Monday, July 26, 2010

Return to days of old

You may have noticed me posting pics of the odd tank every now and then , I am collecting the Deagostini Combats Tanks Collection which consists of over 100 1/72 scale model armoured fighting vehicles dating from WW2 onwards.
I joined the collections'forum and have been amazed by some of the static models that the members build , back when I was a kid my favourite hobby was to save up $2.50 and go to Ettalong newsagents or the toy store at Woy Woy and buy a good old Airfix model.
I built models for years and some of the last ones I built in the 70's were Star Wars ones.
Then I discovered girls and surfing , a couple of weeks back I was in the toy store at Erina and decided to buy a few kits and have a crack at it again.
I had already been working on a large scale remote control tank , I have 2 of these and they are a large scale at 1/24.
This project is the conversion of a VS Tanks Abrams M1A2 to and Australian M1A1 AIM , I decided to build Australian armour as there are few if any ready to build examples on the market and I enjoy the research that goes with it.
The Abrams required removal of some pieces and addition of some sfter market accessories , I am still waiting on some red kangaroo decals for it before I finish painting the model , here's a pic of it so far

abra2

Next project was the making of a diorama for the 1/72 scale German " Maus " , I bought the Maus as a pre made model ( Easymodels ) and painted it up , as all my other small scale tanks are in plastic display cases I decided to whack this one in one as well , found some at the model shop for a reasonable price.
As the case was rather largish I decided to make a diorama and bought a packet of tiny German ( Italeri Anti Tank Crews ) soldiers to go on it as well.
The Maus was the largest tank built during WW2 and 2 of them were made , both broke down before they got into battle and were blown up by their crews , the Russians nicked one and it is on display at the Kubinka Tanks Museum

mos2

Back to the Aussie theme my next project was the Crusader Mk 11 , these tanks were used by the Aussies in WW2 in North Africa ,so it is painted up in desert colours , it is a 1/72 scale kit from Hasegawa and was fun to build , I had to modify the turret a bit as it was a Mk III.
I plan on doing another diorama for this and have ordered an Stuart Light Tank to accompany it as there is plenty room.

crusader3

This weekends project was the Matilda Mk 11 ( 1/72 Italeri ) as used by the Aussies in New Guinea in WW2 , again I had to modify it a bit to represent the type we had and I am quite happy with the result , this one will go in a diorama as well and I have something cool in mind this time.

tilda4

Next project will be the ASLAV-25 , this is a current vehicle and I think I will do the version that was used early on in Iraq and it is in a bigger scale of 1/35 which will give my poor old eyes a break

as2

I was thinking of doing another blog just for the modelling , can I be arsed tho ?

While on tanks , my story called Grandads Tank helped out Mike from the USA who owns a shell casing similar to mine

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