PSC Carriers finished!

Its been a while since I updated, sorry about that. I went away during Easter but I did finish the carriers first.

A nice little trio.

I took these photos on my workbench as the newly-glued static grass still was drying. I used my mobile phone since my regular camera had gone AWOL. I think you can make out the details anyway.

Nice and dusty, but not too muddy.

I was waiting for some markings from Dom's Decals. Dom's decals are meant for 15mm tanks, but as the carriers are quite small 15mm decals fit nicely. (He also got loads of aircraft markings in the smaller scales.) I ordered allied stars and 7th armoured division markings, both the regular red version and the black version commonly used on recon vehicles to reduce visibility.

Note the black version of the desert rat emblem.

The 7th armoured division is the famous "Desert Rats" from North Africa. Unfortunately their track record was not that glorious during the Normandy campaign, but they were involved in a lot of fighting and really is an iconic unit. Besides, I already have Desert Rat themed dice!

Side view, note the muddied up regimental markings.

I wasn't really aware of the intricacies of british vehicle markings though. Apparently the vehicles belonging to the armoured regiments get either the 51, 52 or 53 regimental sign. These regiments either used armoured cars or light tanks for recon. The carriers were used by the recon troops of the Motor Batallion, which had the number 54 instead. I did not know that at the time of ordering and just figured I needed the desert rat emblem and some stars.

Third one, dusty with rat barely visible. 

Google is your friend they say, but after learning what I now know, I couldn't finish the carriers without regimental markings. I also realised I had ordered the wrong kind of stars -- stars within a circle was mostly used on top of tank turrets as an aerial recognition symbol -- I needed plain stars.

Simon says "Follow me!"

So I had a rummage through my model stash. First I looked at the IBG carrier I recently bought to see what markings I got there. Regimental number 45, whatever that is. Probably the mortar batallion since the kit was of the mortar carrier. Then I found my stash of left-over Airfix carrier bits. I had started these several years ago, but I abandoned the project since I thought they looked too small. I still had the decals from them, but they showed number 56. Bohoo.

Simon says "Moon the enemy!"

I could use the stars from the airfix carriers though. And I realised I could take the two 45 markings from the IBG version, carefully slice them in half and rearrange the numbers to get 54. And I could take a 56 from the airfix versions and cover up the 6 with dirt. Splendid! I bungled one of the 5's though, so I had to cover that one too. I took the serial numbers from the IBG carrier, the airfix carrier and a Revell Cromwell kit to get different numbers.

Still need to add crew and personal belongings as they look quite bare inside.

I used 60x40 bases from Renedra. The bases were quickly done by adding Vallejo Base gel and some larger rocks. I basecoated them with GW Khemri Brown and drybrushed with GW Bleached Bone once the gel was dry. Some base gel was also used as dried mud on the carriers and touched up with Khemri brown. I then glued the carriers to their bases and dusted both the bases and carriers with MIG European Dust pigments. Tamiya gun metal pigment was used on the upper edges. Finally static grass was added.

Note how the dust pigments tie the ground and the carrier together, as well as toning down the markings.

I'm quite satisfied with these. I need to do the crews now, of course. And the bridge weight discs are missing too. So I have now ordered plain stars, more tank numbers and the correct regimental numbers from Dom's Decals. Why? you ask. Well, I still have the IBG carrier left to do, and I'm planning on buying one more box of PSC carriers.