Seventh Painting Challenge Entry - 20mm Bundeswehr Panzer Grenadiers

1980s West German Panzer Grenadiers from the Bundeswehr; 20mm sculpts from Elhiem and S&S Models

My Analogue-Hobbies-Painting-Challenge-motivated 20mm insanity continues.  My last entry switched from WW2 into the "Cold-War-Goes-Hot" setting, and this entry follows along - a platoon of Bundeswehr Panzer Grenadiers.  There are three eight-man sections, a commanding officer, a MILAN guided anti-tank missile team along with a pair of Marder 1A3 infantry fighting vehicles.

That's my driveway last week - 70km/h wind gusts driving the snow through the streets.  Seriously, winter can go f*ck itself

It is winter in the Canadian Prairies, and though I know I am so fortunate to call Canada home, Winnipeg in January can be a bit of a sh*t bomb as Army Group Winter encloses the city in a vice-like grip. Case in point last week a small snow storm swept through (one that none of the clowns at Enviro-guess Canada managed to warn anyone about, but anyway).  The bright side of this weather is that I can really fire up my internal painting machine, put some hockey games on TV, and get a lot of stuff done - not quite as fast as some of the leading Challenge participants like Tamsin or Millsy, but still a pretty good pace.

NATO's front lines

As with the last submission, the infantry figures are all from Elhiem Figures while the vehicles are from S&S Models.  The painting/modeling experience is consistent with the last entry as well. The Elhiem sculpts have some soft details and a manic resistance to primer, and yet I just love them as their overall appearance is quite pleasing, and their proportions are excellent.  The S&S vehicles are suspiciously undersized and plagued with numerous small casting flaws that significantly lower the overall quality of the model.

Platoon commander on a hex shaped base

I did not have a precise TO&E for a West German Panzer Grenadier platoon, so I suspect the sections are understrength.  Each one has an MG3 gunner and a fellow carrying a modern panzerfaust 44 AT launcher.  The balance are armed with G3 assault rifles.  And obviously with only two Marder IFVs, it will be a little harder for this lot to get around. Spare BMW will have to be "appropriated"!

The MG3 sure looks a lot like the MG42 from WW2

The Marder is a very cool-looking IFV - the turret sports a 20mm cannon that would provide some scary fire support in a firefight.  I like the sci-fi look of the turret.  Later models of the Marder also included a mount for a MILAN missile launcher as well.  It's too bad the S&S quality is poor, but black paint covers a lot of issues, so that's what I tried to do.  Some decals would be great too, but I couldn't find any 20mm scale modern West German decal sheets, and so I did the crosses free-hand.  The results were very poor, but serviceable.

A view of the Marder 1A3s

Much "Cold-War-Goes-Hot" interest here in North America centers (understandably enough) around the US forces and encounters of M1 Abrams tanks and clouds of T-72s and T-80s in the Fulda Gap.  I love tank battles (a lot - my favourite gaming encounter), but am much more interested in gaming the other NATO countries, and the West Germans in particular - I have quite a bit of West German stuff for Modern Spearhead.

MILAN team lurking

A potent anti-tank system; the MILAN crew set from Elhiem is excellent

In the 80's the West Germans would obviously have been at the very forefront of any resistance to a Warsaw Pact attack. While NATO would have tried to trade space for time in the face of the large Warsaw Pact shock armies driving across the North German plain and through the Fulda Gap, I expect these fellows would have resisted ferociously, motivated as only those who fight with their own homes and families at their backs can be.  I see that as a rich context for scenarios, particularly skirmish encounters.

Assortment of helmets - some plain, some with scrim

For example, perhaps they are disobeying orders a little bit, holding out longer than directed outside a small village to allow more time for evacuation behind them - they will have already lost one or two of their IFVs, and the strength of their sections is diminished, but as long as they have the MILAN launcher and missiles to use, they will dig deep to slow the advancing Red Army.  Should make a fitting opponent for the Motor Rifles I completed in my last entry.

The free-hand crosses turned out poorly - I wish I could find some 20mm decals

I still have a fair chunk of 20mm stuff to paint, but I am feeling a bit of an urge to switch over to sci-fi, so we'll see what comes next for the Challenge. In the meantime I hope we can set up a scrap sometime soon with these fellows at the Fawcett Avenue gaming table.

Sixth Painting Challenge Entry - 20mm Warsaw Pact Motor Rifle Platoon

Warsaw Pact era Soviet Motor Rifle Platoon in BTR-80 APCs

My newly discovered mania for 20mm figures continues but it has jumped to another period, from WW2 to another favourite setting of mine - the fictional "cold-war-gone-hot" of the 1980s.  Interest in this period with the Fawcett Avenue Conscripts goes back to around 2007 or so - I can't remember exactly how it started, but once Eureka released a line of 28mm Soviet troops wearing MOPP gear, it seemed suddenly Dallas and I were in an arms race. To keep it simple, I just blame Dallas. Today we have clouds of 28mm stuff, including a bunch of helicopters, and we enjoy rolling it out for local gaming events. Mike F jumped in as well - be sure to check out his awesome 28mm, 6mm and 15mm stuff elsewhere on the blog.

A Soviet motor rifle section - figures from Elhiem, vehicles from S&S Models

Anyway, my hobby interest in this setting spread rapidly to 6mm (for Modern Spearhead), and because I dabble constantly, I started to play the setting in even more scales, from 15mm down to 3mm. I even have painted 10mm and 40mm.  The last one I haven't tried was 20mm - and since I was diving into this with WW2, I figured why not modern too?

My mania in one picture - from left: 3mm modern Soviets from Oddzial Ozmy, 6mm modern Soviets from GHQ, 10mm modern Soviets from Minifigs, 15mm modern Russian from Eureka, 20mm modern Soviet from Elhiem, 28m modern Soviet from Mongrel Miniatures, and a 40mm modern Russian from the Honourable Lead Boiler Suit Company

Another view of the group photo - all scales accounted for :)

So this entry includes a 20mm scale Warsaw Pact-era Soviet Motor Rifle platoon.  The infantry figures are 20mm sculpts from Elhiem Figures, and the vehicles are (supposedly) 20mm-size BTR-80 APCs from S&S Models. The colour palette for these figures is almost identical to the WW2 Russian troops, so I was able to bear down and get this little points grenade finished during my holidays last week.

Ready to fight NATO lackeys

The platoon has three 8-man sections and a small command group.  Each section contains one trooper with a PK-LMG, an RPK-74, an RPG-7 anti-tank launcher, and the balance armed with AK-74 assault rifles.  The commander has a radio man and a trooper carrying an SA-7 shoulder-launched surface-to-air missile unit.

Officer with a radio man and a trooper carrying an SA-7 SAM

Elhiem's Cold War era Russian line is admirably complete, with a wide selection of troops wearing body armour, so most of the regular infantrymen are from that section of their line.  I love the look of the body armour and it really fits the setting to my mind.  One of the things I respect most about this Elhiem range is just how complete it is - most modern collections (or those north of 10mm in size) are very limited, often lacking in key areas, with strange mismatched assortments of figures (Eureka has a lot of this).

NCO on a square base for quick recognition during the game

The Elhiem sculpts themselves are an uneven quality.  Some of them have very soft details.  And the castings themselves are heroically resistant to primer.  But its a strange thing - in spite of the many challenges and limitations to these sculpts, these figures have an excellent overall appearance - I think that is the magic of the sculptor! The Elhiem poses are nice, the figures are not too heavy or too chunky, and there is a great selection. Even with their challenges, I strongly recommend them.

Elhiem figures...they have their challenges, but I really like them

I can't say the same for S&S Models.  My first concern is the size of the model - these are allegedly 1/72 scale models, but it just doesn't add up.

Actual BTR-80 - cramped, yes, but still larger than the men - unlike the S&S Models

Soviet-designed APCs and IFVs are notorious for cramped conditions, but this is still supposed to carry 10 men (including the crew) and the MG in the turret is supposed to be a heavy calibre 14.5mm weapon. Looking at it beside these 20mm figures, there is just no way this is a 1/72 model.  Do you see a whole section of these guys crowding into that vehicle?  This looks to me more like a 1/87 scale model - the effect is similar to seeing 1/56 scale vehicle models beside 28mm figures.

I rusted out the exhausts...make them look a little used

Beyond the size of the vehicles, there are serious quality issues with these models as well.  It is not readily apparent in the photos, but there are numerous flaws and small bubbles all over the vehicles.  Many small details - like vision ports, hatches or headlights, are missing or have holes due to small bubbles that formed during casting. One fender area on one of the vehicles was particularly weak. And at 12 GBP per model (which works out to about $20 Canadian as our stupid third-world-petro-dollar plummets in value, and that's before shipping) let's just say I'm way less than impressed - and this was a surprise as I had always heard good things about S&S.

Note the gaps and holes over the front wheel, and the missing headlight in the same area - an example of the shoddy quality of the S&S casts

The BTRs received a very basic green paint scheme and some mild weathering, mostly on the exhaust, which I can imagine rusting out in almost no time.  The armour on these vehicles is almost non-existent by modern combat standards, enough to deflect light bullets and shrapnel and little else.  I don't think these would have lasted long enough to look worn out!

We must protect our revolution...

Units like these would have filled the armoured and motor rifle divisions from the Group of Soviet Forces in Germany, and would have been at the forefront of any assault toward the Rhine by the Warsaw Pact.  Thankfully for the world this remained a fictional event - but it is great fun to game.  I understand the Too Fat Lardies are working on a modern variant of their Chain of Command Rules - I hope to try that with these fellows!

Up next will be some opponents finished off for these fellows.  Gotta love 20mm!