**Repost from the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge Blog, just because I want to keep track of this project on our own blog. If you've seen it already please click "back"**
Well I have GregB to thank once again for further hobby escalation... several years ago, encouraged by Mr. B, I built up a small force of Egyptians for the Yom Kippur War. Greg had Israelis and we had a few good games, including a game at PrairieCon that made it into the pages of Wargames Illustrated, no less! But sadly Greg now lives in Toronto with his IDF and it occurred to me I should maybe paint an Opfor to face my Egyptians, so here we are!I was able to get a box of Israeli Magach-6s (aka US M60 Pattons with some choice modifications) from Meeplemart in Toronto. The Battlefront site recommended that the smoke dischargers be eliminated from the turret fronts as the Magach-6 didn't have 'em. That was pretty easy.I don't have a ton of spare 15mm stowage so the turrets just got a couple jerrycans glued on. I have a bunch of resin stowage coming from abroad to stick onto the BF Israeli M113s I'm building next.Painting was straightforward - AK Green-Grey washed with Agrax Earthshade for that lived-in look, tracks Mechanicus Standard Grey washed Nuln Oil, and some sponge chipping with Vallejo German Camo Black-Brown. A light dusty drybrush of Rakarth Flesh around the wheels and lower hull and it's done. Decals are Battlefront of course. Bone-dome helmets needed a little carving to look right for '73 as the supplied crew have more modern headgear with bulges for the headsets. Uniform and helmet were painted Vallejo Khaki. Groundwork is Steel Legion Drab, drybrushed Khaki, with static grass and tufts to suit. 
Continuing the new "Israelis in '73" project, here is a box of Battlefront M113s. These are literally the stock M113s the BF sell for every other army, with some Israeli crew and a set of Israeli decals stuck in the box. Now I'm not complaining, these are super little models, but they do need some work to be Israeli Zeldas - and I did some of that work, but not all of it.
The defining feature of the Israeli M113 in period had to be the gypsy-caravan look with tons of stowage. Battlefront used to sell specific "Israeli stowage" packs but these aren't available anywhere in their current sales chaos. I also couldn't find any on eBay or the other usual places. So I had to order some 15mm stowage from Redog. Pretty good stuff but took a long time to get here.
I stuck a LOT of stowage on these vehicles but did not build the racks that the Israelis equipped these vehicles with. I figured this was OK given the small scale.
HOWEVER... what I didn't do was scratch-build the special exhaust pipes that the Israelis equipped their M113s with. You'd see it in the picture here - they extended from the exhaust on the right top of the vehicle, and down the side. Try as I might I haven't been able to determine the exact rationale for the modification. I presume that the exhaust mod was done to address the problem of the exhaust being right in front of the "family hatch" on the top - but Conscript Hugh had extensive experience riding in M113s in the '80s and didn't recall any excessive exhaust coming into the troop compartment. Maybe in the Middle East the heat combined with exhaust presented a particular problem. Anyway the special BF stowage kits came with modded exhausts and I would have loved to have those bits. Oh well. 
For crew I used the dudes supplied in the box. You get four guys with MGs firing from the hatch, two guys yelling, and a couple sets of crews for more modern M113 weapons, AT missiles or something - not relevant for 1973. It was kinda tricky to get these figures settled in the hatch, but I ended up putting a blob of greenstuff on the vehicle floor and sticking the models' feet into that.
I think the models look pretty cool with crew hanging out of the hatch.
I did build one without any crew though. For this one I cut up some spare MGs and stuck them to the vehicle deck.
The BF decal set is great, and includes a bunch of the Israeli vehicle ID tags, one of which is seen just above the chevron.I really like these models. Now I have to get to the IDF infantry which I ordered from Khurasan. I picked them up from Pembina last week along with some relevant reading material - "Fire & Steel" (a history of the IDF's 7th Armoured Brigade) and "Israeli Tank Battles - Yom Kippur to Lebanon" both by Samuel M. Katz. I've got the first platoon of IDF infantry based and primed and they should go up fast. They'd better, because I'm hoping to run a YKW game at PrairieCon at the end of May. Shalom!
2 comments:
Pedantic note - M-60 / Magach-6 were very much in a minority in 1973; they were very much outnumbered by M-48 which the IDF had upgraded to M48A3 standard. The M-60 still had the US MG cupola and did not yet have the multiple MGs shown; the M-48 had the Urdan cupola and a .50 MG but the AA mg above the main gun was a later (1982) adaption.
M113 were outnumbered by M-3 halftracks.
A good source is Frank Chadwick "Guns of October".
Neil
Well at least you didn't slag me for the lack of proper exhausts on the M113s :-)
Anyway I wrote to Mr. Chadwick inquiring about his book ("Armies of October" not "Guns") and he told me that the book didn't really cover the minutiae of modifications the Israelis made to the equipment acquired from foreign governments. So if you can recommend a book or source for that information it would be gratefully received. I'd been relying on the Internet and in particular, the Battlefront website, but this detailed info has been hard to find.
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