Desert Shermans and some extra desert crews

 The last bit of desert armour on my painting list were some Shermans for El Alamein and onwards. Some years ago I picked up a very, very cheap PSC 'US Tank Company' boxed set at Triples, which really has been the gift which goes on giving. It is still stuffed with unbuilt Shermans, Stuarts and halftracks, the Shermans helpfully being all varieties except Fireflies.

I just wanted three desert Shermans. PSC supply separate sand shields for their cast hull Shermans, and a range of turrets and mantlets. As ever with PSC they are lovely crisp mouldings with hardly any flash and went together perfectly.

There seem to have been a mix of small and large mantlet Shermans supplied to 8th Army, so I did two wide wide mantlets like this one and one narrow. The sand shields have to be glued on as separate pieces, but mercifully they fit well and there are some tiny locating lugs to help position them.

Lots of stowage is provided so I mixed it up on the different vehicles so they all look similar, but not identical with variations on spare wheels, tracks, tarps, jerry cans etc. I omitted the AAMG on the commanders tank and also did it with a narrow mantlet.

I painted them all in desert pink with three variations on the 'official' disruptive black camo scheme taken from various photographs of vehicles. As with the stowage, they all look similar, but not identical. I finished them off with an ink wash and a light drybrush of pale sand to pick out the highlights.

As I was doing some desert stuff, I did another QRF Grant I had in stock. This one also got the jazzy sand/brown/white camo scheme as I think it looks rather smart. So now I have two plain Grants, and two camouflaged. 

While I was doing some modelling, I also added a few bits and pieces of crew. One of my Vickers Lights got a commander, in this case a PP tank commander in sidecap. I just filed off the top of the cupola and cut the figure down until it was flush. I painted the top of the hatch cover black and just stuck the figure on. I didn't bother to model the open hatches as they would be tiny and vulnerable to being knocked off.

Although the PP figures are on the beefier side, it makes you realise just how tiny the Vickers is. It really is just a Bren Carrier with a turret. Many years ago I converted an Airfix carrier into a Vickers, the chassis is almost identical. 

I also did some drivers for my QRF 15cwt CMP trucks. These are all PP figures, somewhat misleadingly labelled as 'Seated British' when in fact they all have moulded on steering wheels, I'd hoped for some seated figures with rifles. Anyway, the trucks didn't have cast on steering wheels, and after cutting off most of the figures legs and lower bodies I managed to get them into the cabs OK with the wheels positioned behind the dashboard. They look much better with drivers.

I do slightly regret getting these as they are horrible models, but I couldn't quite face building a bunch of PSC 15cwt trucks at the time. They look OK now I guess. 

That is pretty much it for the 15mm Desert stuff now, the 'desert armour' box is completely full. I need to add some drivers to a few more German vehicles, but I'll do that as and when needed and couple more Italian bits. I'm basically back to just doing bits and pieces now, which I much prefer to the big batch paints. I've realised I 'need' a Nashorn and a couple of Hetzers for a scenario and I also need more US transport, some more recovery vehicles and ambulances and maybe some M3 GMC Tank Destroyers, so plenty of other stuff to do yet.