I have been working on getting a fleet of tanks for the What a Tanker game from the Too Fat Lardies company. It’s a great game and has been a true hit with my gaming club, the Mass Pikemen. I have been working on building up a flexible group of tanks, and so far I am up to 71 tanks in 15mm/1:100 scale – not including ones needing assembly and painting.
My sources have been eBay, hobby stores, and Facebook. If I waited to paint them all, I would never do another project, so finding some mostly painted resin (and reasonably priced) models from Wargame Models in Ohio has helped shorten the process. Mostly I just washed and varnished the ones I have gotten from WMIO.
One group acquisition was from another source on eBay – it was a resin Soviet KV-1 platoon consisting of 5 KV-1’s heavy tanks, 2 T-26 light tanks, 2 BA-64 armored cars, and 2 trucks. I do not know the manufacturer. They had been given some sort of dark brown coating with splashes of lighter brown. They color-wise did not look particularly like Soviet tanks from 1941. This platoon is the main subject of this blog post.
It was necessary to use a Sharpie to mark one end of the 1/8″ magnets such that I inserted them in the correct alignment (I did not want the turrets “blowing off” prematurely!). I glued the magnets into the holes with Gorilla Glue.
I needed to find a way to paint the figures without damaging the paint, and tanks were new to me. I decided to take advantage of the magnets on the turrets here. I used small nails inserted into styrofoam blocks (the kind used for flower crafts). For the hulls, I masked the tracks for secondary painting, and such that I could hold them safely.
I airbrushed/primed the figures with Vallejo “Surface Primer – Russian Green”.
I then gave the figures an airbrushed base coat with a thinned coat of Vallejo Panzer Series “Camouflage Olive Green”.
These looked too drab, and not very Soviet green looking. I moved on to adding Vallejo Mecha Color “Green” with a light airbrushing. Next, I used a brush to dry brush Vallejo Mecha Color “Light Green” on the figures. I was able to then give the figures an appropriate light green by using Citadel “Biel-Tan Green” as a shade. It worked!
At this point, I removed the masking and painted the tracks. I then wanted to add some mud, dirt, and dust with pigments. I used several Vallejo pigments and binders (all listed at the end of this post). These models are small, (about 3″ long by 1½” wide by 1¾” high so I wanted to give enough weathering without overwhelming them.
This was my first attempt at painting any WWII tank models. I think I can do better, but early war Soviet tanks are pretty simple, as they had not usually added any markings. It will not be my last, and I am hoping that I get better with more tries. This project also is my first submission for Azazel’s November Community painting challenge – Mechanical November ’18. If you have not checked out his blog, it’s worth a look. Also, my next few posts will showcase tanks, so I hope you enjoy.
Now for some eye candy!
I hope that you enjoyed this post. Please let me know your thoughts and feedback below in the comments section.
Thanks for looking!
PAINTS, INKS, GLAZES, WASHES, AND FLOCKING USED:
- Citadel “Imperium Primer”
- Vallejo “Surface Primer – Russian Green”
- Vallejo “Flow Improver”
- Vallejo “Airbrush Thinner”
- Testors “Universal Acrylic Thinner”
- Vallejo Panzer Series “Camouflage Olive Green”
- Vallejo Mecha Color “Green”
- Vallejo Mecha Color “Light Green”
- Citadel “Biel-Tan Green” (shade)
- Citadel “Athonian Camoshade” (shade)
- Vallejo “Surface Primer – Black”
- Elmer’s White Glue
- Vallejo “Pigment Binder”
- Vallejo “Burnt Umber” (pigment)
- Vallejo “Industrial Splash Mud” (weathering)
- Vallejo “Light Sienna” (pigment)
- Vallejo “Light Slate Grey” (pigment)
- Gorilla Glue
- Vallejo Mecha Varnish “Matt Varnish”
Thanks again for looking and for your feedback!
Mark A. Morin 
They’ve come up well man. So small! I like the contrast between the turrets and hulls you’ve achieved.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I tried to show less mud on the turrets, as that is what is expected. I have been in M60A3’s and driven them, and the mud rarely got high. I did use some light pigments as dust, but they didn’t really show on the pics. They are small!
LikeLiked by 2 people
Did you fire the gun too?????
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yes I fired 5 shots on an M60A1 at Fort Knox during my cadet summer training. To this day, I can say without exception that a tank gun firing is the loudest thing I have ever heard.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Haha I can imagine. The loudest thing I’ve fired is a 12 gauge shotgun.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Well I’ve never done a tank at all regardless of scale but if I ever do and they come out looking like these on my first attempt I would be delighted. Great stuff Mark.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I would love to see you do a tank in your dioramas! Thanks Dave!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Maybe one day Mark. If I went for anything it would be Oddballs Sherman.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Very nice work here, Mark. The BA-64s are interesting – I didn’t know they existed, but was wondering why you had SdKfz 221s in your Soviet force for a few minutes there until Dr.Google came to my aid. And KV-1s, eh? Veeeery Interesting…. Are they 15mm or 20mm?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks Azazel. WAT does not have armored cars in the rules, but I used them to an extent which I will cover in my next post. These are 15mm, at least they are consistent with the rest of my stuff size-wise.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Nice! I haven’t tried painting anything at this scale before, but I’m impressed with what you did there. I have played What a Tanker though, 28mm scale with 40k tanks – great fun 🙂
LikeLiked by 2 people
Sounds interesting. Did you just use historical tank profiles and do something like change cm to inches, or did it take more conversion?
LikeLiked by 2 people
Yeah, we just selected an existing tank profile based on what the model looked like (this was an Old Hammer event, so there were a lot of weird & wonderful conversions), and then just converted everything to inches 🙂
LikeLiked by 2 people
Thanks Alex! It works very well at 15mm. Allows for a lot of maneuvering on the tabletop.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Tanks looking great. I haven’t had a look at the rules mentioned. I have a pile of 15mm Flames of War tanks… I might give them a look.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks it’s perfect for FoW scale tanks. The game hooked me.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I just love KV-1s and really like your muddy platoon! Funnily enough, I found the Vallejo Russian Green primer too dark, but the camouflage green spot on (similar to Humbrol olive green I’ve used in the past) but your highlighting and washing has come out well. And like yourself, I don’t usually put much in the way of markings on earlier Russian WW2 tanks! Looking forward to seeing your next batch, whatever they might be!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks JNV. I agree on the primer, but with successive lighter greens and especially the washes I am indeed happy with. I will be posting their first battle next, and then a huge surprise for tank lovers!
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’d be happy with them! Ooh! Surprises! Tanks! I can’t contain me excitement here! 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
Superb- Glad to see you are obey the Soviet maxim of quantity has a quality all of its own. That said your painting methods to good by itself. You’ll not be short of game options for sure.
Cheers,
Pete.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks Pete – but…must paint more….tanks!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Amazing Mark ! you do get a lot done mate ,makes me feel really slack ! ,nice little critters love the paint jobs.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks pat!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Nice job with the paint and weathering, those KV-1 models that you found on Ebay are from Wargames Models as well. They a good inexpensive models and are the only way that I was able to afford the huge numbers of tanks that an early WW2 Russian army demands back when we were playing Flames of War. Have fun playing WaT!
You might want to look at these house rules; https://spqvi.com/2018/11/05/house-rules-what-a-tanker/ They smooth out play and get rid of the frustrating situation of getting into a perfect firing position and rolling no “Fire” dice, or being unable to move for lack of “Move” dice
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks on the kind words about the KV-1s, it’s appreciated! I did look at your rules, and thanks very much for sharing them. You obviously thought a lot about this. I guess I’d push back on your rules changes as I personally like the frustration factor- it adds a fog of war aspect to what basically is a beer and pretzels game. In combat, stuff happens that frustrates soldiers. Mechanical issues, human issues, etc. So, some days you’re the bug, some days the windshield. It also raises some drama, which is fun too. Yes,that may ruin your plans, but in War, plans can fail even if perfectly executed. I get your point on the ramming, which did occur on the Eastern front by the Soviets a lot, but without momentum it would not work that well, so is it 3 dice or 2? I take your point but ii also think that 3 makes that a bit rarer. So I would say kudos on the thought and mods, and if they work for you, great!
I have been using the game at our club meetings, and keeping it simple and fun is the goal, so the dashboards I use make the game very easy to pick up. Adding additional charts for me would significantly detract from that simplicity. With that said, I have added the 2 BA-64’s as I described in the last Mass Pikemen post, as well as trucks, but they were mostly cosmetic in that the trucks just moved. The BA-64’s just could force tanks to button up at half range, unless they rolled double 6’s.
LikeLike
71 tanks? You never do anything half arsed, do you? Looking forward to follow along with interest as I have been toying with WW2 Eastern Front for a long while. I am thinking of using Battlegroup rules, but still not sure about 15mm vs 20mm. I like your application of mud and dust, need to achieve something similar, as I usually paint things “too clean”.
LikeLike