volume 10, issue 12 amms brisbane news · so did the soviet 122mm gun really work? (thanks blackie)...
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is necessary to buy
more than one set to
ensure the easiest re-
sult.
Modelling wise, I think
we’ve had a pretty good
year—can’t wait to see
what 2015 will bring.
Bergepanther perhaps?
(yeah, right . . . .)
I hope Santa brings you
lots of plastic—may you
and yours have a happy
and safe Christmas and
a prosperous New
Year.
I give up! Some months
I have to beg for contri-
butions, this month I
have so many that I’ve
nearly filled the January
edition as well!
And no, I haven’t forgot-
ten who won the door
prize last month and
hasn’t sent me a contri-
bution.
I have been putting to-
gether a DML M4 Mor-
tar Carrier of late, and
decided to add a bit of
extra detail, as well as
some scratchbuilding
so that it looks like the
one of which I have
some nice clear photos
courtesy of Archer Fine
Transfers.
Between Eduard, Voy-
ager, Griffon and Aber I
found all the fine detail I
needed (and then
some) and it’s interest-
ing how the various
companies approach a
solution to the same
problem (eg the jer-
rycan rack on the side),
Their methods differ
wildly and ensure that it
Editorial (aka Rob’s Rantings)
6 December 2014
Volume 10, Issue 12
AMMS Brisbane News Inside this issue:
The Funnies 2
Real Life Observations 3-5
A Real Hero 6-8
Personal Profile 9-
10
Display Bases 11
The little illustration
below is courtesy of
Murray—thanks ma-
te.
The Funnies Page
Page 2
AMMS Brisbane News Volume 10, Issue
Thank you Airfix Jones for the cartoon atop and at left and also
whoever sent me the one above
After spending quality time (try telling the wife that…just one more museum to go Darling, I promise..) at several German AFV & Technical museums on my recent holiday, it was interesting to note the dif-ferent kinds of wear & tear that the vehi-cles exhibited – the fact that a large per-centage of these museum vehicles are driven regularly, and can get quite grubby gives the modeler a real insight to what “Actual” wear & tear may look like.
For instance, as shown in this picture, the sdkfz 251 muffler – a common item of interest to weather on this popular vehi-
cle. It’s not a bright rusty blob, but actual-ly still displays traces of paint – this is due to the fact that although it gets warm, the muffler’s not quite hot enough to total-ly blister all the paint off. And, of course, it’s leaving a nice sooty effect on the track guard.
In another pic it shows that on a section of SWS track where the road wheels run it’s quite a dull finish– it’s more like a dull grey/gunmetal effect. Also note with the SWS how the rusty replaced wheel with the different coloured hub creates a good contrast to its plain “Gelb” counterparts.
However, as this Tiger I Steel Wheel pic proves the inner track/wheel wearing sur-faces can get quite shiny. As this vehicle is a static exhibit only, and is only occa-sionally moved, the tracks are quite uni-form in their “Rusty” appearance. Also of
note on this Tiger, it displayed obvious battle damage to the spare Track links as well as its own running tracks. This sort of damage is probably overlooked to a cer-tain degree in our hobby – the spare links were sometimes there for added protec-tion too remember…….Well, on Allied stuff anyway….it needed it!
Continued on Page 4
Real Life Observations—from the Fatherland (thanks Graham Moore)
Page 3
Volume 10, Issue AMMS Brisbane News
On this pic showing the grouser box (thingy?) on a FT17 displayed at Ko-blenz, it’s a good example how dust may settle on a WW1 tank & have an oil/grease drip effect on it. This vehicle is obviously maintained to a certain degree by the museum to be easily moved if need be – pretty gungy for a museum vehicle hey?
This Hetzer (yes yes, I know it’s not a real one Craig!….) displayed at Munster easily demonstrated how a 3-tone ca-mo may wear – on the sloping rear deck the crew’s boots have scuffed the Green & Camo Red Brown back to the Gelb – and the worn raised deck bolts are now quite prominent.
The Hetzer tracks also provided a good example as to how tracks caked in dirt may look – not just one shade of “Mud”, but light/dark & oily shades too.
What I did find interesting was examining some of the Scars of Battle that some of the larger AFV’s wore – everything from the tattoo line of bullets, small caliber, shrapnel, to the larger glancing scars.
Continued on Page 5
Real Life Observations—from the Fatherland (Cont’d from Page
3)
Page 4
AMMS Brisbane News Volume 10, Issue
These pics show a series of glancing blows to the front of this Jagdpanther – but these hits weren’t the ones that put it out of action….Allegedly the smaller hole in the Mantlet caused the Panther’s demise. Was this Mantlet metal softer? I’m sure one of our knowledgeable AMMS members would have a theory.
Here’s a good example of Track damage, this pic shows the Modeller that tracks don’t just pop their pin and lay on the ground neatly – if they go “with a Bang” this would probably more accurately depict such an occurrence.
I did try picking up a pair of KingTiger tracks – guess what, they were bloody heavy! It must have been no small feat to change an entire track run, let alone with a million bullets zing-ing past……
Real Life Observations—from the Fatherland (cont’d from Page
4)
Page 5
Volume 10, Issue AMMS Brisbane News
So Did the Soviet 122mm Gun Really Work? (thanks Blackie)
Apparently it did!
In a military career span-
ning 1899-1947, Adrian
Carton de Wiart fought in
4 wars, and survived be-
ing shot in the stomach,
groin, head, hand, ankle,
hip and leg; as surviving
well as two plane crashes
and five escape attempts
from a POW camp. He
lost an eye and a hand in
1915, but still won the Vic-
toria Cross in 1916.
It is a war story that
sounds far-fetched even
by Hollywood standards,
but Adrian Carton de Wiart
really existed.
Adrian Paul Ghislain Car-
ton de Wiart was born in
Belgium in 1880 to an Irish
mother and a Belgian aris-
tocratic father (although it
was widely rumoured he
was the illegitimate son of
the King of the Belgians,
Leopold II)
When his mother died and
his father remarried to an
Englishwoman, his new
stepmother sent Carton de
Wiart to boarding school in
England. From there he
went to Oxford University
in 1899, but dropped out
after one term to join the
British Army.
The Boer War had just
started at the time and,
after enlisting under the
false identity of ‘Trooper
Carton’, Carton de Wiart
was sent to
South Africa. However,
he was seriously wounded
in the stomach and groin
early in the war and inva-
lided home. As soon as
he had recovered, he re-
turned to action in South
Africa in 1901 as a com-
missioned officer under
his true identity.
When the First World War
broke out in 1914, Carton
de Wiart was en route to
British Somaliland in the
Horn of Africa, where the
British were engaged in a
low level war against the
“Mad Mullah“. In an attack
on an enemy fort, Carton
de Wiart was shot twice in
the face, losing his left
eye.
He wore a glass eye for a
short time after but, whilst
travelling in a taxi, threw it
out of the window and put
on a black eye patch,
which he wore for the rest
of his life.
In 1915 he embarked on a
steamer for France. As an
infantry commander on
the Western Front, he was
wounded seven more
times. Soon after his arri-
val he lost his left hand
(biting his mangled fingers
off when a doctor declined
to remove them). He was
later shot through the skull
and ankle at the Battle of
the Somme, through the
hip at the Battle of Pass-
chendaele, through the leg
at Cambrai, and through
the ear at Arras. Cont’d on
Page 7
A Real Hero
Page 6
AMMS Brisbane News Volume 10, Issue
loss of various body parts,
he said: “Frankly I enjoyed
the war.”
Adrian Carton de Wiart
From 1919-1921, Carton
de Wiart saw further front
line action in Poland
against the Red Army in
the Polish-Soviet
War. On one occasion,
while out on his observa-
tion train, he was at-
tacked by a group of Red
cavalry. He fought them
off with his revolver from
the running board of the
train, at one point falling
on the track and quickly
jumping back on. He
even survived an aircraft
crash which led to a brief
period in Lithuanian cap-
tivity.
He retired from the Army
in 1923 with the honorary
rank of major-general,
and spent the next 15
years shooting waterfowl
on a friend’s 500,000 acre
marshland estate in east-
ern Poland – his home a
converted hunting lodge
on an island, only a few
miles from the Soviet bor-
der.
His peaceful life was
rudely interrupted by the
Second World War in
1939, when he was re-
called as head of the Brit-
It was during the Battle of
the Somme in July 1916
that he won the Victoria
Cross, the British Empire’s
highest award for gallantry
in combat. His citation
read:
“For most conspicuous
bravery, coolness and de-
termination during severe
operations of a prolonged
nature. It was owing in a
great measure to his
dauntless courage and
inspiring example that a
serious reverse was avert-
ed. He displayed the ut-
most energy and courage
in forcing our attack home.
After three other battalion
Commanders had become
casualties, he controlled
their commands, and en-
sured that the ground won
was maintained at all
costs. He frequently ex-
posed himself in the or-
ganisation of positions and
of supplies, passing un-
flinchingly through fire bar-
rage of the most intense
nature. His gallantry was
inspiring to all.”
In his later autobiography,
Happy Odyssey , he
made no mention of his
VC. Of the First World
War itself, and despite the
ish Military Mission to Po-
land. When Poland was at-
tacked by both Nazi Germa-
ny and Soviet Russia in Sep-
tember 1939, the estate was
overrun and all Carton de
Wiart’s possessions were
confiscated by the Soviets,
then destroyed by the Ger-
mans in later fighting. He
never saw the area again.
Carton de Wiart and his mis-
sion team escaped Poland
by road convoy, with the
Germans and the Russians
in hot pursuit. Despite being
attacked from the air by the
Luftwaffe, the convoy made
it across the Romanian bor-
der. Carton de Wiart then
made it back to England by
aircraft, travelling under a
false passport.
In 1940 he was dispatched
to Norway, where he took
charge of an Anglo-French
force with orders to take the
city of Trondheim. With few
supplies and little support, he
managed to move his forces
over the mountains and
down to Trondheim
Fjord, despite coming under
frequent attack from the Luft-
waffe, being shelled by Ger-
man naval destroyers and
machine gunned by German
ski troops. Continued on
Page 8
A Real Hero
(cont’d from Page 6)
Page 7
Volume 10, Issue AMMS Brisbane News
Unable to effectively challenge the
superior German forces, Carton de
Wiart was eventually ordered to evac-
uate. Royal Navy transports got his
men away, but they were bombed
severely on the way out. Carton de
Wiart arrived back at Scapa Flow on
his 60th birthday.
Even back on British soil, Carton de
Wiart found himself on the frontline
when his London home was bombed
by the Germans during the Blitz. All of
his medals and decorations were de-
stroyed or lost and he had to apply to
the War Office for official replace-
ments.
In 1941 he was appointed head of the
British-Yugoslavian Military Mission,
just as Hitler was preparing to invade
Yuogoslavia. After negotiating with
the Yugoslavian government in Bel-
grade, Carton de Wiart’s aircraft was
heading for Cairo when both engines
failed. The plane crash landed in the
Mediterranean off the coast of Italian-
controlled Libya. Carton de Wiart was
knocked un-
conscious in the crash, but
the cold water revived
him. When the plane sank,
he and the crew were forced
to swim a mile to shore,
where they were captured by
the Italians.
Carton de Wiart was sent to
a special prison for senior
officers at in Italy. With his
distinguished comrades, he
five escape attempts, one of
which including seven
months of tunnelling. During
one attempt, Carton de Wiart
evaded capture for eight
days disguised as an Italian
peasant – but his age, eye
patch, empty sleeve, multiple
scars and lack of Italian gave
him away.
Carton de Wiart was re-
leased from prison in 1943
and taken to Rome, where
the Italian government se-
cretly planned to leave the war and
wanted Carton de Wiart to act as
messenger to the British govern-
ment. He was accompanied by an
Italian negotiator to Portugal to meet
Allied contacts to facilitate the surren-
der. From Portugal, Carton de Wiart
made his way back to England.
Carton de Wiart was immediately
summoned by Churchill to be his per-
sonal representative in China, where
he worked for the rest of the war and
up to his retirement in 1947. On his
way back to England, he stopped off
in Rangoon as a house guest of the
local army commander. Coming
down stairs, he slipped on coconut
matting, fell, broke his back and
knocked himself unconscious. He
eventually made it back to England
and into hospital where he slowly
recovered. The doctors succeeded
in extracting an incredible amount of
shrapnel from his old wounds.
Lieutenant-General Sir Adrian Paul
Ghislain Carton de Wiart VC KBE CB
CMG DSO finally settled in County
Cork, Ireland, where he died in 1963
at the age of 83. The Oxford Diction-
ary of National Biography described
him thus: “With his black eyepatch
and empty sleeve, Carton de Wiart
looked like an elegant pirate, and
became a figure of legend.”
A Real Hero (Cont’d from Page 7)
Page 8
AMMS Brisbane News Volume 10, Issue
Left—Carton de Wiart probably
needed a reinforced jacket to carry
all his medals!
My modelling career started in the late 60s at the age of about
4. My father, ex RAAF decided he would buy me a model
plane each fortnight on shopping day. I thought this was a
great idea. I was so excited the next time we went shopping
where we purchased a 1/72 scale Frog Spitfire. I could wait to
get home to start building it. The down side was, Dad thought
because I was only young, it would be best if he built it for me.
This was the trend that continued on for a few years. Not only
I wasn’t allowed to build them, I also wasn’t allowed to play
with them and to ensure I didn’t he placed them in a display
case out of my reach. Not only that, but he wanted to take his
time in building them and doing things like sanding parts and
waiting for glue and paint to dry, where I just wanted to slap
them together. (I see nothing has changed there.) There were
a lot of fond memories there. As I started to get older Dad
would start to let me do some minor supervised constriction
and then when I was about 7, I was finally let loose on one by
myself. It was a Matchbox half track complete with a display
base. I thought this was great because it was model in colours
so I didn’t have to paint it.
We moved from the Gold Coast to Charleville in SW Qld in the
early 70’s where my collect of Matchbox, Frog and Airfix mod-
els continued to grow. I had a temporary model building ban
applied by my mother when I was 9 after receiving 6 stitches
in a cut on my finger. Dad was working in the Ambulance and
I had access to surgical scalpels that were great to remove
parts from the sprues as well as sections from fingers. One
year we came to Brisbane for a holiday where Dad and I went
to a toy shop called Toy and Novelty at Annerley were we
found new and exciting model brands like Tamiya and Mono-
gram. He bought me two Monogram models, a 1/48 scale Lib-
erator and a 1/24 scale P51. Dad decided that he had to build
these for me because I was too inexperienced to build pro-
jects of this size, well at least that’s what he told Mum.
This trend continued for the next few years and then model-
ling started to take a backward step to sport, camping, girls,
shooting, fishing, girls, cars and did I mention girls. It wasn’t
until the mid 80s that I bought another model kit. I was off
work with a knee injury from playing football and needed
something to do. So I hobbled down to the model shop and
came home with a car kit and a rattle can of paint. Modelling
started to slowly creep back into my life from that point. I
would buy a kit and build it, and then I would buy another and
build it and before I knew it I had to build another display case
to show of my proud masterpieces. Then I would start to buy
two kits and build one etc … Today the trend has completely
changed…..Now I have heaps of display space and have to
build an extension on the house to store the
unbuilt stuff….
I have a wide verity of modelling interests how-
ever subjects from my childhood and early teen
years still top the list with Vietnam armour, SCI
FI Star wars/Star Trek (and no I can speak
Klingon) drag/ muscle cars and aircraft, espe-
cially RAAF.
Over the years I have been an active member
of many clubs by either supporting with displays
or holding down various committee positions. I
have also held various committee positions with
the QMHE.
Over the last few years my life has undergone
some changes on the personal and work front
with getting married again to a lovely lady who
total understands that I am a “Modelholic” and
suffers from a similar disorder with hand bags,
shoes and scrap booking…
On the work front the engineering company I
was managing was sold off in 2007 and I went
to work for another of the owners companies
Drake Trailer where I became the special pro-
jects & marketing manager. One of my special
project was to develop 1/50 scale diecast repli-
cas of heavy haulage equipment we manufac-
ture for marketing purposes. Four years later,
Drake Trailers now has a collectable business
that produces museum quality scale replicas of
Australia heavy haulage equipment (rated by
the experts as the world’s best heavy haulage
diecast) for worldwide distribution, and sells
scaled diecast Kenworth trucks to Kenworth. At
present my job role enables me to travel the
world for Hobby and Toy fairs to promote the
models as well as work closely with overseas
companies to develop new products. I guess I
have the ideal job…
I consider myself to be very fortunate to have
not only gained a lot of knowledge from model
clubs such as AMMS but to also gain some
great friends along the way.
Continued on Page 10
Personal Profile (thanks Bruce Hay)
Page 9
Volume 10, Issue AMMS Brisbane News
My lifelong goal is … one day I hope
that I am a good enough modeller to
tackle some of those hi grade kits I
have in the stash at home.
Some pics of Bruce’s stash are on the
rest of this page—every time my wife
complains about mine, I just show her
Bruce’s—Rob
Personal Profile (Cont’d from Page 9)
Page 10
AMMS Brisbane News Volume 10, Issue
Meets first Saturday of every month at
Loganlea Community Centre, Timms Street,
Loganlea, between 11:30am and 4:00pm
Contributions to the newsletter are always
welcome. Please email contributions to the
editor at gncw@bigpond.com
A M M S B R I S B A N E
Display Bases by Jim Young (thanks Graham McNamara)
Start Them Young . . . .
AMMS Brisbane is on
the Web at
www.ammsbrisbane.co
As launched at last month’s
meeting, Jim has turned his
hand to Jarrah display bases
to suit AFV’s, dio’s or aircraft.
Prices start from $15 for the
smallest size to $20 for the
larger sizes. I’ll be bringing
half a dozen on a regular ba-
sis for the impulse buyers
and can arrange contact with
Jim for special orders.
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