World War II Project - P107 (f)/U304 (f) 21st Pz Div Halftracks - Streaking

I was able to sit down and add some fairly extensive streaking to the halftracks. For this round I used the Ammo streaking effects; streaking grime and streaking rust. I tried to make the streaks a bit more obvious this time around by making sure that I kept the use of thinner to a minimum on the brush. I have definitely not mastered this technique yet but I am getting better at it. I think I have decided that I prefer using the Ammo Oilbrushers for this, the enamel streaking effects just seem to thin coming out of the bottle and I felt like I constantly needing to add a second "coat" to make sure there was enough paint to actually create the streak with. The tube oils work very nicely for this as well but at least two of the Abteilung tubes seemed to have completely separated in the tubes and I ended up with a huge mess on the palette which makes me lean even more towards using the Oilbrushers for just about everything that uses oil paints and supplement with tube oils.

NOTE: After looking at even more videos it seems that the best surface to do streaks on is a semi-gloss surface. A matte surface has to much texture making it difficult to work the streaking effect and a gloss surface (which is what I used on these) doesn't give the surface enough tooth for the paint to grab, which goes along way in explaining some of my frustrations with the technique. I will no better for the next batch test subjects.

World War II Project - P107 (f)/U304 (f) 21st Pz Div Halftracks - Paintwork

Its been a while since I have worked on these but its time to get them across the finish line. I did a little more research because I was getting a little confused about some of the information I was reading. I blame it on Becker. So the P107 (f) itself is actually the unarmored version, which looks a lot like a halftracked truck. The original function, for the French, was as a light artillery tractor or an engineering platform. Enter our friend Alfred Becker. The 21st Panzer Division was short on all types of armored vehicles, but especially the SdKfz 251/1 halftracks. Becker took the P107 and from them created the armored U304 (f) halftrack. It looks very similar to the SdKfz 251 and I suspect that was intentional to help avoid friendly fire as the angled armored sides would not have been easy to construct.

I'm using the Warlord Games P107 (which should be called the U304(f)) which required some fairly major "adjustments" to get it to come together properly. Warlord also makes a U304(f) with the PaK 36 (I'm not sure how I missed that). I don't know if its the same body as their P107 or a new model but I'm fairly certain it was not available when I bought my P107s which was, admittedly, a number of years ago. I have also learned that Mad Bob Miniatures is also making the U304 (f) now and that would probably be my first choice if I were to do it again or just needed more. Mad Bob makes two AA versions (armored and partially armored) the MG version and the Pak 36 version. Their castings tend to be a little on the rough side but the simplicity of construction and the price go a long way in making up for that and really there are plenty of ways to fix a rough casting.

Here are links to the previous progress on the U304 (f)s:

The Beginning
Axles
Windscreens
Machine Guns
Primer
A Spot of Paint
Decals

And with that I started off with the paint sequence (still trying to figure out the best sequence for this, so subject to change without notice). I applied a filter first to tie the colors together a bit more. I did two very thin coats which harmonized the colors a bit more than a single coat would do. Following that I did the lining. This really starts to make the vehicles standout and its definitely a bit tedious. You don't just apply an dark wash over the whole vehicle which would really hide what I was trying to do with the filter, instead I use a brush with a reasonably good tip and outline the areas, especially around raised panels, panel lines and the like. I don't use my good Kolinsky sables for this, I'm using Ammo's Dark Wash which is an enamel wash and enamels will eat a brush really fast. Which means I finally found a good use for those double ended brushes I got on a kickstarter so many years ago now. Oh and apparently I didn't really get enough gloss varnish over the decals in a couple of places and the filter really ripped them up. However, I think they look quite good after that so I didn't bother to replace them. They will help with the chipping.

After that was finished I started to fade the upper surfaces a bit. I'm trying some oil colors from Abteilung to see how those work differently from the Ammo Oilbrushers. Unfortunately I really didn't really let things dry adequately so the initial work was not what I had hoped for. Time to step away and let things dry before I try it again.

I have just started the lining on the U304 on the left, it really stands out from the one on the right even at this stage.

Lining is complete, next I'll move on to fading some of the top surfaces. If you look close you can see the disintegrated iron cross on the middle U304, the result of not applying enough gloss varnish over it.

And from the back

The step I was hoping to get to, fading using the new Abteilung oils I purchased. Best to spread these out on a piece of cardboard to absorb some of the excess oil, helps it dry faster too. I'll go back to these after the U304s have had some more time to dry.

World War II Project - Return to Normandy - The Gangs all here

There has been a lot of building and not much painting for a while now. Here is the line up for the paint shop

15cm sFH 135/1 (Sf) auf Geschutzwagen Lorraine Schlepper (f), Pak 40 auf S307 (f) both from MadBob Miniatures

Pak 40 auf S307 (f), Unic P107 Halftrack (f) [Warlord Games]

First up; a filter to help bring the colors together a bit more.

Filter applied and lining started on one of the schleppers. The filter affect is hard to see in the photos, it is subtle but the colors are a bit more unified because of it. The lining on the first schlepper may be to dark a brown might have been a better choice. Further weathering may tone it down quite a bit. I'm going to try a different wash for lining on the next one, more of an umber brown I think.

World War II Project - Return to Normandy - P107/U304(f) Halftrack - Decals

A spot of detail painting and some decals and these are ready for some weathering. For the most part the markings used on the 21st Panzer Division vehicles was pretty light, I decided to flaunt historical accuracy at this point and add the markings that I wanted which includes divisional symbols and numbers. Location of the division symbols is pure conjecture as are the numbers on the rear of the vehicle. License plate markings on the front round the whole thing out. There doesn't appear to be a spot for the license plate on the back.

World War II Project - Return to Normandy - P107/U304(f) Halftrack - Basic Camo

I know we are all on lock down but sometimes finding time to paint between all the things my wife can find for me to do is quite difficult! A little basic camo work on the U304s. I like this "leopard" pattern a lot so I decided to do these 21st Panzer vehicles in the same scheme as the others. I'm seeing a little bit of spitting from the airbrush with the brown paint, I'll have to be a little more careful in thinning the paint down a bit more.

That brings these up to about the same level as the other 21st Panzer Division vehicles I have been working on. I'll add the decals and then start the weathering work on all 7 of them. Good practice before I move back to the StuG IIIs.

World War II Project - Return to Normandy - P107/U304(f) Halftrack - MGs

Probably against my better judgement I decided to go ahead and add the extra MG positions. Realizing that this are going to be pretty fragile I pinned everything. Since quarters are pretty tight I used a #70 drill bit (and probably should have used a #71 or #72 instead) for all the holes and staples for the pins themselves. Finding staples around here is a lot easier than darn near anything else. Each staple yields four pins so they are a pretty good value when you think about it.

This is a pretty standard pinning job. I didn't realize how soft the lighter grey resin really is until I managed to shave away one of the support posts when I was cutting an "x" into the top to guide the drill bit. Fortunately I had a piece of styrene that I could substitute for it so I cut the whole thing away after my knife slipped. The only issue is the cross section is hexagonal rather than round but I doubt anyone will notice once they are on the table.

Six MG34s and three MG42s. Each halftrack will have three MGs; one in the main mount over the driving compartment, and one on either side.

With pins glued in. I'll cut these to length after I glue them to the support arms.

Glued to the support arms although not I have not trimmed down the pins yet. I also had to drill out the bottom portion of the support arm to hold it to the halftrack. This is when I discovered I should have used and even smaller bit when I blew through one of the sides when I was slightly off center.

Drilled out the holes for the support arms on the left and right side. I had already drilled out and mounted the MG shield at this point.

Pins in place on the sides

And all glued up. I suspect that they side MGs will not last long in game play, but they look cool now.

World War II Project - Return to Normandy - P107/U304(f) Halftrack - Windscreen

The next issue with Warlord's P107 is the windscreen which really doesn't fit and has a tendency to fall through into the body. What I did was take some strips of sheet styrene and glued this in behind the windscreen so it had something to rest on. The second issue is the hinges on the windscreen don't match up between the top of the hood and the windscreen. I'm just going to ignore this particular issue figuring that most people are not likely to notice after its been painted up and weathered.

Slipping in these little pieces of strip styrene turned out to be trickier than expected. There just isn't much space for my big fingers, but the concept is pretty straight forward. Once the windscreens were in place I filled the gaps with Squadron Green and smoothed everything out.

After that I pinned and glued in place the MG shield, but didn't mount the MG and added the head lights. I glued the heads to the drivers and left those loose as well for painting. 

That's what it takes to get the Warlord Games UNIC P107 up to snuff for the gaming table. I was pretty unhappy with this kit and how poorly it went together considering how expensive it is.

World War II Project - Return to Normandy - P107/U304(f) Halftrack

The UNIC P107, U304(f) in German nomenclature, is another one of the vehicles needed for the Kampfgruppe Von Luck Pint Sized Campaign from Two Fat Lardies. Warlord Games is the only manufacturer of the regular P107, they also have a command version. There is also a command version available from Mad Bob Miniatures and I really wish he had the standard version. I have been putting off assembling these for a long time at this point. There are a couple of major things wrong with the resin and metal castings that I just haven't had the patience to sit down and figure out how to fix it without making it in to a long term project.

Here are the issues with this kit:

1) The resin body definitely didn't come out of the mold cleanly and there is a lot of filing required between the upper and lower body panels on the passenger compartment. I have two different castings; one in light grey resin which really wasn't to bad and two in a lighter almost yellow grey resin which required a lot of knife and file work to make it look vaguely acceptable. Fortunately these will be tabletop miniatures so its unlikely that anyone will be talking a close look.

2) The metal windshield isn't quite big enough to fit into the opening in the body. I have contemplated rebuilding it out of sheet styrene but I'm not sure I want to go to that much work. I'm thinking of maybe adding a styrene plastic edge to it and then cutting and filing to fit. Still brooding on this one.

3) Axles; there are two long and two short axles all cast in pewter. Just trying to test fit them was a chore and the possibility of damage during a game is pretty good. I'm going to replace these with brass rod to give it some extra strength.

Once those issues are dealt with I think I can make them look pretty good on the table. I apparently need to replace all my super glue at this point, its not working on pewter to plastic or pewter to pewter. I need to see if I have some epoxy hiding someplace.

I only cut out one set of axles so I can figure out what sized brass rod I need to replace them with. At this point I also left all the MGs on the sprues to deal with later. Technically you can mount 3 MGs on the body but that looks really crowded. I think there are 5 MGs provided for each of the three models so I'm going to have some spares.