Well another year has flown by and it's the festive period again. Not my favourite time of year as you know but as is tradition it's time to review the year. 2017 has again been a busy one for me not least with the amount of hospital appointments I've had to attend. I'm still at work although on reduced hours due to my ongoing back problems but I don't think I'll be there this time next year, (with any bloody luck!). I've also had another medical issue this year too. Sometimes I ask myself when will it ever end?
The step kids have flown the nest as well this year and it's great to see them getting on with life and flourishing. It's also very nice to have the house to ourselves, cue reduced utility & food bills! Fangus our cat likes the peace and quiet too and has stepped in as a surrogate needy feline who rules the roost.
On the blog and modelling front it's been an absolutely brilliant year. The blog has really gone well as you will have noticed by the amount of posts I've made. With 11 builds completed so far this year I've had plenty to share and have enjoyed it immensely. Stonehenge modellers has also had a great year with the highlight as ever the IPMS Belgium show we attend in October. I'm looking forward to next year as it's their 50th anniversary so the show should be a blinder.
Next year as ever we kick off our show session with the On Track show at Folkestone in February so I'll have plenty of new builds for the tables. I've also got some interesting builds lined up for the blog next year too. With the focus for a change on modern British armour & I will be continuing to do the odd review of anything that really impresses me.
So happy Christmas to you all and thanks for following the blog, oh and here's some festive cheer for you in the form of the lovely Dita!
Well my new regulator & pressure gauge arrived yesterday so now the compressor is running as sweet as a nut. The new part is all metal, much better than the plastic original so it should last forever. I've also got more done on the M10 & have started adding some missing details and stowage.
You get a small sprue of stowage included in the kit which is nice and I've also used some spares from my Humber armoured car build last year. I've got a fair bit more stowage to add & will be using some putty to sculpt some more tarps and packs.
I've also embarked on another project for a workmate. This is totally different for me as it's been a very long time since I painted anything like this. I'm doing a scene from the Zulu wars & the battle of Isandlwana. My mate has been there and even provided me with a piece of rock from the area. Perfect for the small dio I'll build.
The figures are 75mm from Beneito miniatures and are white metal. they took some careful cleaning up before assembly and a first test spraying of primer to check for any flaws. As you can see the soldier needed a bit more attention to one of the arm joints. I'll be painting these mostly with oils so there will be quite a bit of drying time to factor in between colours and blending etc. Looking forwards to this as it's quite a challenge for me.
And this is a rough idea of the scene I will make.
Recently whilst using my compressor I've noticed that it just didn't seem to be delivering the air pressure I wanted for spraying. So after a bit of investigation I discovered that the pressure gauge was not working due to the housing basically falling off it & the pressure regulator/water trap had cracks in the plastic. I've got a revell omega compressor by the way.
This gave me a good opportunity to change the oil and give the unit a good clean. I've had this compressor for years and the only thing I've had to replace up to now was a tiny rubber washer on the tank drain plug. I did also find a lot of gunk and a disintegrated foam filter in the compressor air filter. Once all back together minus the regulator it's a lot quieter than before, possibly due to the blocked filter. A new regulator/water trap assembly is on the way. So not the end of the world but a delay in my schedule nonetheless.
I've also had another package from VMS, I'm seriously impressed with their stuff and even with postage to the UK the prices are very reasonable. This time I've got some texture sets for anti slip, acrylic pigment binders & acrylic sand and gravel freeze.
This is all part of my on going plan to do away with almost all enamel or solvent based products on my bench. As a bonus they also emailed me a voucher for a further 10% off my next order, smashing chaps that they are!
And finally another model has made it's way onto the bench, it's tamiya's 1/48th M10 which is typical tamiya quality and builds up very fast! I'm going to finish this as a British version as well.
On to the leopard now & I've finished adding some fading and streaking with oils and pin washes with acrylics & just given it a matt coat. the figure is also done & I like the contrast between the tank and his black uniform. Once the matt has cured I just have a little bit of painting to do before pigments and mud.
After another flurry of activity at the bench over the last few days I've now finished the husky. The base was a simple affair with a pallet and small load added as well as the usual carved plants and grass tufts. Whilst working on the base I used some of my new VMS pigments to add the final weathering to the model. I'm very impressed with these pigments, they are very fine and really nice to use.
I built up some mud in the wheel wells using water then stippled on pigments until any damp areas had been soaked up by the pigments. A lighter shade was used on the upper surfaces to suggest some dried dust. The last thing to do was paint up a period pepsi can and fit the figure on the model. I'm really pleased with this and have enjoyed the project immensely. So much so that I think a Cougar will be finding it's way to the stash very soon. Then I'll have the full house, grizzly, husky & cougar.
Today amongst other things I've sprayed the model in it's camo scheme. I've just blocked it in for now but will go back over the model and sharpen up the edges with tape once fully cured. I've already done this on the rear fin and lightened the blue slightly to better match my refs.
The figures have also been built up and should work well in the turret. I'm really enjoying painting this and like the funky colour combination of this scheme.
A few items have arrived on the bench over the last few days. First up the Meng PLA set arrived on Wednesday and very nice they are too. I've already started building up two of them for the ZBD-05.
Next another figure set just out from Miniart, Modern Bundeswehr tank crew & some lifecolor liquid pigments. The figures again look very nice and will work out well as I have a Leopard 2A4 & Panzerhaubitze 2000 in the stash so this set will crew both of them. The lifecolor stuff I've wanted to try out for some time.
And finally courtesy of the black Friday sales are a set of pigments from VMS. These look good and there's loads in each big pot so they should last quite a while.
