15mm WWII and Modern Odds and Ends

 All,

Closing out the '15mm stuff I've been working on,' here are some odds and ends that I thought were cool enough to share but probably each of them didn't warrant a post of their own.  Almost all of this stuff was purchased ready to go; the only work I did in here was the Peter Pig troops, which I painted and based myself.

Here's the whole mess, most of which came through purchases off Ebay and the TMP Marketplace.

Another look.  Let's start with the actual work I did.

I was wanting some Soviet casualty bases, so I headed over to Brookhurst Hobbies and got me some troops from Peter Pig.  I painted up and based these three stands of casualty figures.

Another look.

A couple bases of guys surrendering.

Another look.

And some dismounted tank crew members.

Then I got a good deal on Ebay for these monsters, Soviet T-28s.  I need to find a crew figure to put on that far-left tank, and maybe some decals.

Another look.

I bought a big 'grab-bag' of different terrain pieces off Ebay, and one of the pieces was this T-34/85 tank turret bunker.  Not sure what the hell I'll do with it, but it does look cool, mounted on a cork base.

Got a good deal on Ebay on these six Valentines for my Brits in North Africa.  Need to find a crew figure for that bottom right tank, and maybe some decals, too.

Another look.

"Pilot to bombardier, pilot to bombardier.  Oh wait, sorry, wrong channel."

I picked up a few British halftracks for Northwest Europe, could use some decals.

A closeup.

Again.

And one more, this one with a .50-cal HMG.  I believe the Brits removed the .50-cals, but I'm lazy and will probably leave it on...

Some more vehicle goodness from my buddy AJ, a platoon of four Panzer Mk IIIs, with 3.7cm guns.

Another look.

And a platoon of Marder Is from AJ, with their 4.7cm guns.

Another look.

And one more.  He's an artist.

And then a platoon of five Stug-IIIGs, with long 7.5cm but no sideskirts, and still in panzer grey (I've already got Stug IIIDs with short 7.5cm, and Stug IIIHs with long 7.5cm and sideskirts in dunkelgelb/camo).

A closer look.

And another.

More from the terrain grab bag, and sorry, not sure why it's so fuzzy.

More terrain grab bag objective markers.

This one even has a doggie on watch.

Some bunkers.  I don't know who makes the two grassy ones, but pretty sure the concrete ones are from Battlefront.  They're all pretty small, and none of them have lift-off roofs to put troops in.  I get that the smaller dimensions are realistic, but I also like to have the ability to put actual troops inside...

The back side of the two grassy bunkers.

Walls, fountains, monument, and buildings from the terrain grab bag.

This house...

And the clock tower (both Battlefront models) were from the terrain grab bag.

A better look at the concrete bunkers.  You can also see the dust clouds I got from AJ, which I believe are Battlefront models.

And their backsides.

Two 1/144 scale AV-8B Harriers, which I got for ridiculously cheap on Ebay.  I think they're Battlefront (Team Yankee) models, but with some other flight stands.

Great camo paintjobs on these things.

Here's a look at some of the dust clouds trailing behind some Valentines making tracks.

Oops, here's a few more I picked up since I originally drafted this post!  How 'bout a couple Elefants and a couple Jacksons?

Now I can play Norm's cool scenario, "Follow the Elefants" at Kursk.

Let's take a look at the M-36 Jacksons first, a couple open-topped tank destroyers mounting 90mm guns on an M-10 GMC chassis.

Fore and aft.  Got them off of Ebay from my buddy Art (tons of stuff has come from him now), very nicely painted.

And a closeup of one of the crews.  Very cool.

And the two Elefants, super massive monster tank destroyers with battleship thick armor and the legendary 8.8cm gun.  Very nicely painted, again off Ebay, just wish there were more decals on them.

Another look.

And a peek at the tank commander.

So, some cool stuff I wanted to share, and I hope it makes sense why I shared them this way.  Lots of stuff to use, with some of it needing a little bit of work to make it perfect.  This should tie up all the loose ends for my 15mm stuff but, knowing myself, I'm probably working on more as we speak...

V/R,
Jack

Cold War-Era US Infantry

 All

Modern (Cold War) US Infantry

As usual, I didn't really need these (given all the modern US troops I already have), but when I spotted two platoons, painted and based, for $30, I just couldn't pass them up.  These are two of the Battlefront Tam Yankee US Marine platoons, so they've got not just the rifle and Dragon stands, they've also got M-60 machine guns (my first love ;) ), SMAWs, and 60mm mortars.

Once again I found the paintjobs to be decent, but not quite what I was looking for, and the basing was pretty nasty: the poor dude had gotten basing sand all over the guys, and then made some pretty strange decisions with regards to what weapons went on the different bases.  For example, the pack is actually set up so that you put a standard four-man fireteam consisting of a grenadier, automatic rifleman, and two riflemen, on each base, but this guy didn't understand that, so you'd pick up a base and it would have three SAWs and a rifleman on it, and the next one would have three grenadiers and a rifleman on it, etc...  Well, that wasn't going to do for me, so I pried them all off their bases, scraped the basing sand off them, glued them on new bases, and completely repainted them, opting to do half in desert tricolors and half in woodland camo.  It all worked out ;)

The desert force, consisting of a CO, XO, two M-60 MG teams, two SMAW teams, two M-47 Dragon teams, a 60mm mortar team, and nine rifle stands (fireteams).

Same goes for the temperate troops.

A closeup of the desert command stand.  I probably got too much brown on the cammies, making them look more like "Chocolate Chips" than "Tricolors," and after much deliberation I decided to give them the yellow 'desert jungle' boots, rather than black boots (that a lot of Marines deployed to Desert Storm and Somalia with).

Backside of the command stand, showing the RTO's PRC-77.

Let's look at some rifle stands!  As you see here, each stand has a Corporal (Fireteam Leader) has an M-203, a Lance Corporal (Automatic Rifleman) with an M-249 SAW, a PFC (Assistant Gunner) with an M-16A2, and a Private (Scout) with an M-16A2.  One of the two riflemen in each team is carrying or firing an M-72 LAW.

Actually, one rifle stand in each force has one stand that is missing a SAW as each pack apparently only came with 8 SAWs for some reason...

More rifle stands.

The two SMAW stands.

The 60mm mortar stand.  I saw it done in combat, but I absolutely hate the fact the tube is being 'free-handed' (rather then properly set upon its bipod and baseplate) nonetheless... 

The two Dragon teams, one seated firing and one strapped across his back and on the move.

The two 'Pig' teams.  Heavy metal, baby, Guns Up!

Having said that, I started on the M-60E3, and clearly these are M-60A1s ;)

A look at the temperate force's Skipper.

Again.  Pretty happy with how my woodland camo turned out.

A look at the rifle teams.

Another.  

The sharp of eye and sharper of mind will recall that I actually bought a pack of the Team Yankee US Mech Platoon troops, painted them up, and sold them, several years ago.  Yup, that's me, that's how I roll.  As I said, Wargaming in an Exceedingly Poor Manner...

The SMAWs, getting to see a different angle on them.

Opposite angle on the 60mm mortar team.

And the Dragon teams.

We actually still had Dragons when I joined the Corps, but I never got to fire one as they were quickly phased out not long after I got to the Fleet.  They weren't replaced until the Javelins came out years later, so we didn't have any real AT capability at company level, it was all at battalion level (where the TOWs were part of Weapons Company).  Sure, we had AT-4s, which had replaced the LAWs, but...

The machine gun teams.

So badly would I love to see castings of the three-man MG teams set up the way we were taught: all three men are prone, loader on the left, right arm over the gunner, gunner in the middle (with the gun on a tripod), and team leader on the right, with left arm over the gunner, all armed with pistols (I forget what year they started issuing service rifles to machine gunners).