Post by scottwashburn on Apr 21, 2017 22:57:57 GMT
As an avid player of All Quiet on the Martian Front (and as the author of a series of novels based on the game) I wanted to add a group of armored cars to my American Army. Unfortunately, I wasn’t happy with the armored cars that the original owner of the game had created. These were basically just automobiles with some armor plate slapped on and a guy standing in the rear firing a machine gun. I mean they were okay, but I wanted something cooler.
Then, while surfing around for inspiration, I stumbled upon this incredible beauty: the Reeves “Octoauto”!
This was a real car! And from exactly the time period the game is set in. Wow! I wanted this as the basis for my armored car force!
But how to do it? I thought about making a master of it from scratch, or perhaps trying my luck with this new 3D printing stuff and then making molds to cast more. I mean I do have experience with 3D computer modeling and I’ve done a lot of casting. But it still seemed like more work than I wanted to go to for the limited number I’d need (10). So after thinking about it, I decided to modify an existing plastic model of an actual 8-wheeled armored car. This guy here:
A German armored car from World War II, the SDKFZ 231. The Plastic Soldier Company makes a very nice model of this in 15mm scale and I used that as my starting point. The first thing I needed to change was the spacing of the wheels. The Reeves OctoAuto has its wheels in pairs pushed forward and back with a gap in the middle, while the SDKFZ 231 has the wheels evenly spaced. Fortunately, the model has the axle assemblies as separate pieces and it was easy to clip out some of the supports and re-glue the axles closer together. I briefly considered modifying the wheel fenders to make them shorter, but I decided it wasn’t worth the trouble.
The next thing I wanted to change was the turret. The German armored car’s turret was pretty distinctive and I wanted something more steampunky
So I scratch built a whole new turret using plastic tubing and sheet styrene. I carved the turret hatch out of the German vehicle and glued that on top of the new turret. I also decided to turn the whole car around so the back of the German armored car became the front of mine. (Interestingly, the actual German SDKFZ 231 was designed to be operable equally well in forward or reverse.) And I added a machine gun mount to the hull next to the driver.
Finally, I added some rivets to the body and the turret using white glue mixed with talcum powder. Then it was just a matter of painting. I like the results.
Now I just need to make nine more!
Then, while surfing around for inspiration, I stumbled upon this incredible beauty: the Reeves “Octoauto”!
This was a real car! And from exactly the time period the game is set in. Wow! I wanted this as the basis for my armored car force!
But how to do it? I thought about making a master of it from scratch, or perhaps trying my luck with this new 3D printing stuff and then making molds to cast more. I mean I do have experience with 3D computer modeling and I’ve done a lot of casting. But it still seemed like more work than I wanted to go to for the limited number I’d need (10). So after thinking about it, I decided to modify an existing plastic model of an actual 8-wheeled armored car. This guy here:
A German armored car from World War II, the SDKFZ 231. The Plastic Soldier Company makes a very nice model of this in 15mm scale and I used that as my starting point. The first thing I needed to change was the spacing of the wheels. The Reeves OctoAuto has its wheels in pairs pushed forward and back with a gap in the middle, while the SDKFZ 231 has the wheels evenly spaced. Fortunately, the model has the axle assemblies as separate pieces and it was easy to clip out some of the supports and re-glue the axles closer together. I briefly considered modifying the wheel fenders to make them shorter, but I decided it wasn’t worth the trouble.
The next thing I wanted to change was the turret. The German armored car’s turret was pretty distinctive and I wanted something more steampunky
So I scratch built a whole new turret using plastic tubing and sheet styrene. I carved the turret hatch out of the German vehicle and glued that on top of the new turret. I also decided to turn the whole car around so the back of the German armored car became the front of mine. (Interestingly, the actual German SDKFZ 231 was designed to be operable equally well in forward or reverse.) And I added a machine gun mount to the hull next to the driver.Finally, I added some rivets to the body and the turret using white glue mixed with talcum powder. Then it was just a matter of painting. I like the results.
Now I just need to make nine more!
