and various files.

I also added width-indicators, modelled in three parts: plastic sprue was used as for the mounting points; stiff wire formed the length of rod; and tiny balls Milliput were made for the little white bobbles at the terminal points. Rather unfortunately, I lost one of these tiny little balls. I decided not to make another one, on account of one of the width-indicators being rather too short anyway. I may also bend this one a little, and pass it off as battle damage (the driver has obviously clipped a corner!).

In the above picture you can see that, on this occasion, I have opted to use plastic-card to make the jerrycan holders, having had such a painful experience using the photo-etched ones.

And last of all, the Kubelwagen and Sdkfz internal areas are masked off, ready for base-coating. This was done, as can be seen from the four small balls of Milliput in the Kubelwagen hood, before a I lost one of them, and before a I drilled tiny holes in them, and superglued them to the wire. In the background a Fujimi BMW with sidecar has had a scratch-built headlamp added, to replace (another) lost part.