Two Three Alpha Scorpion, 3 Troop, 'B' Sqn Blues and Royals

[Boldman]

Thanks for the compliments chaps! bromo - the driver is aftermarket, from Accurate Armour one of the figures from the Modern AFV Warrior set - he has just the right "bone dome" helmet for the period!

[bromo]

Cheers for the info, seeing your build has made me drag my Tamiya 1/35 Pershing out of the stash and start stroking the sprues.

[Boldman]

Here is the base I completed this evening...



The paint was still wet on the rocks which explains why they looks so shiny. This pic gives you a better idea of the lumpiness of the terrain



This was created using a base of air dough which if kept damp remains sticky and is a perfect base for the grass mat that has been spread over it and squeezed down into all the corners, nooks and crannies.

The rocks are plaster casts from rubber moulds - the ones you can get in Modelzone. There is some added grass clumbs and small stones, but most of it is the grass mat which I think is superb - its the stony steppe grass mat from here.

Now back to the Scorpion build itself...

[Jagewa]

Man that base is blooming brilliant, fantastic.

Cheers
Jim

[MerlinJones]

Great stuff going on here and that base is outstanding.

Regards,
Bruce

[bromo]

Brilliant base, going to be one stunning mini dio when its all done.

[Dazzled]

Stunning base and thanks for sharing the supplier link with us. Their products look pretty handy, particularly the "quickwheel" wheel painting aid. As someone who hates painting wheels with tyres I can feel an investment coming on

As for the rocks looking wet, it does rain a lot in the Falklands so I've been told so maybe the wet look is apprpriste

[ShaunW]

This really is a very interesting thread and there's some great modelling going on here, with some excellent attention to detail. I agree with those above, that base is very good.

[Boldman]

Thanks for the comments guys, its really nice to see so much interest

Well this was a turn up for the books, I was sent a link to a BBC documentary about the Falklands and lo and behold, there in all its glory is 23A:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... HEE#t=998s;

Not only that but in this clip you can see the Samson

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... V4#t=1704s;

and more footage of the Scorpions and Scimitars:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... fc#t=1102s;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... HEE#t=982s;

Today has been something of a marathon! Started the day with the airbrush and ended the day, well looking like this...





All I can say is thank god for Accurate Armour! There is so many of their accessories on this now... Bergan, bedrools and helmets, AFV Hanging kit, PE camo netting, carbon fibre aerials, 120mm ammo boxes, 30mm Rarden ammo boxes... (yes I know this is a Scorpion not a Scimitar, but it looks like they salvaged boxes from wherever they could!)

Lots of mud and sadly the green/black camo has been lost under a layer of black wash I applied that went a bit funny, but never mind its a dirty machine and thats what I was aiming for. However I'm not sure that I haven't overdone the mud on the roadwheels...

Fitting the tracks was entertaining! After getting all the wheels on I fitted the first track only to discover that it came up a bit tight. Bugger I thought, I'll have to add another link, so I did and then the track sagged so much the upper track sagged down onto the top of the roadwheels!! Well thats not right, so I had to take the link out again. Now that the tracks have been on for a while, the links have stretched a tiny bit so there is a small amount of sag that looks realistic I'm pleased to say!

So all thats left to do tomorrow is sort out the driver and commander figure. Should be a piece of cake (he says laughing hysterically!)

Looks like I may even finish this one in time to take it to IPMS Farnborough on Monday evening... oh hang on I've still got to sort of the bloody decals... arse! Might need to take a quick trip into the office tomorrow to use the colour laser printer...

[Dazzled]

All I can say is WOW!!

Terrific model and excellent work on progressing it so much in such a short space of time>

[splash]

That looks fantastic, I think you win hands down as best build of the GB.

Good luck at the show.

Regards
Splash

[Boldman]

and so we come to the finale of my totally enjoyable build for this GB. I present to you, Scorpion callsign 23A, 3 Troop, 'B' Sqn Blues and Royals as it appeared in May-June 1982 during the Falklands Conflict.


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Bit more mud applied, this time mixed with acrylic resin (all MiG stuff), plus some soft pencil rubbed onto edges to simulate wear and of course the figures. I've just realised looking at the photos that one of the driver's goggles is still white as the Krystal Clear I used to make the goggle lenses hasn't totally dried lol!

The only things that are still missing are the decals... there are only two of them which I'll print on the works colour laser tomorrow. The two decals are the small black square with the callsign marking and the broken red square squadron marking. The registration numbers have been overpainted (there is a difference in the colour for this but the camera can't pick it up) and unfortunately I forgot to put the Convoy distance markings on before adding all the mud - so they've obviously been totally obscured by the mud - ahem!

The commander's face doesn't show up very well in the camera which is a shame as I spent quite a bit of time on it this morning!

I'll post the two best photos in the completed gallery...

[ShaunW]

Great result, really excellent - the commander looks fine from where I'm sitting. I see you did quite a marathon to finish this model!!

[MerlinJones]

Very, very good and I, for one, am well chuffed you put the effort in.
Great work and the end result looks to be a fitting tribute.

Regards,
Bruce

[Dazzled]

Amazing result and kudos to you for putting in that marathon finish. it's certainly a model to be proud of