Hetzer 38(t) for Bolt Action Rescue Build - Part 1

I have finally gotten off my rear to start posting something again! I am terrible at taking pictures, so many of my builds pass quietly without good documentation or stepping.

That said, I was lucky enough recently to secure an old, second-hand, Resin-and-metal Bolt Action Hetzer! It is definitely showing its wear and missing a few details and components. I of course do not hold the seller or the original owner to account for this, because the more I dug into the research portion for this kit, the more I discovered apparently Warlord just didn't supply some of the gubbinz visible on real-life models of this tank!

I obviously needed to bring this up to a rivet counter's standards, but also wanted to experiment with 'low tech' solutions along the way. Sure I could just order a parts kit, or 3d-print components I need, and sure I have access to fancy plasticard, but what if someone doesn't? How would someone go about making a higher-tier looking kit despite not having higher tier supplies?

First and most importantly, why not try replacing Plasticard of various thicknesses with... a bread bag tag! (Or in my case, a bulk food store tag.)

Note above that the Hetzer has had a nice long bath in some Simple Green, followed by a gentle scrubbing wtih a metal brush I have. Whatever primer first base-coated the tank, it was better than any I use! Normally just a toothbrush clears it off, but this one I had to scour.

The easiest place to start getting this up to needed shape, and the one that required only a pin drill (not shown), was to hollow out the exhaust tube.

Next, we fix the gun. It glues on strangely at the best of times, but as I looked to see exactly how it should go together, I also discovered it sits in a really odd spot on the vehicle anyway. "Shot Trap" immediately came to mind. For my purposes, even after gluing it in place, a casual side-on glance shows a weird terminus to the gun I could not allow for.

Luckily, some greenstuff crammed under covered the problem nicely, and adds some much-needed stability not provided by just pinning the thing in place. Also visible here was my drilling out holes for the tow cables. Curiously, while I know there should be horseshoe connectors here, I can't find a single period photo that shows any in place! I'm going to leave mine off in solidarity, and totally not because I don't want to bend modelling wire into consistent size and shape four times...

Now, on to those mudguards.

First up is measuring out the space for the mudguards, adding a bit more for 'shrinkage', and cutting them out. The Hetzer mudguards have an interesting L-shape, so those were glued in place using a scrap cut after the first pieces were removed. As always, I glue more in place than I will need, and then trim down to exact size after.

Next, once the angled pieces are dry and cut down, we glue in the square sections. The left front mudguard has a waffle pattern on it, which was accomplished by shaving down some of the pieces to very, very thin, and then spreading superglue across the entire mudguard, gluing the pieces in place, and then trimming them down when dry.

Since I have fat fingers, I was using the craft blade itself to 'stick' the pieces to, trusting that once in place  the glue bond will be stronger than the knife bond.

Once the mud guards are well and truly dry, we can use strips of the paper part of the bread tag to form the front flap of the mud guards. Especially for these, glue in more than you think you'll need, and then shave it carefully down. It's tough to guess beforehand and not worth being wrong.

Finally we can see the sloped front of the mud guards, as well as some liquid green stuff to gap-fill and assist with curving. The last step is to glue in a small piece of wood (craft wood stick is almost ideal thickness) to represent the wooden block I believe to be used as a base for the jack.

On part 2 I'll show the process for Schurzen, as well as a few other next steps.

Orcs of the Northern Steppes

 A friend is creating a skirmish game centred around various small warbands venturing into the realm between worlds for fame, fortune, or other nefarious to noble purposes. That thin excuse was enough for me to justify getting miniatures from a company I am super excited to champion, (Yedharo Models) because their models are fantastic, the company itself is lovely, and orcs that look distinctive is always a joy.

I will say if I had one minor complaint it is that the scale between the male models and females is wildly off. a 32mm "Female Champion" is 48mm, while the "Male Champion is a massive 63mm. This leads to them looking wildly out of scale with one another, which makes a mixed-gender crew more bizarre looking. Considering most of the male models don't fit on the default base size for my friend's game, I have a convoluted lore reason why the warband is entirely female.

Enough talking, pretty model time! No surprise there are lots of conversions, because it's also me...

First up is the Champion. Equipped with a two-handed axe, covered in scars, with the bright fiery red I decided to paint all the orcs with, and somewhat covered in battered orc-steel armour. The green took a lot of experimentation to get feeling right. I didn't want hulk-neon, but I also didn't want to mute the green into yellow. It's a mix of a variety of made-for-war-vehicles greens, browns, and yellows that are almost impossible to do a step-by-step for! The red is a fun mix of Vallejo Mahogany Brown, through light brown, to bleached bone with a few glazes of an orange-y red.

The metal itself was a bit of an experiment. Gunmetal washed heavily black, highlighted back up to silver with lots of scratches and chips to make it look well beaten. I debated washing it with either green (like Skyrim) or chromed blue, and in the end settled for a very subtle blue glaze on the first layer only.

It just so happened that I backed their 3d kickstarter and got an STL of the champion as well! Having two of the same would of course be silly, so for variety's sake, I turned one of them into a great-hammer wielder. Same woman, different weapon du jour. Fun question for comments; which is the 3d print and which is their mould?

The hammer itself was a fun conversion. Delicately removed the blade of the axe, and then kludged together a part of the axe with plasticard hammer head. I wanted this thing to look a more reasonable sized war hammer that still evokes something fantasy-orc sized.

Next up: any good war party needs ranged cover! Archers are terrifying, and orc-strength metal bow wielding archers are presumably doubly-so! The physics of a metal bow would be fascinating but here we are! Kudos to Yedharo for doing an astoundingly small, durable, detailed trio of archers. They're 'missing' the trademark orc boots, but hey; they're fleetfoot archers. I did a bright red feather mostly to contrast all that green and brown, but otherwise kept to the same consistent scheme. All the 'leather' bits were highlighted with a hatching-style to imply rough and durable, well-worn leather made to keep up with a lifestyle of jogging across the steppes fighting everything from wolves to raiding parties...

Also one of many perpetual kudos to Yedharo; the poses on these archers is fantastic. Where they're in a dynamic pose, there's a tactical rock to ensure base adhesion still holds. Even the archer-default shooting model is bracing against a rock, and the dynamism of the other two lends a distinct impression of 'ranger' over the stoic and staid poses of many rank-and-flank archers.

Next up is the probably least-converted miniatures short of the archers in my entire force. I also decided narratively that these warrior women have the concept of "Battle Braids" - Noteworthy deeds justify more or wilder hairschemes. The initiates are archers (safely learn combat from a distance) with short, unbraided hair. The champion has her mid-back length ponytail to highlight her prestige. By contrast we have these two. The axe/dagger woman has a half-shaved head and is working on enough length for a braid, displaying her relative 'youth', whereas the great-axe orc has a full and complex set of braids, showing off her experience. 

The Yedharo orcs (male and female... though of course mostly female) have a bit of a battle-bikini problem, so I added a putty half-skirt to the axer as well. It's still open on one side for mobility, but she's swapped the traditional loincloth with a bit more thigh protection on her 'off-side'. It's hard to tell by final highlight, but she also started from a much darker basecoat.

Next up is the front-line combatants! The Shield Trio was a fun set of conversions with various degrees of modification. First up is mace-and-shield, who is also a very new warrior lacking her braids. The shield she is equipped with is a mix of plasticard (the base layers of the shield) and green-stuff (the diamond boss and rivets). She is otherwise an un-modified warrior, merely replacing a weapon with a shield. (Strangely, her model doesn't seem to exist on their site anymore!)

Second is a spearwoman with that perpetual paperclip spear-haft, with a chunk of axe handle butchered from another model in the vein of two-hander axe from above. She too has a battle skirt rather than loincloth, but also sports some custom-puttied shoulder and thigh armour. I also puttied in a battle braid similar to the Champion's, to highlight her years of experience.

Last up is a very traditional sword-and-board lady. Her battle-braids mark her as well as a long-veteran, and she's actually not converted at all! Yedharo made her when I was in the middle of converting the rest, and I had to add her to the crew. Her shield doesn't match the other two, but who knows; different armourer, older/newer shield, or personal/familial preference?

Not technically included in the crew in most battles, but I had the minis and had to use them was the banner bearer and musician. In the concept of the skirmish raiding party, a pair of orcs standing around announcing "HERE WE ARE" doesn't make a ton of sense, but they're so cool! The absolute badassery of the banner-bearer's pose and expression, the pseudo-Warcraft vibe of the banner's shape, and her distinctive two-blade cleaver/machete marks her as an instant too-cool-to-not-paint. The hornblower is a far more 'obvious' pose, but gets kudos for the detail of the horn itself, and also the puffed-out cheeks to clearly indicate she's mid-battle-call.

I haven't decided on what symbol or markings to do on the banner. I keep waffling between more Warcraft-style symbolism, First Nations art style, or not-yet-specified "option c". Opinions welcome!

Nearly-last and OMG Most is the Orc Queen. In my warparty she's the bruiser who's extra-large, extra-armoured, and extra-badass. Rather than being an alternate raid leader, she's the heavy who gets called in when something really needs to die. She is possibly the next-to-most converted mini in the crew. Unfortunately her unconverted model lacks the boots, and has a battle-bikini rather than the back-flap. I had to give her the same boots as the rest of the party, which helps to balance out the armour on the rest of her. I love the pose, the giant greatsword (great-cleaver?) and crown wrought into her helm. It was fun to try to make her boots feel like the rest of them. I find greenstuff by default has too "soft" an edge, so this was at least three layers of putty-dry-slice-putty again. Overall I'm quite pleased with the effect of it matching the rest!

The ultimate, and hardest-to-photograph mini in my party is the Battle-Sage. This is the most extensively converted mini of the crew. Technically the base model is the greataxe-woman from before! After a haircut and shave, re-pose of her left hand, addition of skirt, pouches, cloak, hood, and staff, she's now nearly unrecognizable. In her hand she brandishes a totem of jade, and on her back is an obsidian dagger. Her staff is made up of a piece from a Sylvaneth druid attached to a paperclip coated in liquid greenstuff to make it look like a sapling pulled from the ground for exactly this purpose. Tied to it for ritual purposes is another jade token, some raven feathers, and rings of precious metals. As the women of this tribe do battle and interact with the other races, so do their Sages lead the parties and ensure the wisdom of the tribe is foremost in all dealings. Being a Battle-Sage she still wears the steppe-defeating boots, battle-bra, and groin armour, but it is augmented in a semi-cloak of the mystic. 

She was a ton of fun to convert, a challenge to paint, and I have photographed her fully three times, once and most recently after gluing her back together after a nightmare drop in which she severed her thigh and came off her base!

I truly can't stress enough how much fun the Yedharo minis line is. They do fantastic Orcs, have expanded to a full and beautiful line of dwarves, and are adding demons (though not nearly enough!) Expect to see more of theirs on this blog eventually and grab what you can of theirs!