Now I was always into my Airfix as a child but I’m a very keen sci fi fan and when I discovered Warhammer as a teenager, I was hooked. Warhammer had all the fun of model making and painting but it also had the most amazing back story which is still rapidly expanding (thanks to the great work of the Black Library). It is also a wargame but to me the main attraction is the fiction with the painting and modelling a second. I am, however, no good with the painting lark but I do love the conversion and modelling side of thinks.
What’s this got to do with aircraft modelling? Well over the past year I’ve been building up (ok, buying, but since last September, I’ve not really had the heart to paint or build any of the models) my army. Of the many races, I collect Imperial Guard – the human army in a universe filled with super human warriors and aliens. It might have been mentioned before when I did my Imperial Guard loadout (something I want to resurrect if only I could come up with enough people to create rag tag guard bunch!). Around February I felt the urge to buy something and model it. I know I have a lot of stuff lying around in boxes but I wanted something large, something I could use as a centre piece in my army.
Now my army is focussed on an artillery company. Don’t ask me why particularly but I love scenes such as this one in “A Bridge To Far”.
The aim is to pound the enemy to dust with big guns. However these still obviously needs support and when Games Workshop released the Valkyrie I couldn’t resist it. The model is fantastic. It also adds tactical flexibility to my army and would allow a conversion to take place.
Taken from the Games Workshop Website
This aircraft keeps my army theme together – the artillery pound the enemy and the dropship flys overhead to deliver the elite stormtrooper squad inside to where ever on the battlefield. However I had noticed was that my army lacked any anti tank hunting capabilities. The artillery I use (Medusa’s) are a serious threat to infantry but if you take the anti tank shells, it makes them less effective at the infantry. Also the artillery itself is inaccurate so using something with a little more accuracy to target the tanks made more sense.
Therefore I decided to convert the Valkyrie into the Vendetta gunship with 3 x twin linked lascannons which are devastating to armoured units. It’s job is to fly around and take out tanks (and possibly deploy some units behind enemy lines). Obviously this required some modification to take place as there’s no parts in the box to make what I wanted (typical!) so I dug around in my bits box and pulled some lascannons out from my heavy weapon squads – they all use mortars or heavy bolters so there are a few left over. With some plasticard and putty, I fitted them under the wing.
Also as this is a large model, I decided it needed to be done well so I’m also sorting the base out to be a fully detailed miniature diorama. I toyed between using Epic scale models to represent the Vendetta flying at high altitude or to have it flying over a kill. In the end the kill option won out as I had the parts to start getting on with it.
Now it’s currently work in progress but here it stands currently.
The base has a the remains of a Chaos chimera which I got from a Basilisk kit I had which had an extra sprue of armour plating in. The model is supposed to be flying low over the Chimera which it has just destroyed – the Chimera has the gaping hole where the las shots entered and this will be painted to show molten metal (or ceramite to Warhammer fans!) as the “kill” is fresh. The white parts are supposed to be the escape hatch that has blown out due to overpressure (the explosion of the Chimera!). The green stuff is putty and is there to represent the sand as as the side comes to a stop from exploding out from the side of the tank. It will be covered in sand along with the base. I also intend to scatter a few bits of “burning” debris around to base once the putty is fully cured and base is covered in sand.
The model is not affixed to the stand to allow for ease of carrying and to make it easier to know when the place is hovering etc in game. With a little luck, it should come along soon but I’m going to have to redo the black undercoat as some of it has gone horrible and bits are missed.
As for the paint scheme, I’m undecided. It will have to tie in with the desert themed camo that my guardsmen wear but I’m currently unsure how to pattern the craft – I would like to use an airbrush but they are quite expensive so I’ll have to consider the options. I certainly wont be using the Games Workshop “airbrush” as it’s terrible! It’s more an undercoating device…
As regular readers may remember, I got my Kalash AK74S upgraded over the Christmas period with a MOSFET and deans connectors. I got to use it in anger in the last week at the Grange Farm game in January.
I thought this would be an ideal time to give a few words on it and a quick after action report on the game.
Gun Performance
When I got the gun back I was happy with it however I got a bit concerned when I got it chronoed at the start of the day – it was still shooting ~220fps even though I had a new spring put in. This means that the old spring probably wasn’t the issue and I may have an air leak somewhere, either in the gearbox or in the hop unit. Odd as the hop seemed to be working fine. Otherwise the gun performance was good.
The deans connectors increased the RoF. In fact, the site owner asked me what the gun was as he said it sounds like a beast and was very nice looking (due to the real steel furniture). The deans connectors improve the rate of fire by providing a large surface area and better efficiency for current transfer. Anyhow, I was happy with that and all my charging cables seemed to be fine for it.
The MOSFET is a nice addition. I didn’t realise the difference it made until I compared my 74S with my 74SU. It actually made an impressive difference. And since I bought mine, RSOV have started selling a MOSFET for the AK here. for the price, it’s a very good addition. For those that don’t know, it essentially makes the trigger connection electronic rather than mechanical. It speeds up trigger responsiveness which is always a good option.
Game
The game itself was good – unfortunately no pictures as my camera wasn’t present. Getting to the site was interesting due to the large quantities of snow that managed to fall overnight – there must have been an inch of snow which made driving a little interesting! However once the M1 was reached, it wasn’t to bad and we eventually made it there.
Game was slow to get started as we waited for people to arrive due to the snow but we played a good few games during the day – the snow made it very wet and cold through the entire day. The snow melted about lunchtime but it hadn’t warmed up at all.
Games were quick and punchy thanks to the cold – however one game seemed to drag for a bit and we seemed to be taking the brunt of the enemy attack and seemed to be failing. And then just like that, it suddenly changed and the battle swung in our favour completely – I’ve no idea what happened but one minute we were losing, the next, we’d won!
Anyhow, it was a good day all round, if a bit chilly. The benefit of the Partizan I have is that it’s designed as an over suit (at least it seems like it), so I happily stayed warm by wearing some “civvie” clothes underneath to keep warm. And during the summer, I can wear just that to keep cool! I think I’ll be purchasing another set in the KLMK pattern to replace the KLMK suit I sold on.
Anyhow, another big thank you to Grange farm for another great days airsoft!
Regular readers or those that know me personally may know that I’m a keen archery fan. I have been for some while now. Early last year, I upgraded my carry case for my bow to a backpack based bag as I was carrying my archery equipment around a lot more and using the backpack was far easier than carrying around the hard case I used to have. This obviously left me with my old Negrini bow case. I didn’t fancy selling it on eBay as the postage would have been quite expensive. In the mean time it sat in the corner gathering dust.
Then it dawned on me that I could probably use this case for an airsoft gun, especially after I sold an AK and a bag (which was the only bag I could fit a full size AK in). After checking that the AK74S will fit, I set out to purchase some foam to put in the case to replace the foam cut to my bow. Cutting around the AK was easy but getting the foam out of the foam was hard. I resorted to cutting and ripping foam out using my hands. If I had used a hot wire cutter, the foam would have been much easier to remove and I would have ended up with a tidier finish. As you can see, the AK fits quite nicely within the case. The top layer of foam had to be cut down as well to allow the AK have a foam base (when I had the archery equipment in, the bow was against the case – not ideal). However I now have a nice smart gun case that will protect my case more than my previous green padded case, which to be honest was getting quite tatty.
Overall I’m very impressed with the solid case and I’m considering buying a pistol size case for my Scorpion. My local archery shop, Merlin Archery, also sell airguns so have a good selection of hard cases that I can choose from – however these will be the eggbox foam style rather than cut like the AK one above – I do however have a large amount of foam left from my £6 block so I could customise the boxes to suit what I currently use.
It all started whilst getting ready to move to start my PhD. Moving all my gear around I realised I had loads of AK parts lying about doing nothing. I believe I have a full AK47 just sat in pieces. What a waste! I could sell them on…or I could make a new gun…
So I went for the second option!
I have two AK47 bodies lying around, a full stock and an AK47S body. My plan is to make an AK47S. This gun was always rejected by me. I thought it looked a bit rubbish but gradually I’ve come to like it, especially after seeing this picture.
The above picture (I cant reference the original photographer as I cant remember where I got it but all credit goes to the original photographer) shows the gun I wish to create. Now it gives me a chance to use my PBS silencer. In previous articles I’ve discuess how I got it and was disappointed I struggled to get it working nicely. In fact, I’ve still never used it. This will change with this gun as I plan to slip a longer inner barrel into it to reach to the end or near the end of the silencer.
Eagle eyed readers may notice that the gun the chap is holding above is in fact not an AK47S but in fact an AKM. I was a bit loathe to make a gun that I don’t think is used in the Russian army anymore, but after reading Milgeek’s post today about the New Model Russian army, I was convinced this was the gun I wanted.
In essence I have most of the parts I require. A quick browse on ASCUK and I’ve now got myself a pretty new upgraded TM gearbox and Mauri hop up and bucking. All I need now is to purchase a longer inner barrel. This should lead this gun to fulfill a designated marksmen role as the inner barrel and extra power of the 1J spring, coupled with the already excellent mauri hop, will allow me to have a fairly well ranging gun.
As time goes by, I may convert it towards an AKM but to start with, I’ll use up what pieces I have lying around. All I really need now is an AK47 folding stock. At a later date I may stick a PSOP or a Kobra red dot on it but currently I’ll make it like the one in the picture.
One of my all time favourite pistols is the USP. It’s the first pistol I bought as an airsofter, mainly because someone was selling it second hand on my site for cheap so I bought it.
To me, it fits nicely in the hand, is very pointable and is a good looking gun as well. I’m not so keen on the compact version but overall, it’s a pistol I’ll come back to again and again.
The grandaddy of the USP’s in my opinion is the USP Match. Doesn’t ring a bell? As the astute readers will have guessed from my title, is that the USP Match was made famous by a certain tomb raider, Lara Croft.
It was used in both the film and the games. No I won’t be putting together a hot pants loadout to be going with it!!
It’s also (and most importantly in my case as I adore the series) the pistol in the Half Life 2 series of games (Half Life 1 was a Glock and I’m not getting one of those!!) I did have a feeling of doing a Half life 2 load out for fun, especially after watching a fan made HL2 video (Escape from City 17).
Regardless of a loadout, I wanted to make or buy the USP Match. Now after a quick look around, I found that there WAS a manufacturer of an airsoft USP macth. Made by KSC, this gorgeous bit of kit has a fairly large price tag and is restricted to the mags it comes with. See it here at Redwolf. These mags are expensive and overall I decided that I couldn’t afford it.
I then attempted to figure out how I can make it. The most iconic thing about the Match is the vented compensator and I struggled to figure out how to make a robust and good looking copy.
However the next day, after a google search, I found that in America, there seems to be a lot of USP Match springers. My aim was to then buy myself a springer from America and then remove the front end somehow. However people would not ship to the UK.
This was solved by posting on the Red Alliance.. I asked if an American member would purchase the springer and then ship the fore-end. However a European member kindly said he had one for sale and I snapped it up!
My USP transformed from a standard USP into this:
USP With Compensator
and finally into this:
Half Life 2 USP
This isn’t quite done yet. I want to add the tritium spots to the rear sights like in HL2, This will just be painted on as the tritium sight would be far out of my price range. However this was just a test before I buy a GBB USP (my first gas pistol in almost 3 years!)
I’m quite happy with the current results. Makes for a fairly unique pistol.
