A Sexton  appeared at a Milan Modelling Fair recently. Probably it used to belong to the Italian Army which took it on board after the end of WW2

Interestingly there was also this sidecar with full cover for the vehicle....

DECISION TIME

I have figured out some German officiers need to make up their mind and discuss about the next step. The SdKfz 250 neu (004 tells you it is operated by the command staff) is the transformation of a Milicast Sd Kfz 250 long with Pak. I have already one, which I will put on these pages as soon as finished so I preferred to convert one into a more logistic role. The Kubel is either Airfix or Fujimi, I do not remember.

Soldiers are a mixed bag: from the basic Aifirx to Fujimi, MMS, Milicast, Preiser, etc

TERRAIN BOARD - movable scenic parts

I usually utilize a 1m x 1m board when I like to test some scenic components or imagine an event or a particular scene with vehicles and figures. 

This time I wanted to see how well certain scenic elements fit with the basic landscape.

The starting point is the base for almost anything: I use some rigid transparent plastic sheets which I cut with an irregular pattern and I adapt it to the size of the item it supports, ie a soldier, a tree, a pile of cut trees, and so on. You may find the raw material very easily; it is usually the folder of a booklet. All the items pictured here can be moved easily in any part of the board and can not be detected immediately.

The key is that the plastic needs to be clean, without any shade of powder or dirty in order not to become evident and it can actually "disappear" melting itself with the surrounding terrain. It also needs to be a bit rigid otherwide the borders may bend up or detach itself from the item glued above whenever you pick it up and place it in a container to be stored or on the terrain.

From the pics shown here you may easily understand that there is a flaw in most of the scenic items but trees, bush, grass: the border of any item built up, such as a house, a fence, a stone wall, etc needs to give the impression to amalgamate with the land so better to glue some little stones, some grass of different colours.

An Allied convoy

The idea was to put together some British soft skins. I like to mix up vehicles in a casual way so we have here a couple of Airfix Quad, an Airfix Jeep, an Airfix Matador from the refueling set upgraded with Matador kit, an Airfix Sherman with Culin device from Matador, a Sherman ARV based on  Airfix plus Matador upgrade, a couple of Bren Carriers by Cromwell

Some German soft skin vehicles across a village

We have a variety of items here, an Airfix SdKfz 7, a VW and SdKfz 222 from the same manufacturer, a few 251s by Hasegawa and Esci and one by Alby, a Heller (ex Airfix) Opel Blitz, a Milicast limber, a MMS SdKfz 10, a Fujimi sidecar, a SdKfz 11 HKL.
I have been trying to stick to 1:76 scale so the Alby was very much an exception.