We're All In This Together!

At the sumptuous Lord Mayor's Banquet our beloved Old Etonian leader, the Right Honourable David Cameron MP, gave a speech to the assembled fat cats extolling 'permanent austerity' for the peasantry.

Bonuses all round, chaps!

Homo digitalis

Generic 1930s Tankettes: 28 mm

A couple of new resin generic turreted 2-man tankettes that I bought off eBay from Aylafred for the princely sum of a fiver plus P&P.

I painted them up as 1939 Renault 17s which they vaguely resemble but they could be used to represent a wide variety of 1930s FT 17 or Lloyds tankettes.

Review: Bolt Action Plastic Japanese Infantry

I ought a box of the new plastic range of Bolt Action infantry a few weeks ago to create a second platoon for my Imperial Japanese Army and to get hold of some suicide anti-tank men: nutters with exploding pikes.

The back of the box gives a taste of the contents and you get the paper banners as shown bottom left.

 This (not very clear - sorry) pic shows one of the enclosed sprues and bases. The figures can be assembled in a variety of ways to give a rich diversity. This is one of the great advantages of plastic models.

A rather better pic showing the inserts . Have a look at the descriptions on the right. They give a flavour of the variation.

Just one of the assembled and painted troopers. I mixed together a left 'holding arm', a bayonet, a head with cap, a right hand with grenade, and a separate rifle with strap (put it on before putting the guy's arms on: I didn't and had to disassemble). 

Poses are dynamic and the detail is crisp. I got a good result with some basic watered-down colour over a white primer finishing with a slosh of yellow-brown wash.

When it stops raining, if it stops raining, I will photograph the whole finished army.

Forge World - Poor Quality Control

These pictures were posted on twitter by someone I follow - I won't mention his name. They are cockpit components for a Forge World Marauder Bomber and this is what Forge World sent him.

This model is £190. By any standards it is a premium product and yet Forge World were of the opinion that components so warpt as to be unusable were acceptable to be sent to a customer. And this is not a one-off. I have experienced similar issues with Forge World.

Now this customer was an experienced modeller so was able to fix them using boiling water but why the hell should he? Warping like this happens because the resin is removed from the mold before it is properly hardened. They do this to increase productivity and hence raise profit margins on fixed capital equipment and labour costs.

Games Workshop should in my opinion show a little more espect for their customers. We are not a captive cash cow to be milked.

Or are we?

Lest We Forget What We Owe

Sgt Percie M Lambshead MM
DCLI, Cornish Company KSLI.

Gunpowder Treason and Plot

Remember, remember the fifth of November
Gunpowder, treason and plot
I see no reason why gunpowder treason
Should ever be forgot

Guy Fawkes, Guy Fawkes, 'twas his intent
To blow up the King and the Parliament
Three score barrels of powder below
Poor old England to overthrow
By God's providence he was catched
With a dark lantern and burning match
Holloa boys, holloa boys
God save the King!
Hip hip hooray!
Hip hip hooray!

 
Actually, these days we are more likely to drive around

with a car bumper sticker saying:
 
 'Come back Guy Fawkes - all is forgiven." 
 
 But have a good bonfire night!