Project Panzer Lehr Part Two

So with the lists decided for Sturm uber Normandie, I set about building and painting. Two months very quickly became one month in the countdown to the tournament and not much was progressing due to a combination of a busy time at work and rediscovering Wargame Airland Battle.... Focus damn it! I had submitted my lists to the tournament organisers, so I was committed to fielding an army mostly built and painted specially for it!

With six weeks to go how was I doing? Well the three infantry platoons were all cleaned up and blue-tac'd to wooden garden plant labels, which as an aside, is the easiest way to paint up Flames of War scale infantry by a long way! Not sure why I didn't start doing it ages ago as it allows for fast and accurate painting. What else, well two Grille H's I decided I wasn't fielding were ready to go, there was my focus wandering again... I had built all the half tracks I needed though! The HQ platoon has three, four for each mounted infantry platoon and three for the mortar platoon. In addition I had a kfz 15 field car and three sd kfz 11 half track artillery tractors for the nebelwerfer or 88cm gun platoons. Ok, ok, I hear you, I know the 88s should be towed by sd kfz 7 tractors, however I was acutely aware of time and after reading around found that the Germans did end up using the 11s for towing just about everything as the war progressed and losses mounted, so i could justify it!

On to painting then, with one month to go.

Previous work meant that I only had to finish up painting one panther and an 88 gun for those units, the required kubelwagons for the nebs and mortar platoons were also good to go as were the command and spotting teams for each.The AA gun platoon was also good to go. So only 31 stands of Lehr infantry, 14 half tracks a field car and three artillery tractors to left!

For the infantry I base coated in a light grey and used two layers of black wash to create a quick and easy well contrasted paint scheme I was happy with.The Panzer Lehr had a mix of plain dark grey helmets and some with camouflaged covers, for the covers I base coated in dunklegelb and added stippled brown and green patches. 
 Now on to the half tracks! As the summer was officially upon us I set up the car port for some alfresco painting. This has the practical benefit of being able to use my airbrush without worrying about setting up and extractor and the added benefit of painting in bright natural light.

I started off with a base coat of dunklegelb than after a bit of practicing on a spare "test half track", (poor test half track, poor, poor test half tack) I got into the mind set of a bored young German Panzergrenadier given a spray gun and paint as I set about camo'in up my half tracks! I opted for the soft edged lines of colour so typical of German vehicles in Normandy. I used Vallejo chocolate brown and olive green as once airbrushed on they took shades I was after.

Overall I'm very happy with how the half tracks turned out and am looking forward to trying out more intricate schemes in the future.

To finish off the half tracks and other vehicles I painted in various details, baggage and weapons and brought out the lovely details of these miniatures (from the Plastic Soldier Company), with a pin wash of wash for German vehicles from the new-ish Ammo by Mig range. It is brilliant stuff and fairly easy to use, giving a lovely and effective finish without too much trouble. Pin washing is another new technique for me and I know I'll be using it from now on.

 With one day left to go I based up the infantry and added number decals to the panthers and half tracks using more new products, namely decal softer and decal fixative by army painter. Again these were easy to use and gave a great finish!  A final coat of matte varnish and I was done with time to spare to finish up a couple of M10 tank destroyers Al had requested to borrow for his Allied list. Thus was project Panzer Lehr completed just in time!

Coming up next - Sturm uber Normandie!