Merry Christmas and a happy New Year 52/52

I wish you all Merry Christmas and a happy New Year.

Many thanks for following and reading my bad English blogs. :-)

P.S.

Before you believe I took a photographer course, the picture is from my brother, he is the professional in the family.

1/144 Sdkfz. 9 the Famo 51/52

I am very happy to announce, that I just finished two new models. Not a tank but at least on the same level of complexity. The German Sonderkraftfahrzeug 9 or better known as Famo. Famo was the name of the company which built the Sdkfz. 9.

Here is very good source of several pictures from different Famos: Famo.
During the war, the design chaned several times, mostly to save material.
The Famo ca,e in several designs, 
- as a tractor to tow heavy guns and to tranport the crew
- as a recovery truck to rescue tanks and other soft skins
- as a platform for several Flak or AA guns
- as a platform for a crane, the Bilstein crane and the stronger 10 ton crane

If you like to find out more about the differnt uses and versions of the Famo, here is a list of web pages, which I used during design:

http://modelerssocialclub.proboards.com/thread/11119/sdkfz-crane-update-final-stretch?page=3
http://www.fahrzeuge-der-wehrmacht.de/Artikel/Zgkw_18t.html
http://modelerssocialclub.proboards.com/thread/11119/sdkfz-crane-update-final-stretch?page=2

Here some pictures from my first test prints:

1/144 Famo with spade for recovery tasks

PD For the first picture I used the Famo from Panzerdepot and added the spade including the loading. The spade is fixed.

two Famo cranes and the tractor version 

The right and left Famos are the one from Panzerdepot while the white one in the middle is the brand new version, completely in 3D produced.

1/144 Famo with Bilstein crane

Famo with spade and crane

with some modifications you can make it moveable

1/144 Famo with Bilstein crane

1/144 recovery version

1/144 Famo with spade

German 1/144 Armoured Recovery Vehicle new video 50/52

Last weekend I spend again some time with creating a new video. I took all my ARV from the shelfs and created a new video. I hope you like it.

overview of all my 1/144 ARV

Elefant Recovery tank only 3 existed

simple field modification for a Bergepanther

1/144 Bergepanther with 3D printed parts

complete version of a Bergepanther, only the front MG is missing

Henschel D33 with recovery device for softskins

1/144 Famo with spade

Russian T-34 now in German service, field modification

Bergepanzer III, all parts are 3D printed

Hetzer with spade, this was only a unccessful prototype

Culemeyer transport platform

buy here

trailer 116 for Famo

buy here or in fine detailed material: buy here

Sonderanhänger 121 Kässbohrer trailer for heavy tanks

buy here

a complete set for Tiger transport

buy here

an addon set for the Famo

buy here

set to change a Panther into a Bergepanther

buy here

Batterie Gneisenau German Railway gun operated by the Kriegsmarine 49/52

Actually a friend of mine asked me to design the German railway gun Kurze Bruno. I do not know why, but somehow it changed very fast to the so called German Batterie Gneisenau. These were very reliable guns from WWI and found their way to the German railway. Why they are called Gneisenau, I have no idea, I remember the Gneisenau used these 15 cm guns on the side artillery too, but I believe it is just as many Batteries or Bunkers got names.
So these 4 guns were put on platform trailers and used during the WWII in the area of Cherbourg in France. There they got destroyed shortly after D-Day. Special is the fact, that the they got operated by the Kriegsmarine and not by the Wehrmacht.
If you look for pictures from the original gun, then you realize that there are not so many pictures. Finally I was lucky and found some good sources from where I could take the details I missed on the only drawing I found.

Here is the list of all sources I justed:

https://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=83812

http://www.one35th.com/model/k5/k5_15cmke.htm

https://ru-artillery.livejournal.com/449043.html

http://vds104.monespace.net/thau-info/images/patrimoine/histoire/histoire-frontignan/frontignan-1943-DM-Gneisenau-3.jpg

http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNGER_59-45_skc16.php

http://www.dws-xip.pl/encyklopedia/dzk15cmkkr-de/

and here are the first screenshots, the model is at the moment on the way to the printer.

1/144 Batterie Gneisenau, ready to fire

1/144 Batterie Gneisenau, some details of the gun

1/144 Batterie Gneisenau, in travelling position

1/144 Batterie Gneisenau, ready to fire

Happy Thanksgiving

I will you all a happy and peaceful weekend and a beautiful Thanksgiving.

Special wishes I send to Steve in Texas and to all our friends in California.

As business is not my most important task I hope you have time to enjoy the long weekend and do not waste time with shopping.

In one month we have Christmas, so there is still enough time to do a lot of shopping.

Thomas

One last wish to all British reader who my leave Europe this weekend finally.

Schienensicherungszug Blücher a new 1/144 train on its way 47/52

at the moment I try to finalize a new train model for one of the German Panzerzüge.
The waggon is very interesting as it's a combination of German and Russian train material. The main frame is a Russian waggon, built for the Russian Panzer trains. The Germans catched it and built on top a closed cabin with Russian tank turrets. For a short period it was used with a T-70 and T-34 turret, but later it changed to an Panzer IV turret.
If you look for more information, two of these wagons were part of the Sicherungszug Blücher, or Panzerzug 51.

Here some sources, where you can find more information:

http://braillebuilder.blogspot.com/2013/11/scratchbuilt-armoured-train-wagon.html

http://fahrzeuge-der-wehrmacht.de/Modelle/M-Artikel/M1-24_Eisenbahnwagen_Flak_RB.html

http://www.materielsterrestres39-45.fr/fr/index.php/materiels-ferroviaires/61-allemagne-materiel-ferroviaire/1074-flakwagen-equipe-d-un-quadruple-affut-de-20-mm

And here a preview of my design. I try to get it finished for thanksgiving, what is very competitive.

Panzerzug 51 / Streckensicherungszug Blücher

Streckensicherungszug Blücher

Panzerzug 51

new movie "my collection of 1/144 mini dioramas 46/52

Actually this was more a fun than a serious project, created on two evenings on the couch.
At the moment I have several small dioramas, all created on the same size of a 3 by 5" painitng canvas. None of them is really finished but on the weekend I took some pictures just for fun. Then I remembered that my wife had done several videos from pictures we had taken on vacations.
The video is done with an app from GoPro. I hope you like it.

1/144 German Reichsbahn and their special waggons AA-service 45/52

Transports by rail were during WWII one of the most important ways to bring everything what was needed to all fronts from the production plants inside Germany. As the Americans started bombing the German infrastructure, more and more Trains got directly attacked. Therefore the German Richsbahn looked for a easy to adopt solution to give the Trains a minimum of protection.
This has nothing to do with the German Panzerzüge. The Wehrmacht was owner of the Panzerzüge, but here we talk about the Reichsbahn.
So they came up with two types of armed trains. Both were eaysy to adapt and were based on existing material.

Geschützwagen type I with 2cm Flak

Geschützwagen I with 2 cm Falk

Geschützwagen type II with two concrete towers

Geschützwagen type II with two concrete towers

side view of the type II, on some pictures you can see them with Drillings instead of the 2 cm Flak

1/144 Autocar with Ponton trailer 44/52

More American stuff on the way.

Below you will see the first pictures from my new pontoon trailer. In general the US engineers used the Autocar tractor. So to complete the set, I have to build a new version of the Autocar tractor, for the pontoon set they had a big wooden box behind the cabin.
So I will change the design a bit and you can build a complete Autocar set.

1/144 Autocar set with Ponton trailer

1/144 Autocar set with Ponton trailer

1/144 Autocar set with Ponton trailer

1/144 Autocar set with Ponton trailer

new 1/144 horse sets for German Wehrmacht 43/52

The design of the horse was a real challenge and took some time. But I like them, as with the German Wehrmacht thousands of them were used during the whole war.

1/144 German horse drawn carts

1/144 Diorama: Germanys last attack

1/144 horse set I

1/144 Diorama: Germanys last attack

1/144 set of 4 horses

1/144 set of 4 horses

In the next weeks I will create more sets, so if you have any Special wishes, let me know.

1/144 special transport trailer for Maus, German super tank 42/52

Sometimes everything goes wrong. That is often called Murphy's law.
My Murphy's law has 14 wheels on each side and 3 misfailled prints.

I have designed the Maus Special transport trailer several months ago. Design done, measurements checked and ordered from Shapeways and then I present it here. This time the first print was not correct, so I changed the design to inforce some weak areas and thought, now it will work.
Print # 2 was better, but still far away from perfect or even acceptable. This time even some parts missed completly. So I changed the design again, partly redesigned most of the model new and waited for print numer # 3of the Maus trailer.
By the way, the Reichsbahn had only two of this trailers, the Wehrmacht only two Maus prototypes. At this time I already had more then they ever had. So I redesigned the rest of the model, changed some parts with a complete new design and waited for print # 4.

some of my misprinted versions, none of them was perfect

1/144 Maus transporter

the final perfect print of the Maus transporter 

Bottom view of the Maus transport waggon

1/144 Maus tansporter with the two end parts

front and end part of the Maus transporter are moveable

there was not so much space left, the Maus fits perfectly

the complete set, Transporter and the Cando Maus

the final Version and painted

some Background Information About the Maus

Wikipedia (engl)

Wikipedia (dt)

a Picture with the Maus on the Plattform can be found here

And here the a very nice built diorama, from where I got the Inspiration to build this plattform Trailer in the scale 1/144.