W is for Wehrmachtsmodelle

Wiking, the company best known to railway-modellers as a manufacturer of HO vehicles, and now owned by Siku, began life before the Second World War, as a maker of a larger range of small-scale (1:1250) ships and vessels in a lead-based Zamac, these ships were used as recognition and training models by the German Army, and were joined by 1:200th aircraft models, a range to which, AFV models known as the Wehrmachtsmodelle line, were added, and that's what we are looking at here.

 

Sadly not in my collection, I shot these on Mercator Trading's table about six years ago, and the group shot is taken with a Britains limber (#1726) for scale. The sample would appear to a complete air-defence unit.

 

Heavy trucks, a command/control 'office body' vehicle and GS troop-carrier/ammo-truck, both variants of the Mercedes G3A I think, but that's off a quick Google, not personal depth of knowledge! The nearer one may be a Krupp L3H?

 

Opel 'Blitz' and a command car/utility vehicle.

 

Staff car and two of the guns, which I think are the WWI forerunner of the famous eighty-eight, the 8.8 cm Flak 16, also known as an "Acht-acht" by the Germans, which became anglicised as "Ack Ack".

 

Two Krupp Protze medium trucks in the passenger configuration, one towing the searchlight and the other a generator needed for the power to the searchlight, and the equipment in the command vehicles, lights in the tentage/shelters &etc. Not the best shots, but they are very, very small, and shots at shows are always hurried!

 

By 1936, these were being made in plastic (probably the same grey plastic as the WHW's we've seen here several times, I've suggested Siku as a source for them, maybe it was Wiking?), so these metal ones are quite early, and quite rare. Ironically, they would fit-in perfectly with the Skytrex range of my childhood!

M is for Mohawk and More Military Miniatures

At the recent Sandown Park show I picked up a parcel from our roving reporter in New York, Brian Berke, which was very useful, as while I've mentioned them once or twice over the years, I've never encountered the sample while transferring things between different places, so they've remained rather absent from the Blog, but we can now tick that box - Mohawk's mini 'dimestore dreams'.

 

The one on the right is the colour of all my sample, so the pale herb-green ones, to the left, which made-up the bulk of Brian's donation were new to me, and this is a slightly larger version of the jeep we've seen before here more than once.

 

Brian also included a few marked-Lido mini's, so we can compare the two mouldings, as a full-stop to this original post, here, which compared the other three contenders for who's the pirate, who's the licensee, and who did the first version!

 

So that's six (Kleeware, Lido x2, Merit, Pyro and Mohawk) in total now, with the soft plastic Hong Kong version, Lido seem to have sanctioned themselves, toward the end!

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2018/08/l-is-for-lido-not-load-of-limp.html 

 

The lorry on the left, a sort of 1950's pantechnicon, is also a homage to other mini 'readymades' of the era (the Pyro 'artic'), and also scaled-up, while the Ambulance is a more original moulding. I know I have a tanker, to look at another day, but I think I was missing the pantechnicon, so lovely to get both colours.

 

The car is also based on another model, and while less obvious, joins the Empire-Ideal-Kleeware-Lido-Pyro (2 sculpts)-Wyandotte family of small post-war family saloons, for an eight-count! While Brian himself sent us the Carzol coloured versions of the Tank not that long ago;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2023/07/n-is-for-new-stuff-from-new-york.html

 

Lido on the left, Mohawk on the right and there's more on the cars here;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2013/03/s-is-for-siblings-take-2.html

 

Among the Lido's was a lovely bronzed version of the 'StuG III' which was new to me, and while rather washed-out by camera-flash in this shot (left-hand tank), is - in daylight - a distinctive goldish-bronze colour plastic, like some of the Captain Video figures!

 

At the same show Adrian had a few dime-store's saved for me, both of which are useful, having seen marked tractors and or guns from Banner, Bell and Merit, I'm not sure who issued this unbranded pair (left, the tractor has a 'Made in England' which I'll compare to others in the collection at a later date), but in a batch of British stuff, Kleeware, Tudor Rose or Merit (licensed or copy) are in the frame, and with the wreaker-truck a marked Kleeware copy/mould-swap of the Pyro, the clever money goes on Kleeware?

 

As with the Jeeps and 'Staff Cars', we've looked at many versions of the gun here at Small Scale World, already, but getting two new versions in one show is a feather in the collection's cap, with the unmarked green one, and a full-sized Hong Kong copy, in silver polymer, with eye-damaging ammunition!

 

There were a couple of more conventional/less contentious British 'Dime Store' AFV's from Tudor Rose, not copied by five other people, or licensed to anyone, the rather good Churchill IV, and the more dodgy armoured car.

Many thanks to Brian and Adrian, it’s all a dimestoretastic show-plunder and donations post, folks!

F is for Phoenix Fallen

Or at least I think they have? They were a staple of Military Modelling magazine (and Battle) in that late 1970-early 1980's heyday when the ads' were sometimes better than the content, or it seemed that way as you drew-up your wants lists and circled things in Biro or pencil!

 

Checks google, remembers we've had this conversation before . . . they're still going, but exclusively supporting the dolls house hobby, which, being bigger, will be more lucrative? Although the previous mention was way back when and the website (now based in Eire and incorporating Warwick Miniatures) doesn't seem to have been updated since 2018, so I suspect they are now defunct?

Phoenix Model Developments, possibly known to wargamers as Phoenix Renown (it's how I think of them), an aftermarket manufacturer better known back then for their 54mm antique furniture and ECW stuff or their 30mm ceremonial sets (we looked at the Toyal Tournement's Naval gun-race teams, last time), produced a small range of OO-gauge compatible figures, which may or may not have extended beyond these four sets?

They were also originally associated with Ravenscourt Miniatures, as Jon Attwood, who supplied most of these images, reminded me.

The figures, as mentioned in the cutting below.

 

The cutting, from a 1980's railway modelling magazine.

 

 

How they were packaged, as with the first image, and both cuttings, these are Jon's, there's not much I can add, beyond the fact that this article might help me ID some of my unknowns at some point, let's hope it helps you too!

From the archive, and the only other OO/1:76th stuff they were known for was a small range of WWII vehicles, I actually have the Kubelwagen somewhere (orange or scarlet header-card, I think?), but it has an interesting story attached to it, involving Crown Court, witnesses and other shenanigans, so we'll look at it another day and tell whole the sorry tale!

A is for "And Now For Something Completely Different"!

A title I fear we have had before at least once, but after that vintage Soviet-bloc stuff, we're going the other way entirely with this little post, we looked at the figures from "the other" Kentoys before, here, but the rest of the play-set had some stuff of interest; primarily to war-gamers and/or modellers/dioramists in the 1:72nd-scale bracket.

No matter how hard you tug your brain when doing rocket-launchers (the other month) there will always be a few who fall through the net (I found some other green ones while looking for this lot's tub!), and here another one, not cap-firing, but sprung-loaded and ready to scare some kittens!

I think the truck and bottom - green part - of the rocket's cradle started life as a fire appliance/ladder-truck, in red plastic! It's a sort of late-FROG or Scud mounted on a vehicle which would disintegrate if asked to actually launch the thing, but for a bit of battlefield tactical-support in an 'old school' game, it's ready to run!

 It's escort-vehicle is a reasonable rendition of a Panzer IV and possibly the source (for the pirates) of the twin-barrelled ethylene rack-toy effort which was kicking around the pound-shops and 99p-stores a few years ago? Colouring would need sorting, but again, when I bought this (early 2000's?) it was just a cheap, ready-to-go 1:72nd scale model - bargain!

While support/C&C crews can travel to and from the weapon store in relative comfort, with a pair of 'technicals' (Toyota and Honda I think?) in a rather fetching 'British racing-green'!

However, the budding gamer's table isn't complete until it's littered with gribbles (like Tribbles - lots of them and they get in the way - but not so furry) and the set didn't disappoint with multiples of all these; a gamut of civil riot-control barriers and preventative-signage, and military defence stores including what appears to be elephant caltrops! You got two each of the larger pieces and four each of the smaller ones.

That's it; another box ticked, Kentoys (the other one!) NO 29645 - Military Base 1:72 play set.

ARU is for Armoured Reconnaissance Unit

Just a quickie I shot at Sandown just over a year ago, now well-over-time to get it out of Picasa, and despite a tatty box - a really rather wonderful thing! Thanks to Adrian Little at Mercator Trading - as always - for these shots.

Huh? What do you think of this? It's not all of them, but therein lies a small story, as Adrian found it it had an extra jeep, but no carrier, and they were all jumbled up, so he wasn't sure it was complete, so when I took it up to the stands outside the hall, to photograph it I worked out that each vehicle's wheels fitted in slots in the lining-card. Turned-out this box didn't have the carrier (single 'rocking' axle) but did have slots for the truck.

I suppose there was a version with the carrier and/or the other missing vehicles - amphibious Jeep/DUKW (it's none too accurate for either) and twin-Bofors 'gun-truck'? But that was months later and a didn't photograph the whole one - Doh!

Box sides, the turret of the armoured-car was missing and I was going to provide a replacement, but in the end to colour-match, I just gave Adrian a whole one as swap for the Allied-star adorned jeep which was buckshee to the set.

Seen here on the right; most of the vehicles can be found with or without the thermo-printed star (exceptions so far being the staff car, gun & limber, and strangely the Churchill?) while all the vehicles which take figures (Jeep, carrier and amphi-thing) can be found with one, two or three figures glued in. The Gun truck also gets a gunner sometimes.

We looked at them separately here, eleven years ago!

and ARU is actually for

1)    Annual Report [on a] Unit
2)    Army Rugby[-football] Union

H is for Hitler - He Only Heffted One Heir-Henge

Stones? Oh never mind! Apparently there may have been some truth to the rumour (which might have let Pike of the hook, (pike, hook - I'm on a roll here!)) but I doubt it. Anyway, he may have had an un-descended testicle; there is a scientific term but I can't remember it!

Why didn't they use vacuum-cleaners? Apply the nozzle to the scrotum, switch-on, when the patient screams, switch-off, bingo - two descended testicles! Might have saved the world a whole heap of trouble...?

Atlantic, closer to 60mm than 54, and looking like he's about 21-and-three-quarters, it is the devil incarnate, Adolf Hitler, and, not half as rare as its price at toy shows would suggest! They've got the hair right though and the little 'tash is present, so he could be painted-up quite adequately by someone more skilled than me.

We have actually seen the whole set in1:76/72nd scale here so this is a real box-ticker, and there is no difference between any of these other than the rear-axle of the Volksdunekubelbuggyvargen which plugs-on (like the front one) in small-scale but slides through holders in the large-scale one.

Also there are various extra holes (in the larger scale), which I think may have been for seats which were replaced by clamps before final tooling, these are to hold Der Fuhrer when he's standing in the back ranting some racist bollocks at gullible, stupid people.

The rest of the mob, don't they look happy! Nothing like a bit of genocide to put a smile on your face; ask the Burmese, ask Bolsanaro! Note these are in a completely different colour, a sort of purple-brown to the previous chocolate of the Hitler and vehicles, I've also seen them in a ginger-brown; so they must have had at least three runs of the tool and can't be rare, just hidden!

To be fair I've seen toy-show dealers with multiples of the Hitler and Mussolini/Carabinieri band sets, the hard ones to find (in both scales) are the Mao and Stalin set, but only because they sold better, however they do turn-up in dribs and drabs in lots of colours, so again plenty made.

Yer'man again! Maybe it had descended, and got pushed back up again by the wearing of all those tight jodhpurs and tailored cavalry twills? No wonder he had a temper! They should have adopted battle-dress earlier - baggy as a sack, but at least your own sack hung free!

We wish! But to be fair - I don't think it would have solved anything? As you can see; the figure is well over the line for 1:32nd scale.

AFV is for Among my Favorite Vehicles!

We've seen these here before at Small Scale World, not least than because I quite like them, and while I did pick a few up back in the early days, they tend to carry a bit of a premium these days and can't be found for 'pennies'! I shot these after the toy soldier show at Witton back in May, and thank Adrian of Mercator Trading for letting me do so.

The low-loader, not really a tank-transporter, but given the diminutive size of the tank in the series (Tri-ang Minic's plastic 'Push-and-Go' range) manages the job and is seen here mounting the - conversely - rather large armoured car.

The clear-plastic radar dish has warped slightly, something the similar dish-shaped piece from Wells-Brimtoy also suffers from, I don't know if this was a specific problem with early styrene in 'clear' or if they were still using a celluloid base for the material, but it mars an otherwise unusual subject.

Like the crawler-tractor, this is as common in civilianised colours (bright orange and red seem commonest) as it is in military guises, and like everything on this page (except the 'Jaguar'?) was also available in an RAF blue-grey.

My absolute favorite (and not in my collection), I thought I'd posted this before; a lovely civilianised (or Dr Death's SMERSH-affiliated secret army) one in black and red but I think it may be one I downloaded from the Internet*! Everyone else was doing twin-mounts, this has 'something of the dark' (or Dalek's) about it!

*It may have been sent-in by somebody, but I have no recollection of it so I can't run with it as I've no provenance, if you sent it, let me know and I'll do it as a follow-up.

Army fire-engine! The important thing here is the ladder, so often missing or damaged; it's nice to see it complete and in a sensible colour - a lot of toy fire engines end up with bright yellow or silver ladders! I have one [now below] - sans ladder!

This seems to be a Jaguar and was new to me, whether it came in the larger military boxed-sets or was just moulded in the same plastic and sold as a civilian car I don't know, but given the numbers of all the other models in the range I've seen over the years, I'd go so far as to say this is a less common piece.

These were all in the previous posts showing my examples, although I think my breakdown-truck (wrecker) is not so well-equipped with original hook! My crawler is green - I think - and we saw the orange logging one a while back. I always think that if you swapped the turrets on the two AFV's they'd both be dramatically improved!

I found a few images of mine 'from the archive', preparing this post, the shots were saved when I shut-down my ImageShack account - a fair few years ago - and they have lost some resolution. The dark green is a late colour without the red-yellow, painted formation-sign, fore 'n' aft, which all the early ones have.

A couple more saved from the same place, compared with a 'Chinatruck' on the left and an older NFIC, itself a Pyro-Kleeware copy of the 1-ton Humber truck on the right. Without the radar (which I didn't know it was missing first time it was posted!) it still makes a useful office-body for HQ units (old school war-gaming!) and at least I know what ladder I'm looking out for now! Cheers Adrian.

BB is for Nonsense!

The big disappointment with Oxford's die-cast range is the fact that they seem to have decided to pander to the worst of the combat-wombat fantasists usually found at Beltring or Wheels and Tracks at What's-it Hop Farm by providing a totally fictional series of Berlin Brigade urban camouflage schemes for various models in their Land Rover family.

They. Did. Not. Get. Urban. Camouflage. Ever! Bit of a rant today!

Worse, I think all three of the ones I'm looking at here weren't even service-vehicles in the brigade, so they are doubly fictional.

It's a long time ago. But I don't remember 1-Ton's in Berlin, at all. The Wombat platoon had old stripped-down series threes with a false floor to stow the Wombat's ramps, while the mortar platoon had series threes (replaced by defenders in 1986, maybe '87) with trailers for the base-plates. There was a Milan platoon, but I seem to recall they man-packed everywhere, broken down to one tube per infantry company? They ('Milan') had had Forward Control's in Tidworth though . . . I think!

The other uses for One-ton FC's was as 105mm Gun-tractors - we didn't have 105's in Berlin - and as ambulances, but in Berlin we had the old 'camper-van' overhanging-bodied' 3-series (as modelled by Corgi!), or - uniquely in the British Army - Unimogs.

So this vehicle wasn't in Berlin, and if it had been, it wouldn't have got the urban camouflage, which was confined to the larger AFV's - The Chieftains had it (for summer 1986?), the FV432 and 432B (Raden turret)'s had it first (they were wearing it for the Royal Hampshire's 'trooping of the colours' as senior battalion on parade for the Queen's Birthday Parade (QBP), so '84'ish?) and the Armoured squadron's Chieftain ARV's, Ferrets and FV438RE's had it, but our Fox's (bigger than a Ferret and armoured) were green and black.

This example also has far too much grey and not enough chocolate and white for the BB urban camouflage scheme's ratios which were closer to 40/30/30, but that’s going to be the obvious trouble with an invented paint-job!

This is comical, not only were 'lightweights' not service vehicles in Berlin Brigade, the camouflage on this has been copied from a combat-wombat's own civilianised Q-plate vehicle (Q568 GFV) which can be found on the internet; his mate had the most ridiculous aerials on a series-3 LWB and they spent their time worrying sheep between petrol-head events like those mentioned at the start!

Lightweights were considered 'special' vehicles, and while I seem to recall one FFR per company-HQ in Tidworth, it just wasn't a vehicle that the Berlin Brigade ever qualified for, there being no air-portability requirement for units written-off the strength of NATO, due to their low survivability 'forecast' in the event of the shit really hitting the fan!

Again, Land Rovers didn't get urban scheme, again; too much grey, not enough of the other two colours, but also, the series-3 safari's we had tended to window bodies with heavy, full-length (over-hanging) roof-racks (the CO had one I think), and while we did take delivery of the new 110 Defenders while I was there (ahead of both UKLF and BAOR), they were all green and black, and the hard-tops were fibre-glass pull-on's, windowed and all-green. But time's a bitch; and of the three, this is the one I'm not so sure of - as a service vehicle - and it could have arrived in the brigade after I left, but it didn't have the camouflage.

Again there's a combat-wombat one (soft-top Series-3) wearing military plates at shows (85 KB 80), but he's got both colours wrong, the chocolate being instead a camel-shit orange and the dark-grey; a pale ducks-egg colour!

He uses the scheme on the original experimental vehicle (01 GF 98?)'s scheme (from 1982?) which was placed on an old series-3 long before my time in the city, and which was only cleared for use with colour modifications, on the larger AFV's.

The thing is, the AFV's had a war-function of providing fire-support as rolling or emplaced 'bunkers' for ad-hoc battle-groups carrying out whatever task/s they had been given, within (holding actions) or through (breakout-infiltration-harassment) what was to be assumed would be a shattered or damaged city - if they had survived whatever indicated the beginning of hostilities! As such, they were painted to effectively disappear into the rubble.

Minutes 2.18 and 3.10 - 432's only, 1984 or '85

The soft-skins (and Fox) were primarily tasked with normal, day-to-day, 'peace-time' transport, patrolling the wire (foxes) and regular exercising 'down the zone' and therefore carried the standard NATO/UKLF scheme of broad black regions over an mid-olive drab-green (called 'Deep Bronze Green). The Fox'es were eventually painted 'urban' as well, but not until '88 or later.

They were not expected to survive the opening of hostilities, or be much use in the confines of rubble-strewn city streets, and would have been unlikely to have had time to be covered in a non-existing series of schemes. There was supposed to be a secondary function of the schemes - which were 'identikit' for each vehicle type - that of confusing the Russians into the exact numbers of armoured vehicles we had.

1987 - Chieftains now done - minute 13.30 - Striped-down brand-new

Defenders still NATO standard. 

Foxes (briefly visible extreme right at one point)

still NATO too - I'm in there somewhere!

However - given that A) each vehicle had a unique number-plate clearly visible, B) 'Soxmis' (the Soviet Military Mission) were allowed to roam freely over our sector; looking and counting, and C) the Russians knew exactly how many of what AFV-types had gone up and down the 'corridor' rail-lines over the previous 30-odd years - it was an excuse for playing with paint; which only the ruperts at MOD could come-up with!

And why don't the model manufacturers produce Bedford's or other larger soft-skins in the BB scheme? It's lazy, easy, pandering to vicarious combat-wombats! And if you've bought one - give it to your 'Nottingham' space-marines, for that is where it belongs . . . La-la Land!

La-la Land Rover's!

A is for Auto-Accident!

Not for the first time some Germans* back the losing side in an argument! Lucky it's not football or they'd be 'all over' us!

*No war-warmongering Austro-Hungarians were hurt in the making of this vignette.

F is for 'First Line'

Continuing our look at the output of Ukraine Collectable Paper Soldiers, we arrive at the 'First Line' officers of the Ukrainian Border Guard (UBG). You may wonder why all the forces looked at so far in these posts have been UBG rather than 'regular' army?

I think the answer is twofold; firstly Ukraine Collectable has specialised in the border guards as a specific range, and secondly; the regular army wasn't a big part of the Ukrainian forces prior to the current emergency.

When the Soviet Union broke-up, it was a worry to governments in the '"West"' that unknown, untried, untested 'regimes' such as Ukraine were ending-up in possession of nuclear weapons, especially easy to use, tracked and wheeled delivery systems (battlefield/tactical devises) like FROG's, SCUD's and their descendents - SS20 &etc.

So an agreement was arrived at, whereby if the country agreed to give-up their nuclear force, they would be guaranteed defence against attack by a superior force. Among the list of signatories to that 'deal' were - us (the UK), The Americans and . . . err . . .  Russia!

The deal never had a clause as to what to do if one of the signatories WAS the superior force and it was a promise - clearly - no one kept!

"The United States of America, the Russian Federation, and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland,

Welcoming the accession of Ukraine to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons as non-nuclear-weapon State,

Taking into account the commitment of Ukraine to eliminate all nuclear weapons from its territory within a specified period of time,

Noting the changes in the world-wide security situation, including the end of the Cold War, which have brought about conditions for deep reductions in nuclear forces.

Confirm the following:

1. The Russian Federation, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the United States of America reaffirm their commitment to Ukraine, in accordance with the principles of the Final Act of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, to respect the independence and sovereignty and the existing borders of Ukraine." . . . &etc, ad nauseum for five-more 'meaningful' paragraphs!

 

It's no good The Trumpton threatening not to defend NATO allies (who haven't spent 'enough' (?) on their defence), when America has shown itself incapable of defending a cast-iron guarantee - we already know they can't be counted-on anymore!

It's also one of the reasons why the Brexiteers are such stupid, parochial, idiots, believing that we still hold any 'place' in the eyes of the world, such that we will be at the front of any queues for trade deals - our name is currently mud, in the rest of EU-Europe, in Eastern Europe, in the Middle East and further afield.

That's why watching Boris and May-means-someday-possibly being busy this week posturing to become the 51st State of England & Wales makes me puke - while the other two (Scotland and now, even, Ulster) creep ever closer to independence - the independence the Ukrainians hold so dear.

This particular set also has sand-bag sangers and checkpoint signage along with a pretty standard-equipped, law-enforcement, 4x4 type vehicle.

Clearly with such a 'set in stone' guarantee of future security (!) and a corrupt pro-Moscow president who would rather spend the money on a 'Versailles' palace (complete with zoo and pirate-ship - I kid you not!) than on a standing military, the border guards assumed a greater role as the army suffered chronic underfunding and leadership 'on the make' and have now become the identifiable face of Ukrainian national defence.

Thanks again to Mark Sergeyev for the above  images.

However because Putin is fundamentally a bully, he hesitated after he got the Crimean peninsula, and using the breathing-space, Ukraine has been busy developing new AFV's (as we have seen and will see again in the next part of these posts), and beefing-up the military, if he moves now, he [Putin] will get a very bloody nose.

Not for the first time this year, I'll say there's a war coming, and it came much closer on Tuesday last. There are too many of us, lots of us are very stupid; leaders as well as 'worker-bees', and we are doing too much damage to the planet.

Mother-nature has two weapons in her armoury for culling us, one is pestilence, which - as we have seen recently with Ebola, SARs and Zika - she has found to be less than efficacious these days, the other is to use our penchant for violence against our fellow man, for the utter destruction of the stranger, 'the other', to her advantage and she is stalking the lands of man, sowing the seeds of disharmony as I type.