Making motor launches...

 I've been building a couple of basic motor launches; hulls under construction with 3mm thick card for bottom and thin card for sides...

Nearly done, built to suit 20mm and 28mm figs, along with my basic scribble plan and card templates used

Roof added, check that 20mm figs on bases look about right

On the left side of the above pic are a couple of scratch built small guns for my next build - a Harbour Defence Motor Launch (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harbour_Defence_Motor_Launch); it won't be fully detailed model but just a game piece so will truncate the length and keep the essential features

naval ship build - ready for action ...

Finished the naval ship....

A good coat of battleship grey and some faded brown for the decks. I used a black marker pen to add the portholes, and a fine black felt tipped pen to indicate the door hinges/handle.

I used the U-Boat crew in the pictures below, look good enough for the ship too

the ship is generic and loosely based on a German M35 class minesweeper and could be used for any navy of the period.

A little note ....

A quick note on the way the blog is going.

• This blog is renamed 'Somewhere in France' to cover the period of the german occupation of France, including the potential invasion of Britain.
• All WW2 modelling and new painted items will be shown on this blog with appropriate labels.  
• Amy story lines and game reports for raids on french targets by British forces and French resistance actions will be on this blog.
• All the story lines and game reports for home guard and german raids on Britain and the potential invasion will be on the sister blog - 'Somewhere in England'. 

A little review ....

I had a good old rummage through my WW2 stuff. I decided to focus on my current gaming interest period of the early war on the western front using 20mm (25mm) figures, covering

• Britain's Home front - home guard, some regulars, downed german air crew, potential invasion
• French Occupation and Resistance - germans, french resistance fighters, downed british air crew, british raids on coastal and special targets.
• German potential invasion of Britain 1940/41.

For the above I have most of what I need but will be adding new items, first up will be some extra british civilian characters.

Additionally for the future I'll be adding to my collection to allow for games involving platoon actions between German and Allied forces on the western front from 1944 onwards - this is currently planned to use 28mm figures.

German Staff Car

an old toy car - in reasonable condition - added a driver so it can be used as a german staff car; something for the resistance to shoot at maybe

Early war project (1940) ...

I've started a little joint project with my regular gaming opponent set in 1940  - you can find it here http://dorset1940.blogspot.co.uk/

I'll probably show all new additions and modelling work here; the items being used as part of the story line posts/games on the dorset1940 blog.

I've popped a link to it on the top right hand of this blog as well.

Home Guard inspiration ...

A nice little map of Walmington-On-Sea,

Sourced from http://number1platoon.tripod.com/id10.html; I'll be using this as inspiration for setting out my seaside town.

A quick update

Have made some progress on opposition for the finished germans, have been getting stuff ready to paint
- based some civilians (mix of Caesar and Dapol)
- in the middle of basing some resistance fighters (Caeser)
- have de-sprued some Italeri british paratroops

plenty to do ....

Painting begins ....

Aha ! things have arrived on the painting table, a section of infantry (mostly Italeri with a couple of Valiant) and some recce bits and bobs (armoured car and k'wagon from Airfix)

While waiting for the primer to dry, I tried out a basing scheme for vehicles, some cardboard with doll's house grass on top, plus a bit of brown painted dabbed on. Seen here with an armoured car ..

Activity ?

A small burst of activity on this project has followed the purchase of the new vehicles, I've now based all the german and british infantry, they're now sitting patiently waiting in their boxes to be painted.

 The Puma and the lorries from the last post, have been repainted and weathered ...

 

so slow ...

Apologies for the lack of posting, I'm afraid this project is languishing in the doldrums - too distracted by my 18C world at the moment.

Infantry Started

I have now 'desprued' a box of Valiant 1/72 plastic Germans and British infanrty, all the figures have been assembled - quite a fiddly process but I am now converted to the benefits of these figures.

I've based all the germans ready for painting and have started some trial figures.

For Starters ....

Target period for my gaming is western front 1944+; scale 1/72 or 1/76. For tanks I've been collecting up oddments from car boots and toy&train fairs and buying some items from shops and online orders.

I've currently got about 12 shermans which form the basis of a british tank regiment; for the germans I have the following 1 tiger, 2 PzIVs, 1 Elefant.

I've got some Valiant plastic infantry figures to assemble and paint, one box of britsih and one of germans.

Ruleset used will be Rapid Fire. I've had a trial game using Rapid Fire for Rookies; quite an enjoyable game it was too.

I have other wargame interests: 18C, ECW and Dark Ages (saxons/vikings). So progress on this project may be a bit slow.