"Normandy British Guards 1/285 pictures" Topic

Hi folks

I've started on some 6mm (mostly GHQ) British Guards for Nomandy and heres some of the vehicles I've painted so far.

I went with the Mike Starmer colour of 50/50 of Tamiya Dark Earth and XF26 Green which I added some Buff to, to allow for the smaller scale Its a very nice colour and comes out well. For the black bits I used Vallejo German Grey as Black is too strong in this scale IMHO and the tires are painted with XF50 Field blue which gives the tires a nice blueish tinge. Then I gave them a light Vallejo Stone drybrush followed by a gloss varnish, then a black oil paint wash and painted the details. Finally I gave them a light Tamiya buff spray with the airbrush over the lower parts and touched them up a bit. Some I also used a coloured wash (mixed from oil paints) and brushed that over the lower parts and wiped off any excess. From now on I'll use the wash rather than trying to spray dust on to them as it is tricky and easy to over do it.

I'm still deciding on a set of rules so the bases are different sizes and are there so I can store them in boxes with magnetic sheet. The decals are all from GHQ and are nice. I went for the Guards Armoured Division and went a bit crazy painting adding Guards Div markings, yellow weight indicators and Arms of Service. They look better in real life rather than magnified like in these pictures.

Dingo Armoured Car

Universal Carriers

Daimler Armoured Car

Recce Regt Cromwells

30 cwt Truck (not sure about the shiny bit on the roof)

15cwt Truck

Crusader Tractor (no 17pdrs yet)

Cheers
Kieran

I love the pictures in your previous post, you are one of the few people I have seen that has got the Normandy feel in the British sector right. The roads and hedges are perfect and everthing about the terrain feels authentic to me, well done and keep posting.

Thanks.

See my website for details of the boards.

I will be uplading the second part of the construction of these in a few days

6mm.wargaming.info/page350.shtml

AAR with the boards

6mm.wargaming.info/page47.shtml

Very nice – especially in 1/285!

Beautiful job! Richard

Forgive my.apparent ignorance. Did the british guards use white stars?

I think so

"Did the british guards use white stars?"

Yes, all British and Commonwealth formations, along with Free European forces under Commonwealth command, were ordered to paint the Allied Star on their vehicles.

Lovely work on the models! One very minor criticism re the choice of models: Daimler Armoured Cars and Crusader Tractors belonged to Corps units, so wouldn't carry Guards Armoured Div signs. The 2nd Household Cavalry (VIII Corps recce regiment) became semi-permanently attached to the division from September 1944 onwards, but retained their old VIII Corps markings until the end of the war. The divisional 17pdrs were either mounted in M10c or were dragged around by M14 halftracks. In the winter of 1944/45 the towed 17pdrs were discarded and the crews (with their halftracks) were used to provide infantry support to the M10cs.