"French Tanks Works in Progress" Topic

The saga of the 15mm tanks of unknown origin continues. No one's really certain of the manufacture of these, but Geoff at QRF and Allen think they might be 15 to 20-year-old Yucca figures. As these have been sitting around for a while and I'm not planning on gaming Early War, I figured it'd be a good project to paint these up. It's not quite making a silk purse out of a sow's ear, but a little paint goes a long way on these.

The FCMs started out looking like this: picture

And the Char B1s looked like this: picture

Here's an example of each joined by a Somua S-35 picture

These have just been block painted and given a wash of GW Devlan Mud (what the heck is a "devlan"?) As soon as I can get some decals, I'll apply more weathering and seal with a clear flat coat.

Battlefront may produce FCMs at some time, but they're likely low priority given only 100 or so were produced. They're the equivalent of the Hotchkiss H-35 or Renault R35 as far as armament, and probably on a par in armor. They weren't necessarily faster, but their diesel engine (unique in French service) allowed them to travel farther.

Wyatt

There's no FCM-36 in Battlefront's Blitzkrieg book. Maybe a PDF will come out later.

The FCM-36 could use a black wash though.

Dang! They're looking a whole lot better now!

As a side note, isn't a devian closely related to a chupacabra?

WarHighlander – yeah, I'm aware that there aren't any FCMs so that's why I said that one could just use them in lieu of the other light tanks (not sure if the Renault or Hotchkiss differ in any ratings). As it stands, these'd be a different, yet accurate, change from the norm.

I used the Devlan Mud for the wash because black tends to be a bit too harsh. The Devlan Mud also does a good job of muting the colors a bit so it doesn't look parade-fresh. And, now that I look at the picture, I realize that I didn't have the FCM washed in the photo. Still, I may take your advice and try some of my old GW black ink to see if it sets into the engine grilles a bit better.

Thanks for the compliment, HighlandCatFrog.

Wyatt

Hey Wyatt,

What colors did you use on the tanks? Are they Vallejos? Speak up , man! Inquiring minds want to know!

Nice job on the tanks. Do you know who made them?

Nice job

I used Devian Mud on a sci-fi tank which had a desert yellow base and I must say I was not happy with it – looks much better with the darker colours on your French tanks

Devian is a Swedish metal band!

After posting my own question about what colors work best about two weeks ago, I got a very helpful response. Here's what I've been using along with some notes:

All tanks were primed using Rustoleum's "Hunt Club Green" satin (semi-gloss), which at $3.50 USD a can does a very good job, as well as being more affordable than the Army Painter color. It's a little "brighter" (more blue) than I really wanted, but that gets muted when one applies a good wash. I overpainted most of it with the very similar Vallejo and Reaper colors, but that was a personal choice.

FCM-36: Vallejo Green Ochre 914 base, & Luftwaffe Cam. Green 823 for blotches. Reaper Muddy Olive would also work for the spots. Tracks are Gun Metal or Iron I used an Adiken paint for this, but just about anything will do. The depictions of some of these tanks show that the upper portion of the turret has either a sky blue or light green area – perhaps meant to break up the silhouette. I first used some 25-year-old Polly S Avocado, but switched to Reaper Olive as it looked better (combination of color and coverage).

Somua: Vallejo Cam. Green for the most part. Reaper's Muddy Olive for the upper surfaces. There was more of a difference between the two greens before I gave it the wash so if I was doing more tanks, I'd mix in a little Reaper Olive to lighten it up. The brown is Vallejo 846 Mahogany Sand and the borders between colors was done with a Sharpie permanent marker.

Char B: Vallejo Cam. Green, Mahogany Sand and Reaper Olive (it looks to be the closest to the Seafoam Green/Light Avocado color used in the French schemes. The Ochre is actually a 2 to 1 mix of Reaper Olive with Vallejo Green Ochre in this case. I'm using Minitracks/Trackstory's illustrations for reference and they're showing a greener ochre on these tanks than what is used elsewhere. Again, the colors were outlined with a permanent marker.

There seems to be a recent line of thought that says that the areas usually depicted as being ochre on some French tanks could possibly be the Seafoam Green color instead.

If you go with the ochre, you can also use the German DunkelGelb or one of the yellower versions of SandGelb. The FCMs ochre is pretty close to the color I created mixing Tamiya Dark Yellow and Desert Yellow in a 2-to-1 ratio.

Wyatt

Aviation Painting Guides?