Monday 24 June 2013

Desert Air Support

My recent review of forces highlighted a couple of gaps that urgently needed plugging. One major missing element was Air Support so I have been working to rectify this over the last couple of weeks. I've never painted 1/300th scale aircraft before so this was a bit of a challenge for me but on the whole I'm pretty happy with these. I will expand my collection eventually, but for not both the Axis and Commonwealth forces can at least call upon some help from the skies.

A flight of Hurricane IIC's which can provide Limited and Sporadic Air Support to Monty's forces

The Hurricanes were painted using Tan Yellow (912) as the base with the camo painted in Beige Brown (875). I mixed a light grey and blue together to make the pale blue undersides (not shown here) and used German Grey (995) for the Canopies. The RAF Roundel transfers (type C on the wings and C1 on the Fuselage) were from Dom's Decals.

A flight of JU87G Stuka's fitted with tank busting Canon
The Stukas were based coated using Iraqi Sand (819) with Beige Brown (875) for the camo and the same blue/grey mix for the undersides. The Balkan Cross decals on these are from Trafalgar (via Heroics and Ros).

Both flights of aircraft based and ready for action
The 3rd Edition FOW rules mean that a flight of up to three aircraft can be represented by one model but it didn't feel right painting just one of each.

I'm not sure what to paint next, I'm waiting for a large order to arrive in the next few days but as I'll be away all next weekend (Tankfest at Bovington! Yeh!!) I'm loath to start anything. Mind you starting a project isn't a problem for me, its finding the willpower not to procrastinate and get it finished that seems to be my issue! 

13 comments:

  1. Amen to that brother.... Starting projects is easier than maintaining them and finishing them.

    Also I want to say these are some of the nicest 1/300 scale aircraft I have seen for a long long while. Kudos mate!

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    1. Thanks Clint. I've never painted 1/300th aircraft before so this was a bit of a learning curve.

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  2. Well, they look very nice.

    And yes starting projects is always exciting. Now I have to finish a lot of them. DArn

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  3. Nice looking planes Lee. Like you, starting projects is never a problem - it's the finishing that's the hard part (is finishing ever possible? "Oooh, look, I could add that unit, and what about that one? I really, really, really need to have all the options available to me, even if they'll never actually be used")

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  4. They look great! I like the desert schemes.

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  5. They do look great - particularly like the desert camo. Best, Dean

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  6. These look excellent Lee! Great brushwork!

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  7. Hi Lee,

    These look really good but the tank busting Stuka with the underslung 37mm at gun did not, as far as I now, see action in the desert.

    They did see plenty of action in Russia though!

    All the best,

    DC

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    1. Maybe this is another one of those Battlefront 'extrapolations'. They are definitely in the FOW army lists (not that that means anything) for north Africa. I wasn't able to find anything on these in the desert either but in the end I decided I must be missing something... proper research probably!

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    2. F.w.i.w.. Wiki says "In April 1943, the first production Ju 87 G-1s were delivered to front line units"... just in time for Kursk....

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  8. Love those Stuka's... time for a flight of Kitthawk's I think... that tigers mouth graphic (112 squadron) is hard to beat! :o)

    http://raf-112-squadron.org/images/raf112_warmup.jpg

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  9. Nice work on the camo / spotting.

    FMB

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