Unit Reveal - Willys MBs

Two more transports today - the venerable Willys MB Jeep from Butlers' Printed Models:

Everybody knows the Jeep. Almost 650.000 of them were used during World War 2, and wherever   US troops went, the Jeep accompanied them.

Nobody really knows why the Jeep is called "Jeep". One plausible and popular theory is that it derives from Ford's designation for the vehicle, "GP". There might be a connection to a character from the contemporary Popeye comic books!

General George Marshall, Chief of Staff during the war, called the Jeep "America's greatest contribution to modern warfare." Right from the start, the vehicle had a major impact and it was not unusual to have fleets of fifty to sixty jeeps roaming the Western desert hunting Rommel's forces.

The Jeeps served in any role imaginable, including as weapon carriers for machine guns and even as  portee with 37mm guns, there was a British Jeep Wasp armed with a flamethrower and the US used Bazooka-Jeeps with improvised armor in the Ardennes. As one war journalist put it: "It does everything. It goes everywhere. It's as faithful as a dog, as strong as a mule and as agile as a goat. It constantly carries twice what it was designed for, and still keeps on going."

Our Jeeps are painted in the same colors as all the other vehicles, and loaded up with some extra supplies. They will serve your officers well on the battlefield!

Tomorrow, we will have more Airborne soldiers ready for you.

Unit Reveal - Chevrolet 1 1⁄2-ton Truck

Today we show you the finished Chevrolet 1 1/2 ton truck from Minairons Miniatures:

This is the 1937 model of the truck, and it would have had quite a career to end up in Europe after D-Day. Nevertheless, the look of US trucks changed only in details during that time, and this model would evolve into the famous Chevrolet G-506 ​1 1⁄2-ton 4x4.

Over 160.000  Chevrolet 1 1⁄2-ton 4x4 trucks were built in 15 variants between 1940 and 1945. That sounds impressive, but in fact, it only scores the Chevy only fourth place behind the GMC CCKW (over 560.000), Dodge WC (over 255.000 ) and Studebaker US6 (over 219.000).

The most famous use for these truck is in the Red Ball Express, when 6000 trucks were used to move 12.500 tons of material per day from the Normandy beaches to the front. It ran for 83 days before the opening of Antwerp harbor significantly decreased the distance over which supplies had to be moved.

Although a venerable veteran in our army, the Chevrolet truck sports the same colors as the rest of our vehicles, and will be a welcome transport for some tired GIs or Airborne soldiers!

Unit Reveal - M3 Half-Tracks

Today we have two M3 half-tracks for our force!

Over 53.000 units of this vehicle were produced by different companies, including Diamond T  and White Motor Car Company. It had no crew beyond the driver and could transport 12 soldiers and their gear.

A little known fact:  the rack just above the track was actually designed to hold land mines!

The first of our M3s is bristling with guns, sporting not just the pintle-mounted  .50 cal machine gun in a ring mount, but alos 3 .30 cal guns in the back, covering every arc.

The first prototype of an American half-track was a modified M3 Scout Car built well before the war. In 1938, the M2 was built and tested, which then developed into the M3 that was adopted for service. It first saw combat during the Japanese invasion of the Philippines and was used until the end of the war and beyond.

Our second half-track is armed just with the ubiquitous .50 cal machine gun and has no storage to make it as different as possible from the first. Both vehicles are painted and weathered in the same way as the tanks.

Next time we will take a break from miniatures and have instead a review of another rule set you'll get with the army!

With less than 10 days to get your raffle tickets, please make sure that you make your contribution in time!

Review - JTFM/Die Waffenkammer GMC CCKW 353 "Deuce and a half"

So, here it is, the last unit review for Operation Good Cause! JTFM/Die Waffenkammer did not just give us their Jumbo Sherman, but also another truck, more precisely a GMC CCKW 353 "Deuce and a half". Over half a million of these were built between 1941 and 1945 and they became a very common sight in Western Europe. It is also the base for the famous DUKW.

As always, JTFM kits come very safely packed:

The truck itself comes as a chassis, separate wheels and optional pieces like canvas covers, seating benches and machine gun. This allows a lot of easy customization. The canvas cover for the back can also easily be kept removable.

Although the chassis is one piece the details are top notch as usual for JTFM:

In addition to the amazing truck model you also get a driver, 5 passengers and a good mix of personal items to put on your vehicle.

Again, the quality and details on those miniatures is some of the best you will ever see in resin:

Assembly is very easy due to the limit number of parts and the great quality. Everything fits as it should, and using two-component resin it will stay together forever.

I decided to build the truck as a transport, so I put in the benches in the back. But then again, you just pop on the canvas and it is a supply truck.
I think eventually I'll have to put the driver in the cabin to be able to add the machine gun, but I'll keep the passengers separate so they can be used as crew for the jeeps.

I can just repeat what I always say: JTFM/Die Waffenkammer is my go-to source for high quality resin kits. Highly recommend!

Pimp My Rides

I needed a break from painting miniatures (so many faces!) and decided to pack up the Butler's Printed Models vehicles with some leftover JTFM accessories. I hope you like it!

 I also cut out the windscreens of the Jeeps, which was quite a mission. Anyway, they look much better this way!

The HMC M8 Scott got a bunch of sand bags and other baggage, as well as a new .50 cal.

I have one more review to do, and after that we will start to reveal finished units. Exciting!

So, just to give you a new count on army composition:

70 Airborne
41 Army
25 Rangers
1 57mm ATG
1 75mm pack howitzer
2 M3 Halftracks
2 Jeeps

1 Truck
1 M5 Stuart

1 M8 Scott
3 M4A4 Sherman
1 M4A3E2 Jumbo Sherman
1 M10 Wolverine
2 M8/M20 Armored Cars
1 Bolt Action 2nd Edition book

Or in short: 136 infantry, 7 tanks, 2 armored cars, 2 guns, 5 transports and a rulebook!

Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner!

No worries, we have not forgotten about our March give-away:

The winner of the Minairons Miniatures Henschel truck is:

Christian D. from Germany!

Congratulations, we will have the model shipped to you as soon as possible.

And stay tuned, we hope to be able to announce another additional give-away very soon.

Review - Butlers' Printed Models Jeeps

Butlers' Printed Models offers an interesting service - 3D-printed vehicles in different scales and covering WW2, Cold War and Modern vehicles, including several models I haven't seen anywhere else.
Today we will look at their first contribution to our project, which is the humble jeep, or rather, two jeeps!

This is a first for me, I have never had the opportunity to examine a 3D-printed vehicle up close. I have seen plenty of pictures, and like to pretend I know a thing or two about the technology, but I never actually got my hands on the products.

Many people will say that 3D-prints are still too rough and lack the details to compete with resin and plastic kits, and, well, that is true. Nevertheless, these jeeps are making a mighty fine impression on me:

The undersides are quite rough, but that doesn't really matter, does it?

There are some easy improvements one can make, i.e. taking out the printed windows from the frames and replacing the steering wheel. I hope to find a driver for each, and I'll add some of the surplus storage from other kits.

The stepping on the hood is quite obvious, but it is extremely easy to fix.

It took me literally less than two minutes to file it down to this, and some sanding should easily finish the job.

The size of the vehicles looks spot on:

I'll do another 5 minutes of filing/sanding on each and than they are going into the painting pipeline. No doubt they will make great additions to the army!

Review - Minairons Miniatures Chevrolet 1.5 ton Truck & Give-Away!

Minairons Miniatures may not the first name that comes to mind when one thinks of WW2 Americans,they are much better known for their Spanish Civil War ranges in 28mm and 20mm.
Nevertheless, one of their products is a 1/56th scale Chevrolet 1.5 ton truck, and they were so generous to provide one of them for our project.

 

The set comes in a standard size box, with the instructions on the back.

As you can see, assembly is very straight-forward, and the kit contains only a handful of pieces.

Inside the box is a bubble wrap envelop that contains all the pieces:

The truck consists of 11 resin parts, and a couple of metal parts (mirrors, bumper, headlights).

There is zero flash on the parts, and you will have a hard time to spot the gates. Top notch casting! The resin is great, too, with the right balance of stability and elasticity. The details are impressive, as you can see below.

The few metal partsare packed separately. They are you regular white metal casts, and also manufactured to a very high standard. Some parts of them could be a bit thinner, but none of it caused any issues.

Assembly was a breeze. I used two-component glue, and the fit of the parts was excellent and I encountered no gaps worth adressing.

Here is a picture of the finished truck with a base coat of paint on, sitting next to a Warlord Games halftrack:

In summary, this is an awesome model and I can see a lot of uses - it would also look very good on the table in a civilian livery.

Minairons Miniatures also gave us one of there German Henschel trucks! That one doesn't really fit into a US force (although I wouldn't be surprise if the Hell on Wheels would have "liberated" a couple...), so we decided to use it as a bonus give-away!

Support Operation Good Cause before March 31st, and you are in the draw to win this model! All you have to do is to contribute some money, and you'll automatically be entered. And in the same way as with the main raffle, every $2 give you one lot.