Rapid Fire! in 20mm. Filling gaps in WW2 (part 7)

 

This batch of models plugs some holes in the OBs of several WW2 periods and armies. Retroaranda is a nice Spanish 3d on-line shop that I found while searching for the Vercors Gotha Go 242. They are still using PLA for their prints but dividing these kits into many parts which helps reducing lines and excess plastic. Besides, the kits arrive with all parts clean which makes them easy to build. There are also three kits from First to Fight, namely the funny little cutter KM12, a large 150mm sFH18 and the artillery crew. 

My Ariete division was very short of command vehicles and this lovely SPA Dovunque 35 radio vehicle comes in that sense. 

The kit has no exterior radio system and this one has to be scratch built. This  photo saved me from making too many mistakes on the roof of this radio vehicle. 

On the background of this photo you can see the two biggest inventions of the last decades,  cyanoacrylate and liquid plastic glue, far ahead from Covid19 vaccine and AI. What would be of us all without them? 

Some tracks, stairs and EverGreen plastics were used to improve the model. 

The Ford V3000 radio vehicle was built from 1941-on and will be helpful particularly for the Eastern Front. Only some stowage was added on the roof. The model also brings another antenna for the travelling position. 

This is another Japanese Type 89 Go. The other one I have is from MiniGeneral, made from a different file and slighly bigger. 

This artillery group - one 155mm sFH18  and a 105mm leFH16 -  is the one necessary for the bombardment of Saint-Nizier-du-Moucherotte, 13-15 June 1944 as part of the artillery of the 157th reserve infantry division. I already had several of these artillery pieces but in different colors and environments so a late war summer style group was necessary for the Vercors.

The artillery group who bombarded the Maquis position at St-Nizier made it from a distance of over 5 km and up to an height of over 1000 meters in relation to Grenoble. These stills are taken from the 2nd part of Le Maquis du Vercors- Juin 1944, La Bataille de St-Nizier. 

For the full video see 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTRyf8seItk

and don´t forget part 1 and 3. 

In this still from the 2nd part of series you can see the St-Nizier heights in relation to the Grenoble valley.

And this is  the today sports park from were the German artillery bombed the Maquis. 

In this other screenshot of the 2nd part of the YouTube Le Maquis du Vercors- Juin 1944, La Bataille de St-Nizier you can see the placement of this artillery group who bombarded the Maquis position at St-Nizier from a distance of over 5 km and up to an height of over 1000 meters in relation to Grenoble and this is the one I´m portraying in RF! terms.  

I don´t have any information on the usage of these Gebirgshaubitze 40 105mm howitzers by the 157 RID as the division had several battalions of Gebirgsjäger. Even so I built these two that can be used elsewhere. 

The crew is FtF with heads from Airfix Afrika korps. There is also one Simon Soldier figure (the one with Zeltbahn) and a Revell conversion that previously was arming a grenade and now is pulling the gun string. 

Other crew for the guns came from FtF and all of them can be used from the artillery box. The seated figures need to bend the legs with heat in order to fit the narrow places on the Feldkanone 16. 

There are some figures with 20/37mm shells for AA guns that were converted to carry the big 150mm shells. That is easy as the FtF plastic is quite easy to carve. 

First to Fight offers the MK12 in 3d printed resin. I don´t know if this one will ever be used in a wargame but the magazine that comes along with the model has some nice stories (recently they are already in english side by side with polish) that can be used as the basis of several wargames. The figures are Revell and Hat WW1 Germans as the Polish sailors had the WW1 Stahlhelm for land combat and even the armored body of the German Stormtroopers, not used here. 

Finally for something wrong. What I asked was one more LVT-A4 in order to have a pair of them to support the Marine landings in the late war period. The designer by seeing the "4" on the vehicle´s name thought that the turret of the M8 75mm HMC fitted the late LVT-4 when in fact the very different LVT-2 was its basis. The "4" just means the 4th way to place guns on the LVT-2 Amtrac. So I got something wrong that needed to be used somewhere. The idea for this conversion came from the following photo: 

One of the few different models from the LVT-4 basic was an ambulance model deprived from its guns and painted with (lots) of red crosses. The canvas cover in the model was made from hardened tissue paper with cyanoacrylate in order to cover the big hole of the turret. This photo sometimes looks a bit fake as the smaller red crosses look strange but I read that "Sphinx" shows in two forms around the Walcheren period, one armed and another - this one - already without its guns. Probably the same vehicle used in two different ways. 

Next: More Napoleonics 

Rapid Fire! in 20mm, Vercors 1944 (part 4) - The Gotha Go 242s at Vassieux

 

On the 23-24 July 1944, three Gotha Go 242 landed on the Vercors plateau at Vassieux in support of the DFS 230 that had already landed. They could carry 20 fully armed men and support weapons, about the double capacity of the DFS 230. One of them brought a 20mm AA gun which reinforced Schäffer´s men. 

What has been puzzling me is the rest of the number "2" that you can see at the tail, while the "019" at the front is clearly seen at the only known photo of one of the Vassieux Gothas, present in the Osprey book on Vercors 1944. This photo also shows up in French videos on the subject and most probably in other publications.

I tried everything, all forms of AI , books and the rest of internet and nothing. There is a very dark and blurry shadow over the number (and probaly the Balkreuz) so its very difficult to decipher the rest of the numbers and letters. Like that the number "2" was left alone until one day someone can solve the mistery. Sometimes I think that I need to go to the Vercors Resistance museum for some clarifications. Maybe when I get retired... but will I remember I need that by then? :) 

The camouflage was made of Vallejo Russian Infantry Green and darkened medium blue giving very aproximate colors to the originals. These Gothas also got different types of camouflage, this one being one of the most usual. The B/W photo of the Vassieux Gotha shows some strange blotches at the front but they may be due to the poor quality of the photo.  

The model is a Retroaranda 3d printed PLA model from Spain. The models are quite nice as Retroaranda solves the problematic PLA plastic by dividing and cleaning around 30 parts, making this model very easy to put together and with no extra plastic around. The only problem is that, probably due to the cleaning process, you need a bit over 20 days for the parcel to arrive from a neighboring country. In the end you get a nice model 2/3 times cheaper that the one from Italeri or IBG. 

Next: a video on the USMC in WW2