and here is the sprue shot.
The flash glare is obscuring the Eduard etch set and you can also see the Accurate Armour resin tracks, although I doubt if I'll be using all of them - I might just use enough to reduce the tension in the rubber tracks that come with the kit. I've actually got the Fruimodel metal tracks as well but they are reserved for later this year for the up-armoured Scimitar I'm planning ;) On order from Accurate Armour is a set of crew which ought to have the correct helmets for this period (well at least I think they do from looking a the photos, click here).
Now for the subject... 4 Scorpions, 4 Scimitars and a Samson went to the Falklands from 3 and 4 Troop, 'B' Sqn, The Blues and Royals. I've spent some time trying to identify which particular vehicles they were, which has not been easy considering the paucity of photos from this time! Thankfully the Osprey Scorpion book by Chris Foss and Simon Dunstan has some cracking nuggets of information and a couple of very useful photos such as this one linked to Google Books.
The caption of that photo give the most perfect information, this is Two Three Alpha. here is a larger version of that photo that I found elsewhere
In addition I found another photo which also looks like it is 23A:
You can see from this photo that the front registration numbers have been painted over and the bridging plate also painted over. Now further along in the Osprey book is a drawing taken from the famous photo of a Scimitar concealed with camo nets and tarp:
What is really interesting about the drawling is it identifies the Scimitar as two three charlie and shows that it had the rear registration still visible along with the convoy stripes, plus the 'B' Squadron insignia in red on the turret and the movement information codes CHALK FAW RAW AUP stenciled on the turret. The Blues and Royals regimental insignia has also been painted over.
Interestingly I found another photo of 23C:
which shows the sort of layout at the rear, which matches what you can see on 23A in the previous picture.
So the only piece of information I'm missing is the registration number of the Scorpion 23A... Anyone got any idea where I might find that out?
Apart from that I'm raring to go... well once I've finished the Aliens Dropship, oh and the 1:32 Revell Hawker Hunter that I am painting to look like the Miss Demeanour display bird... Hmm, I hope to be able to START this before the end of May...
