I have been on a bit of a pause on working on models for a couple of reasons. Currently I have the 3 U104s on the workbench waiting to be finished, I just received a package from Last Cavalry with the painting supplies that I was waiting for (in particular pigment fixer) and I can now wrap those up.
I have been deciding on which tank battalion I want to decal the four M4s on my desk for and I have decided that the 70th Tank Battalion is the winner, it checks all the boxes and there are more pictures available than the vast majority of the other separate tank battalions. So now the research begins on the correct markings for the 70th "Strike Swiftly" tank battalion (fortunately I have been taking notes already). I also want to experiment with some "sand" texture on the turrets of the M4A3/76 and the M4A1/76 as well as on the hull of the M4A1/76 and the M32B1. The M4A3 could be done with a glue technique but I need something else for the texture on the two resin kits. I'm also waiting for some Foundry markings from Archer to arrive which, of course, have been backordered. If you need modeling supplies I highly recommend Last Cavalry (lastcavalry.com), I made the order on Sunday afternoon and it arrived Wednesday. His website is much easier to navigate the Michigan Toy Soldier which is my normal go to for modeling supplies. However, I couldn't log into my account there and was so frustrated with it that I went looking for another source and found Last Cavalry.
Which brings us back to the M32B1 ARV. While I have managed to dig up a dozen or so photos out of the three Steven Zaloga books I have been waiting on one more; "Allied-Axis; The Photo Journal of the Second World War" issue #4. I picked up a copy through eBay for $10 from Canada. The series is long out of print (although David Doyle books still has a number of the issues in stock) although there seem to be plenty of used copies available on eBay. This issue has photos of some of my other favorite vehicles (M18 Hellcat, German 8-Rad ACs)so it was a no brainer for me. The most important piece was the photo spread of a couple of M32B1 ARVs in Czechoslovakia near the end of the war. Of the 15 photos in the spread I had only seen one. There are shots from all angles, including a couple of closeups, with the crane fully deployed and all the cables clearly visible. It confirms my suspicions about the interaction between the arms on the hook block and the cables when fully deployed, they should essentially be parallel to each other. There are two M32B1s in the spread with the other one in travel mode so you can see how the crews stored things on their vehicles. This one is a gold mine if you are building an M32B1 ARV in any scale. I think the key element that will help make this model stand out are wire rope clips that are clearly shown in the pictures.
There are also spreads on the British version; Sherman (ARV) Mk I and Sherman (ARV) Mk II which show off some interesting differences in philosophy of the ARVs.
At this point in time I finally feel like I can move forward with almost all the modeling projects including a return to the StuG trio +1.
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