I love a challenge me...

When chum Jamie sold me his "Open Fire" starter box set for £15 his comments of "I've taken the Stugs but everything else is there. Good luck with those Shermans though. they're absolutely awful. I couldn't face doing them" were as a red rag to a bull.

 

I've already painted and used most of the German Infantry in the Bénouville game (more of them at a later date). I've also added a second US Paras platoon of eBay for a fiver. That should provide enough variation for a CoC force for another project. I must say, the infantry are very nice.

 

So, on to those Shermans. You get eight in total. Two Firefly's & six bog standard mark V's for two troops. 

The sprues are in a softish plastic & don't exactly inspire.

They don't go together all that well. There's a little 'doctoring' needed on both sides of the hull and in the end, I decided to use superglue on the hull assembly to ensure the gaps didn't re-open.

First hull assembled and it's natty little magnet added (in the box!) for the turret.

The hull sides still left a bit of an unsightly gap that's when I had one of those 'lightbulb' moments. I decided to fill the gaps and wondered just what I hafd for the job?

The most disappointing substance known to man. Or is it?

Having bought a pot of Liquid Green stuff only to be very underwhelmed (how can a product really come about from the need to correct a known failing?), I thought I'd give it a go to see if there actually was ANYTHING it was good for before it went on a final journey.

looking a little rough. But I began to believe this plan might just work!



I added another and gave them both an undercoat with my fave trusted Halford's grey primer



Now it was beginning to take shape I decided it was worth pressing on with the others and not consigning them to eBay.


The rest of the troop with a coat of PSC's British armour Spray.

If I did all eight it would take my Sherman count to an unnecessary 22. So I could afford to go against previous thinking and give them decals to make them unit specific. I will be getting some DD's and marking them up as 13/18th Hussars to support the paras in their early battles so for these mark V's I wanted something for the follow on battles east of the Orne. BINGO! Operation Goodwood featured 11th Armoured Division and a quick check yielded that the same tanks could be used for part of Epsom too.

Full troop

I decaled them up as the senior regiment 23rd Hussars and will be adding the second troop very shortly. Considering That I got a German company, an American Airborne platoon, a rulebook (for eBay) & these eight tanks all for £15 I reckon I made off like a bandit!

The decals were 11th Armoured from http://theplasticsoldiercompany.co.uk/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=60_61_62_66&products_id=279 with the remainder from the excellent Dom's Decals http://www.domsdecals.com/shop/category_ecee596a242de13b779391cdaa2c528d/15mm-WW2-Markings.html?shop_param=cid%3D%26And considering you can pick these tanks up for 99p each I reckon I might be back for more.

Next, back to those A/T guns ;^)