"Airfix Guardsman" Topic

I added an Airfix Guardsman to my collection recently. Painted by a chap in budapest, he really looks the part.

You can see some pictures here.

link

Very nice, I had that model back when I was a teenager, but didn't know how to paint him as well as you!

Nicely done!

The oldest amongst us will remember the Airfix Guardsman in 1/12 scale…..he was really crudely done but wore a bearskin and carried a MkIV Lee Enfield!

Those 1/12 figures come up quite well:
link

Did not come up like that in my hands. (I forgot the Household Cavalry trumpeter. Never did buy him.) I had several infantry tho' and one wore the boy scout's hat to become a US soldier WWI (much use of putty)

One of their range even became Che Guevara and he was almost totally putty. Napoleon in 1/12 was poor. The upscaled version of their French Guard Grenadier I never did finish…he was meant to become a G a Cheval.

The 1/32 range was brilliant. We all recall the Scots Grey, Polish Lancer, the Cuirassier (huge figure), maybe even the British Hussar and Household Cavalryman. But the foot figures? Rifleman, French Infantry, British Guardsman as here. Huge conversion potential as multipart and easily swapped. My attic still has an ECW Musketeer

Okay, sorry to be so nit-picky, but I pulled out my book "1815 The Armies at Waterloo" by Ugo Pericoli and it shows a plate with all three of the Guards company uniforms. The centre company did not wear the "wings" on their shoulders, but instead had tufted epaulets. So your figure is either a light or grenadier. So either a green or white plume for him. Only officers and sergeants wore the gold cords on their shakos, so, being an OR, his cords should be white. The cockade at the base of the plume should be black with either a gold grenade in the centre, if grenadier or a white hunting horn if light.

Well, while we're picking nits, the Coldstream Guards didn't adopt a red plume till circa 1831 when they were given the bearskin. Worn on the right! Still, if he's a flanker…

I know stuff! I do! <8^)

I have to say this is what I love about this forum…the knowledge of detail…and I am deadly serious.

You can take it or leave it. But it is there.

"Aye, but there's the rub" (Macbeth, a play and a fillum by WS, Chap from near Brum)

How accessible will this wisdom be in 72 hours time?

Hamlet.

'amlet…..dassit. Like the cigars.

And no greatcoats were carried by British infantry in the Waterloo campaign (by order of the Duke himself).

The older Airfix stuff was often remarkable considering it was the output of a toy company.

The 1/12 Charles I portrait was based on Van Dyck portraits.
Van Dyck:

Airfix:

The George Washington 54mm figure appears to be based on this portrait:

Airfix – note the shabraque detail:

The 1/144 Revenge is pretty much a duplicate of the NMM's model of the Elizabeth Jonas:

Airfix:

With ships like the Royal Sovereign there are only two source drawings, one of the port side and another of the stern. Airfix nonetheless got a kit out of it with the missing data intelligently interpolated. The hull shape for example is deducible from shipbuilders' conventions of the day around what radius each bit should be, but you needed to know that to begin with. This article, "Ships That Scaled the Seven Seas", is an interesting read about that:
link

Then there are the triumphs of products like the Waterloo RHA, where they found a way to supply one gun in action, one in motion, a spare crew for the latter in case you want both in action, and a limber that still holds up well especially at the price. The really impressive bit about the Waterloo RHA though is that unlike some others they got the limber riders' coat tails accurate.

Airfix's attention to detail was remarkable on occasion, but also very patchy, hence the Waterloo French Infantry of whom all one can fairly say is that they look more like Waterloo French Infantry than anything else.

4th. Fascinating stuff – you clearly know your (Airfix) onions. My knowledge of their range is usually focused on the 1/72 figures, so reading about the boats etc is great stuff. Thanks for sharing

Marc

I misspent my youth Marc.

Probably the most impressive Airfix figure is the Black Prince, which is based, with remarkable accuracy, on the tomb effigy and funerary accoutrements, which still exist:
Tomb:

Achievements:

Airfix: link

Seeing those pictures is bringing back many happy memories – I can almost smell the plastic and polystyrene cement. Made the Black Prince, the French Grenadier, Bengal lancer, Cavalier, cuirassier, Lifeguard, hussar, even Anne Boleyn. I still have a Polish lancer and Napoleon in the boxes. Happy times.

What a nostalgia trip. The Revenge and painting hundreds and hundreds of triangles….Chas I and Black Prince (he was massive when completed). I always wanted Cromwell to go with Chas but my Mom, bless her, put her foot down. She would cross herself at the mention of his name…as for a model of him in the house…….No way. A dozen Hail Marys to clear the air at the suggestion.

No one has mentioned those Aurora figures. I had the Beatles (that sounds a bit weird). Most the Horror figures and the Green Beret. I wanted to do him as Che as well, but never finished him.

Biggest regret. Airfix Scharnhorst. Very unusual as shown pre WWII with straight bow and biplanes and no funnel cap. That moulding is lost forever, unlike almost every other one…even Repulse came back in the end. A very poor assembled example in a display case in Eden Camp, N Yorks. Worth its weight in gold.

Does anyone recall the Airfix Plastic Napoleonics in 1/32? They came late on, but were not at all bad, for early 70s. As for my photography….digital we just dreamt of. Indeed my Pentax Spotmatic was my first ever SLR;

Cool vintage piccies deadhead – love Hougoumont!

I recall the Airfix 1/32 Nappies but never had any. I started to accumulate 1/32 Waterloo a year or two ago, but am now selling them off, as a number of key figures that I require are either not made, or are too expensive, or are inconsistently sized, or all the above. The Call to Arms figures are especially disappointing in the latter respect.

One of the missing troop types is British 1815 line centre companies, which are fairly essential. Everyone who does 1/32 Napoleonics seems to do flank companies only. The Airfix 1/32 British are flank companies as are ACTA. The ACTA French line are nice but far smaller than the British, and in turn bigger and much better than the ACTA Dutch. The HaT 1/32 are compatible with the ACTA French line but they're all too small compared to the Italeri 1/32 who appear to me to be 60mm.

4th. +1

I have encountered the same issues so may well sell mine. I collected them in a blaze of glory when it seemed every company was going to make 54s. Then it dried up. So what is left is a mush mash of stuff and styles. So I can get Wuttenberg jäger but not sensible French infantry. Cavalry is like rocking horse doo da. It is just so frustrating

Marc

@ Marc

The worst of it is that the best figures are often the least useful. The Italeri are nice sculpts but all huge and there are only cavalry and mutually incompatible infantry, if you can even find them.

The HaT plastic is a bit rubbery – not sure how well it would hold paint.

Oh well. Dodgy Airfix HO/OO it is…

deadhead, amazing photos! What a great job depicting the closing of the north gate at Hougoumont.

4th Cuirassier, have you seen the Expeditionary Force British centre company figures? link

And have you seen the price! In the UK, £27.00 GBP for 9 figures. I reckoned I was looking at £300.00 GBP to make 3 battalions in matched poses (ie one marching, one advancing, one firing).

That is a lot of money compared to HaT or Esci prices.

I have been trying to remember the source of the figures in the North Gate Diorama, as they seem to differ from the standard Airfix figures. Then it dawned on me. Even in early 70s I could not resist chopping up figures.

So the French I wanted in overalls not gaiters, major head swaps with British Guards resulted. The chap on the wall is a standing-firing top, on a running pair of legs. The totally overexposed blond lad kneeling is a charging top, on a pair of kneeling legs. My favourite was the hard to see French wounded chap outside the wall. He is a British standing firing figure, with all traces of his firearm chopped off, his trunk flexed and reattached all onto a running pair of legs.

What surprises me is the detail I must have known even then. The Guards style cuffs, the green shako fittings and blue wings, the French mostly in Light Infantry blue. But no shading or highlighting anywhere, not one figure. It was my photography that was also awful then. I had no idea at all what the gate really looked like…I only Had Weller's B&W photos from W at Waterloo.

I would love to see more pics of figures in this scale, especially if antique relics. Nostalgia is not what it used to be.

deadhead, here are some photos of my Hougoumont game played in 2015. A real mix of figures, including some metals.
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In my game the French never contested the north gate.

I have loved these photos of old Scruby games since first seeing them in library books as a kid. I've always wondered what unit is in front of the Highlanders. Possibly Fusiliers?
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well the Hougoumont pictures are just what I was hoping someone would show. The building is great, the attention to detail again, with Nassau units, Guards cuff lacing etc

So funny to see one or two of the metals look like the later model Terminator that was liquid metal when he wanted to be.

Brilliant to see those Airfix figures as they were intended on release. Again, mine were chopped to bits. Odd how the running chap with bayonet thrusting actually proved one of the best donors!

@ Marc

Yep, £3.00 GBP a figure. A few years ago when I was replacing missing poses among my 1/32 Airfix 8th Army, Russians, and Japanese, I was buying them on eBay with a ceiling price including p & p of £0.15 GBP per figure.

New Airfix ones would be £0.50 GBP per figure and ACTA, HaT etc around £0.75 GBP. 4x that much was just beyond my budget, nice though they are.