Showing posts with label garden Railway. Show all posts
Showing posts with label garden Railway. Show all posts

Wednesday, March 13, 2024

Military trains in large scale hitting the news

I'm a subscriber to Norway's only model railway magazine called 'Mj-Bladet' (simply translated into 'The Model Railway Magazine'),  which have 4 editions a year.

When I receive a copy I usually sits down, relaxing with a cup of coffee and enjoys the issue.

My military G scale trains on print in Norway's only model railway magazine
When receiving the latest issue today, I was surprised to see this large photo of my large scale military trains, which I has covered in this blog, almost making it to the middle pages too.
My military G scale trains on print in Norway's only model railway magazine
My military G scale trains on print in Norway's only model railway magazine

This was a very nice surprise to see my work from this blog at print and published.

Friday, March 8, 2024

A LGB Toy Train wagon + salvages for the 'scrap box' = Another Heeresfeldbahn military load going to the front

Making a tarpaulin load for model railways. a LGB wagon turnes into a G-scale military railway, heeresfeldbahn.
Click for larger image

One of my other interests other than the military modelling, wargaming and railway modelling is riding my motorcycle. I'm not only riding it a lot just for commuting to work (60 km away), but for recreational rides as well. But motorcycles are a seasonal thing in Norway, as we have long, cold and snowy winters where running conditions are bad or non existent. So when I had to park my motorcycle for the winter in October, I said that when "when one mc-season ends, another one starts..." as I had a couple of indoor motorcycle modelling projects on my workbench for the winter:

Making a tarpaulin load for model railways. a LGB wagon turnes into a G-scale military railway, heeresfeldbahn.
Click for larger image

The plan was to make a Kettenkrad and a BMW motorcycle with sidecar on my 3D-printer as military loads for 2 flatcars I was going to use for my G-scale Heeresfeldbahn. The Kettenkrad-kit turned out just fine, but the motorcycle with the sidecar did not look good when upscaled and 3D-printed on my printer. Both of them was originally made to 28mm scale as wargame items, but only the Kettenkrad looked acceptable when scaled up to 1:19 scale. The sidecar-motorcycle didn't print well in my 3D-printer and looked so bad and crude that I finally replaced it with a 1:18 scale diecast BMW model I was able to get cheap instead. I was just going to throw away the parts for the 3D-printed one, but somehow I just kept them laying around on my workbench for a while as I could use them for paint tests etc.

Making a tarpaulin load for model railways. a LGB wagon turnes into a G-scale military railway, heeresfeldbahn.
The original motorcycle I 3D-printed, but decided not to use.
Click for larger image

Making a tarpaulin load for model railways. a LGB wagon turnes into a G-scale military railway, heeresfeldbahn.
I found this 1:18 scale ready made diecast model instead, which looked the part except for the postwar windscreen and seat. It would be easier to fix those rather than making the 3D-printed model presentable 
Click for larger image

About the same time I went on a trip with my MRC to a model railway exhibition in Germany, where I ended up buying another colorfull LGB flat-wagon, which I could use in my growing Heeresfeldbahn rake:
Making a tarpaulin load for model railways. a LGB wagon turnes into a G-scale military railway, heeresfeldbahn.
Click for larger image

This wagon was going to need a load to make it look more interesting. After seeing a video on YouTube on how to make tarpaulin loads, I was curious to try out the technique my self, and was happy that I didn't throw away the parts for the bad looking 3D-printed BMW motorcycle with sidecar.  It would work as a testpiece for the tarpaulin-technique, as it was ruined anyway. Now I could try to cover up the mistakes literally. 

Making a tarpaulin load

After assembling the motorcycle-model I didn't care to paint it. I just covered it with a sheet of regular tissue-paper (3 layers), and soaked it with diluted PVA-glue (close to 50:50 ratio) using a broad paintbrush to push it into crevices. I started on the highest part of the model, working downwards to the lower parts. I got a couple of rift and tears in the soaked paper, which I just patched up with small tissue- paper pieces and gave them the same treatment, and they blended in perfectly.
Making a tarpaulin load for model railways. a LGB wagon turnes into a G-scale military railway, heeresfeldbahn.
Click for larger image
Making a tarpaulin load for model railways. a LGB wagon turnes into a G-scale military railway, heeresfeldbahn.
Click for larger image

I let the diluted PVA-glue dry until the next day. When I checked it the tissue-paper had turned into a hard shell, but still it felt kind a little fragile. As I was going to use it outside under different weather conditions, I wanted it to be much sturdier so it wouldn't dissolve in rain or snow. To make it harder and sturdier, I gave i 3 coats of ModPodge, which I have good experience from using it as a sealer for wargaming miniatures.
Making a tarpaulin load for model railways. a LGB wagon turnes into a G-scale military railway, heeresfeldbahn.
Click for larger image

Even if ModPodge include som kind of Vinyl, I wanted it to be sturdier against soaking, so I gave it a couple of layers of varnish as well. By now it didn't feel so fragile anymore. 

Next it could be painted:
Making a tarpaulin load for model railways. a LGB wagon turnes into a G-scale military railway, heeresfeldbahn.
Click for larger image

A wash and some drybrushing really brings out the 'details':
Making a tarpaulin load for model railways. a LGB wagon turnes into a G-scale military railway, heeresfeldbahn.
Click for larger image

-And finally placed on the (repainted) flatcar. The flatcar was simply painted 'Panzer Grey' with a rattlecan, and drybushed withe some brown acrylics.
Making a tarpaulin load for model railways. a LGB wagon turnes into a G-scale military railway, heeresfeldbahn.
Click for larger image
Making a tarpaulin load for model railways. a LGB wagon turnes into a G-scale military railway, heeresfeldbahn.
Click for larger image

That motorcycle looks much better now hidden  under a tarpaulin. Throw away nothing, your scrap can be hidden under tarpaulin and be uses as loads or terrain-pieces in wargaming.

This was a fun and quick build and made me feel confident to make more such tarpaulin loads in the future. Just by following the instructions from the YouTube video, this technique worked the first time. Have a try for your self. 

Did I mention that I like motorcycles?
Making a tarpaulin load for model railways. a LGB wagon turnes into a G-scale military railway, heeresfeldbahn.
Click for larger image

My LGB Heeresfeldbahn rake so far:
Making a tarpaulin load for model railways. a LGB wagon turnes into a G-scale military railway, heeresfeldbahn.
Click for larger image


Friday, February 9, 2024

From LGB 'ToyTrain System' to G-scale Heeresfeldbahn rollingstock


How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale Herresfeldbahn rollingstock

To expand my large-scale Heeresfeldbahn beyond the 3 wagons Incuded in the starterset, I found some inexpensive goods-wagons from the LGB's ToyTrain line. They were very colorfull and like the name indicated, toylike and needed to be 'militarized' to suit my purpose.

How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale Herresfeldbahn rollingstock

I've also been upgrading my aged FlashForge Finder 3D-printer to a FlashForge Adventurer 3 recently, and it really improved the overall print quality I think. Even if I bought it second hand, the new printer is very much value for money and are not very expensive even if you goes for a completely new one. Being goods-wagons, I tink they needed to be loaded with some 'military-goods', so to break my new 3D-printer in and get to know it, I printed some items to use as loads:
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale Herresfeldbahn rollingstock

Despite of LGB's general 1:22,5 scale, my locomotives are built to 1:19th scale. Vehicles in 1:19 scale are rare and very expensive. 1:18 vehicles are more common and close enough in scale. Too bad many diecast cars in 1:18th scale are also usually very pricey, and especially military ones, but I found a couple of 1:18th scale toycars second hand I got for just about $69/£54 together. Despite being slightly over-scale, postwar and their civilian appearance, the very same type of vehicles were used by German forces during WWII (even on the eastern front), so they'll make a suitable loads in 16mm with new paintjobs.
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale Herresfeldbahn rollingstock

While working on this project, I also found a cheap 1:18th scale BMW motorcycle for only $11. As the cars, it is actually a post war model but looks very like the older models used in WWII. I'll see if I can give it a convincing backdating as well.
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale Herresfeldbahn rollingstock

This was very colorful so new paint was needed. It only came with 4 stakes when I bought it, so I kept it that way so it would look slightly different from the other wagons of the same type. I just re-positioned them. I placed the motorcycle pictured above as a load after cutting the windscreen away, changing the seat with some 3D-printed ones and painting it 'German Grey'.
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale Herresfeldbahn rollingstock

This is the same car as the previous, but I think the numbers of stakes looked a bit 'overkill'. Perhaps it's needed if carrying long loads like logs etc. but for these smaller loads I thinks it's looked better if I removed some of the stakes. The observant reader may notice some 3D-printed parts for a Kettenkrad in this blogpost's 3rd photo. It was originally a 28mm wargame model I just resized to 1:19th scale, printed, painted and added some few more details to it. 8345 Kettenkrads was made during WWII. Did I mention I like motorcycles??
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale Herresfeldbahn rollingstock

This wagon is just repainted and had one of the repainted 1:18 dicast car loaded to it. My Heeresfeldbahn rake looks like it's 'just been primed' or like '50 shades of grey' so I decided to add some 'kind of more color' to it, by giving the vehicles some different colors than the 'standard grey'. Some 688 VW 82/E Geländekäfer; Beetle body on Kübelwagen chassis were made for the German armed forces. 
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale military Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale military Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
This is exactly the same type of wagon as the previous one, so to make it slightly different I made it look revised and a 'modernized' version of the former by changing from spoked to disc-wheels and giving it a more refreshed grey-paintjob not looking so aged as the previous. Actually I did almost no weathering to it at all, and when bringing it to running sessions I was frecently asked when I was going to finish it. - So I gave it a dirty, brownish wash, just to tone the 'fresh grey' down. It's also had one of the 1:18th scale toycars added as a load after being repainted to suitable colors. Citroën Traction Avant was an innovative vehicle with front wheel drive and ground clearance enough to see service with the French army, Wehrmacht and The French resistance. Beside those vehicles seized by Wehrmacht after occupying France in 1940, another 4722 Citroën Tractions was built for Wehrmacht service, and they saw service on all fronts including in Stalingrad. Between 1934 - 1957 more than 760 000 were built in total. 
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale military Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale military Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
I think this looks like an old wagon and to 'backdating it' I changed the disc-wheels with spoked ones, as trying to paint it to an aged look. I have a friend who is facinated by open cars with figures placed in them often suggested to be partying and similar. I'm not sure if this is 'a thing', but such wagons can often be found on G-scale layouts on model railway exhibitions we have been visiting (mostly in Germany). As this is a German train and I'm often visiting this friend for running sessions in his garden, I would try to make such a theme in this open wagon as well trying to make it suitable for the train, theme and period though. Their pets, the black cats, are a homage to our own pets 'Svarten' and 'Sofus'.
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale military Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale military Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale military Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale military Herresfeldbahn rollingstock

Lesson learned and a warning...

When repainting the VW and Citroën I wanted to recreate a feeling of spraypainting with 'soft edges' in the camouflagepattern. To do this I used 'soft' modeling-clay as a mask to shape the camouflagepattern and spraypaint it with rattlecans (as this will give soft edges). So far, so good:
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale military Herresfeldbahn rollingstockHow to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale military Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale military Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
When removing the mask I saw that the edges had the soft effect I wanted, but it was a complete disaster!! The modeling clay had reacted with the paint beneath, so it become wet again, transparent, very sticky and the paint job was completely ruined. The paint didn't reharden either. Before trying to recover the errors I tried to 'seal' it by overspraying the model with a matt varnish, but it did not help; all the painted areas which had been covered by the modeling clay were still very sticky, and I was afraid the models was ruined. To try to save them, I sanded their surfaces until they didn't feel sticky anymore. Then I just primed them again and used brushes and acrylics for the camouflage.
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale military Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
So note to self, and don't do the same mistake as me; modeling clay does not work very well for painting masks. It made me search info if some modeling clay that would, but I didn't find any. Even Playdough doesn't seems to work acording to what I've seen online. Have you any experiences of what's working, or any other suggestions to get a spraypainted finnish without using an airbrush?

This project has taken a lot longer time that I expected it to, but finally my G-scale LGB Heeresfeldbahn rake slowly keeps growing...
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale military Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
How to easily turn colorful and toy like LGB wagons into G-scale military Herresfeldbahn rollingstock
My LGB Heeresfeldbahn so far with the original starterset + the 5 wagons described in this blogpost.
Click on photo for larger photo
It's been a lot of trains lately, so next blogpost will be about wargaming. A battle report perhaps? Sign up and follow this blog and find out.


Saturday, February 3, 2024

A Day out with friends and trains

Garden railway. Running G scale trains in the garden. Military G scale train. LGB Heeresfeldbahn

A member in our MRC invited to a running-session in his garden today. When I arrived I suddenly understood that it would probably be crowded and heavy traffic on his rails:

Garden railway. Running G scale trains in the garden. Military G scale train. LGB Heeresfeldbahn

And here some of the other members are 'fiddling' and creating their rakes for today:

Garden railway. Running G scale trains in the garden. Military G scale train. LGB Heeresfeldbahn

There is a great span in prototypes, eras and scales and the only thing in common is the rail-gauge with 45mm. Here follows some impressions of today's running-session:

Garden railway. Running G scale trains in the garden. Military G scale train. LGB Heeresfeldbahn
Garden railway. Running G scale trains in the garden. Military G scale train. LGB Heeresfeldbahn
Garden railway. Running G scale trains in the garden. Military G scale train. LGB Heeresfeldbahn
Garden railway. Running G scale trains in the garden. Military G scale train. LGB Heeresfeldbahn
Garden railway. Running G scale trains in the garden. Military G scale train. LGB Heeresfeldbahn
Garden railway. Running G scale trains in the garden. Military G scale train. LGB Heeresfeldbahn
Garden railway. Running G scale trains in the garden. Military G scale train. LGB Heeresfeldbahn
Garden railway. Running G scale trains in the garden. Military G scale train. LGB Heeresfeldbahn
This usually runs weekly on our club-house and made it's first outing today:
Garden railway. Running G scale trains in the garden. Military G scale train. LGB Heeresfeldbahn
I was running my Heeresfeldbahn, surprise surprise...
Garden railway. Running G scale trains in the garden. Military G scale train. LGB Heeresfeldbahn
And running it into another era and train. Luckily it went just fine.
Garden railway. Running G scale trains in the garden. Military G scale train. LGB Heeresfeldbahn
Another member has a couple of the original LGB tankers, so I just had to pull my repainted one up for a comparsion:
Garden railway. Running G scale trains in the garden. Military G scale train. LGB Heeresfeldbahn
We were running until late and it was dark. Then there is no use running my grey military train, as it looks like just grey works good for camouflage.
Garden railway. Running G scale trains in the garden. Military G scale train. LGB Heeresfeldbahn
It was getting dark and cold outside, so our friend invited us in for pizza and beer.

What a great day out!


Sunday, December 31, 2023

2023 - A brief sumary - 2024 Quo Vadis?

a 2023 summary of The Hobby Blog for Model railways, Wargaming and Military modelling

Well it's soon the end of the year and probably time to look back on the past year, and share some thoughts for following one.

This is not a big blog with a lot of blogposts or having a very large number of followers, but 2023 has been the most active year on this blog so far. Most of the readers are located in United States of America, followed by Singapore (!), followed by United kingdom. I'm not sure if there are so many actual readers from Singapore, or if it's some sort of web crawlers or search spiders located there??
Anyway, I appreciate all of you who are following it, reading it, and contributes with your comments. Especially thanks to all of you that have been promoting this blog and linking to it through your own blogs, Facebook pages or other websites. Even if my settings are set to be searchable by Google and search description added, I actually got few hits from Google (only 115 through whole 2023), and when I do it's usually just right after posting a new post. So, you're all responsible for this years growth of members and blogposts, which motivates me to follow up with more. - Thank you!!

2023 - Status

In 2023 I continued to review free downloadable wargame rules that can be played with ordinary Army Men, which I started to in 2022. It seems like 'Old school gaming' from for instance Donald Featherstone are more popular than other free rules reviewed in 2023. I've been playing a lot of the free rules I found and was personally keen to try out, and there are still some few free wargame rules I want to try out though.

a 2023 summary of The Hobby Blog for Model railways, Wargaming and Military modelling

During the year I developed my own 'home brewed wargame rules', Rules of Engagement, based on experience from these other free rules I've played so far. Even if I think they turned out to be playable and pretty good as I achieved a lot of my goals for it, I still thinks they need some further development. I also used a periodic version of these home brewed rules in combination with free paper miniatures for a prehistoric game.

This year I also reviewed a commercial wargame rule, Bolt Action, as I found a way to play it for free. I recognize a lot of game mechanics that can already be found in many of those free wargame rules already mentioned, but I liked the way Warlord Games have combined them in Bolt Action.

2023 was also the year I tried out to use AI for wargaming either to develop rules or using it as an AI-opponent. During the process I experienced that the use of AI in general is controversial, and there was obvious no exception among wargamers.

a 2023 summary of The Hobby Blog for Model railways, Wargaming and Military modelling
Some of the Free Wargame Rules I played in 2023

Summers in Norway are usually short with mostly nice weather, so during that time of year it's more tempting doing 'hobby stuff'outside. Since I'm into model railways as well, I finally got around to convert a LGB-starter set I've had for some while into a Narrow Gauge Military German Railway. Since it was a starter set there wasn't so many wagons to form a larger train, so I started up converting even more LGB-wagons I got cheap. Converting them and making credible loads for them took longer time that I've expected, and it kept me busy through the autumn and winter, and it looks like it will still keep me busy for a while. 

During a running-session in a friend's garden early this winter I had a derailment which sent my German military LGB-locomotive into the ground, smashing the front of it. Luckily I wasn't running my Live Steam Locomotive at the time. Anyhow, this made me use more of my precious modelling- and gaming time to re-construct and getting it back in running condition again. Now I probably got a feeling what it's like to be into RC planes...

I added some more details like building plates, a hatch and grille to it while it was in the workshop. 

a 2023 summary of The Hobby Blog for Model railways, Wargaming and Military modellinga 2023 summary of The Hobby Blog for Model railways, Wargaming and Military modellinga 2023 summary of The Hobby Blog for Model railways, Wargaming and Military modelling

This left me in a situation where I had less time for wargaming and writing battle reports of my games than I expected, and therefore less activity on my blog from late autumn. Until now recently when I've been doing some quick projects on winter and Christmas related modelling.

a 2023 summary of The Hobby Blog for Model railways, Wargaming and Military modelling

2024 - What to expect?

Because my military garden modelling and locomotive mishap seized most of my modelling time at the end of the year, it meant that there were a lot of my planned activity I didn't have time to do during 2023. So this gives a good starting point for 2024 though. I hope I'll manage to cover them all this time:

  • I plan to play and review at least one more new free wargame rules which you can find online and play with ordinary Army Men. If you have any suggestions, please post them in the comment section below.
  • Finish a G-scale rake of cars for my LGB Heeresfeldbahn.
  • Last year I played one of the first conflicts in history, so in 2024  I plan to prepare some figures and play one of the most recents conflicts in history. 
  • I plan to prepare some miniatures and play at least one game of 'Fantasy Scenario' or probably also a 'Wild West Scenario' or both.
  • I plan to do another 'Print and Play for Free', but with another period and scenario this time.
  • If I can find a budget way to do it, I'll play another commercial wargame.
  • As summers are short and intense in Norway, I'll do some outdoor military modelling in 2024 as well. Perhaps make an UK-military rake for my Live Steam locomotive, or make my RC-boat look more 'Norwegian'.
  • Complete another indoor model railway layout.
-Time will show! 
I hope all of you will keep following for updates through 2024 as well, and comment and share the blog's contents. I'm certainly looking forward to follow your activities in the coming year!

I wish you all the very best for 2024!!
a 2023 summary of The Hobby Blog for Model railways, Wargaming and Military modelling


You may also be interested in: