T16s Painted At Last!

After much toil and work, my T16s are finally ready to grace the table! Be forewarned, this post has lots of large images!

All the vehicles have been painted very similarly to my Shermans: Russian Uniform Green paint, overwashed a few times with Agrax Earthshade, with drybrush highlights of the base with a bit of pale sand mixed in. The tracks are Gunmetal Grey mixed with a bit of matte black, the tires are a mix of matte black and Panzer Uniform Black from Vallejo's Tank Aces line. Netting and most of the stowage is a mix of colours I couldn't even remember now, but involves a leather colour, some green, and some pale sand, to make a unique hybridized colour very similar to British tunic colour.

The order of battle markings show my company to be from the Algonquin Regiment of Canada, chosen because it's the closest one to where my family grew up. I had to paint all the 62s by hand (and the green squares) though the Canadian 4th are decals.

The front of each of the T16s has a different specific stowage layout, but all have the extra wheel mounted, which matches the ones on the vehicles themselves.

The interior of the T16s are likewise varied in stowage, one having an extra wheel from the deployed 6pdrs thanks to Tom Stanley's figure standing on one himself.

The sides of each vehicle have a serial number, which is random except for the first two digits, which seem to have been relatively consistent. The rivets were added with liquid greenstuff which, while it's not exactly the greatest for gap filling, makes a fabulous surface additive for subtle detailing. This kind of depth was achieved with only two layers of green stuff, then some careful highlighting to make sure they didn't get lost.

All the guns are magnetized in place by a magnet buried in the vehicle, and a chunk of paperclip in the gun trails. They aren't strongly secured, and will separate on rough surfaces, but it does help reduce the unruliness of the two.

The interior of each vehicle was also intentionally made to be different where I could manage it. Each has the gas tank in what seems to have been the most common place, and has the radio in an appropriate place, but beyond that, I varied up the location of stowage and extra 6pdr shells, as well as doing what I could to throw in different figures for crew. In two cases, commanders from the Shermans from Open Fire became crewmen.

Something else that delayed my finishing of the T16s was that I painted the deployed guns at the same time, to ensure consistency where possible between them. I am at the stage of basing the guns, which I am trying to putty to look like they are in a city, and then this entire platoon will be finished and ready for the table!

8.8 Flak 36 Limbered

While the T16s are being painted, I figured I'd show some photos that were posted on Flames of War, but not necessarily on here yet. Here's a project I did along with a Schutzen Kompanie a while back.

In Flames of War, guns that are limbered to a truck to move are just dragged behind. In some cases it doesn't seem too odd, but I still find it a little strange to have a fully deployed gun with its crew, somehow surfing behind a truck or halftrack.

Where this is especially strange is the 8.8 Flak 36. It is a huge gun on a cruciform mount, and until it's attached to its wheel limber, wouldn't move short of a tank hitting it. I did not want to have such a look, and the Flames of War model thoughtfully comes with limber halves. I set about converting the rest to have limbered versions of my unlimbered guns, for when they're dragged behind their halftracks:

 First up was the relatively simple limber and mounting. This was done primarily by tracing the metal one provided by Battlefront, with extra pieces for the most part using leftovers. The centre of the limber has two pieces of tinfoil, as well as some extra sprue bitz and small cut triangles. The front and back are the metal provided limber halves.

Next came the gun. For this, I got various sizes of plastic rod, combined them with carefully aplied pieces of tinfoil, and modelling wire, and carefully glued each piece, again using the BF one as a guide.

Here's the breach end. Thin plasticard, as well as a thicker clump grooved out simulated the actual breach, with remaining detail being a mix of plasticard, wire, and tinfoil.

The base of the gun went next, and involved a bit of guesswork. The detail is simplified from the real gun, as I hope in most games to not ever have to use their limbered versions! Again, the BF gun shield made a great trace proxy for the custom version.

Here's the full limbered gun, pre-painting. The gun wasn't glued facing down that far, but rather straight ahead. In the background you can see the deployed 8.8, and why I didn't want to have it just 'surf' behind the halftrack.

 And here it is painted up! The 'barn doors' have been painted with a grid pattern, which simulates how the deployed one was painted. While its detail is not exactly on, it does bear enough of a resemblance that from 'table distance' they're indistinguishable.

 Here as well is the only place it's distinctly not the BF version. From the gunner's seat, a couple of the detailed control knobs are just cylinders. Otherwise I'm very pleased with how it turned out, even if they sadly (luckily?) have yet to make it on the battlefield.