From StuartL - WW2 Armour or Resin, How I Loathe Thee (41 Points)

For my second entry for the challenge, I have been working on some late war British armour. These two models are both 1/48 scale resin kits from Blitzkrieg Miniatures. Sadly to say, I am not that happy with either of them as both of these models had some faults, though the Sexton is better than the Churchill. The tracks on the Churchill have large miscasts on the inner sides, there are large blobs of resin between the wheels and other things like that. To top it off, the Churchill is covered in lots of thin parallel lines, which show up fairly clearly when you paint it. I'm guessing that it was 3D printed, because I can't think of any other way the sculptor would have achieved it. I'm not a big fan of resin in general, it's more awkward to work with the plastic or metal in my opinion, and unfortunately these models haven't changed my mind.

Anyway, enough moaning from me, you came here to see models, right?

The above is a Sexton self propelled gun of the 153rd Leicestershire Yeomanry Field Regiment R.A. The 153rd were assigned to the Guards Armoured Division and took part in Operation Market Garden among other actions. The insignia on the vehicle mark it out as the second gun in A troop, call sign 'Accident'. The decals come from a variety of Tamiya kits, though the A2 on the upper left is hand painted as Tamiya don't currently offer any artillery insignia for SPG's.

The mud splatter is from Vallejo, I used Russian Mud Diorama Effect for the first layer. The Vallejo Diorama series is textured, which I find helps to build up a thick layer of churned up dirt. On top of this I put Brown Mud Weathering Effect, which is the richer brown you can see. It's a bit too over the top for display painting, but I find it works well on the tabletop where you are looking at the model from a fair distance away.

The Churchill follows the same weathering pattern as the Sexton. The markings on the hull show (or would if the mud wasn't in the way) that this tank belongs to C Squadron, 9th Battalion Royal Tank Regiment, 31 Tank Brigade. One of the things I enjoy when painting is to try and learn more about the subject under my brush. Regimental histories can make for interesting reading and you can often get a real feel for what you are trying to recreate with paint and brush.

So, if I hate resin, why buy resin vehicles? All of my vehicles for Bolt Action are 1/48 scale. When I began playing, Warlord only offered resin vehicles, whereas my preference was for plastic. At that time Tamiya had a small range of plastic kits, so I went with them to avoid resin. (Plus Tamiya was about half the price of Warlord for me). However, while Warlord's ranges have increased dramatically and now include plastic, Tamiya only release a few kits a year. When Blitzkrieg started to do 1/48 resin kits I bit the bullet and picked up a few to fill in the gaps in my forces. Shortly after my purchase of the Churchill, Tamiya released one in plastic themselves. D'oh! Still, it gives me an excuse to have a squadron of them now. :)

Anyway, those should net me 40 points I believe as well as counting as 1 entry for the Squirrel Challenge and for What a Tanker. 

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While these vehicles may have been a struggle for you they do look terrific. I think you and GregB would have great fun spending hours raging about resin models as he is much of the same opinion as yourself regarding the high level of cleanup required for some of these models. Both of us also really prefer the 1/48 scale as well we find that they look better in relation to today's 28mm figures.

I really enjoyed the short unit histories you provided. As you say, they help place your mind (and brushes) into a frame of reference when working on these models. Great work on the weathering and I like the time and effort you spent with the decals and hand-painting the unit designations. 

Maybe there will be some Challengers who can suggest other manufacturers of 1/48 scale kits to help you fill the gaps in your collection. From my part, you might want to check out Track 48 to see if they have anything that may be of interest to you.

These two tanks will give you a base of 40 points with a bit extra added for the hand painted unit markings. Well done Stuart!