AK47 Air Support

It's perhaps the best bit of a game of AK47.

You roll a double four and in zooms the air strike in support of your hard pressed professionals, as they valiantly fight off hordes of tooled up enemy militia. But..it tends to lack a certain 'something' or as my wife would say, a little je ne sais quoi (she's French by the way), if there isn't an actual aircraft to be plonked on the table.

Fear not, a little searching on Ebay, a bit of spray paint and some spare decals later and you'll have all that you need for a bit of ground strafing, however brief it may be in game terms. These are two of the converted diecast planes that I've made for AK47, a Del Prado/Italeri F4U Corsair and a GE Fabbri P51 Mustang.

I've turned the P51 into an ersatz Mustang Cavalier by adding some tip tanks from a diecast Thunderjet, extending the nose with green stuff and adding some rocket pods from a diecast Augusta helicopter. A bit of a classic COIN aircraft, so perfect for AK47, especially as diecast P51's are really cheap.

The Corsair is straight from the box but with the very spindly three blade prop exchanged for a spare four blade P51 prop with spinner, to make it a little bit like a Cuban Hawker Sea Fury. I quite like this one, so it's destined for my next AK47 dictatorship army (at least until the MiG 17 turns up).

Klear Wash

I mixed up a batch of wash for the ARVN this evening as the sample stuff I prepared before has been pretty much used up on the CO stands. It's a mix of Johnson's Klear as a base plus random quantities of various brown and black acrylic paints that I had to spare.

I'm not sure if it'll match the previous batch of wash I made, although it looks the right sort of grungy shade, so I'll give it a test shot on a single model before I slap it all over my ARVN APC's. I'm not very confident when it comes to mixing washes, so I may have to chuck the whole lot and start again if it goes pear shaped.

I've also added another drybrush coat to the ARVN vehicles, a 50:50 mix of GW Knarloc Green and GW Camo Green, so the next step is the wash before I add a highlight drybrush to pick out the detail. I'm hoping the wash will work as well as the last lot, but I have my fingers firmly crossed just in case.

Axles and Alloys Sprayshop

Hotwheels Shelby Cobra Daytona with machine guns.
(not sure about this one...looks a bit like a snail?)

Maisto Lamborghini Murcialago with autocannon roof turret.

(simple...but does the business)

Hotwheels CCM Country Club Muscle with cannon and machine gun.

(bonkers...who makes up these names?)

Three new additions to the Axles and Alloys production line, all of which I rather quickly bashed together this evening, hence the minimum level of extra bits. The guns are all Dark Future ones which means I have only a few left for further conversions so may have to do some scratchbuilt weapon mounts for the next batch of cars. I've kept the post-apocalyptic thing to a minimum with this lot but will go overboard with the spikes, armour plate and baggage on the next installment.

The Rough Guide To Nbuto

This is what I've worked out so far based on previous battle reports and some judicious use of my imagination. I've left off the relief as it will just complicate things. Otherwise, it's not bad if I say so myself.

Axles and Alloys Accelerated

Looks like Jon has been pretty busy this weekend with some excellent diecast conversions:

http://jonswargamesminis.blogspot.com/2010/01/car-wars.html

I'll have to get cracking with my selection of Hotwheels if I'm going to stand a chance against that lot!

I had a go at the engine-less Pontiac GTO that I found in the kids toy box but ran into a problem with the Dark Future guns, which were far too small to fit in the engine recess. I did find an old plastic gun arm from an EM4 robot that fitted OK, so I cut it down and glued it in. I'll have to add some more bits and bobs to finish it off though, as it looks a little basic. I quite like the idea of some applique armour plates glued on the sides and roof?

I better have a rummage for some more vehicles and components when I get home this evening, so that I can knock some together ready for painting tomorrow. I might also dig out my old copy of Battlecars if I can find it in the loft.

Where is the Independent Republic of Nbuto?

Yes, indeed.

I've been thinking of drawing up some sort of simple map to set out the geography of my AK47 colonial settler nation, the glorious Independent Republic of Nbuto. In all of the games that I've played so far against Jon's Lumatan-Zumatan forces, I've written up an after action report that features a few key locations. From the shanty towns of Watumbi, via the Wanayani Bridge over the Chokwe River to the Mtwange-Batufu corridor, the geography of Nbuto has gradually taken shape. However, it's all a bit vague at the moment, in true AK47 style.

What I'd like to do is sketch out the relative position of some key areas and locations, so that it all starts to make some sense. I'll definately want to include some disputed border lines with neighbouring Lumata and Zumata. I also want to add a couple of other adjacent countries that I can adopt as future territories for my Dictatorship and Superpower Backed armies. I will then be able to add in the places I've already mentioned in dispatches, adding some interesting features such as lakes, rivers, swamps, railway lines, roads and towns, alongside the usual areas of hills, bush and jungle.

I've got some holiday time coming up in a couple of weeks so I'll set some time aside when I'm away (not in France for a change!) to devise a map and a little historical background for the Nbuto regime.

Back on Track

I managed to get a base coat of 50:50 GW Knarloc Green / Foundry Phlegm Green Shade on all of the remaining ARVN vehicles, except the field guns, this afternoon. I've decided to blitz the ARVN APC's and Tanks in one go otherwise I'll not get them finished by half term, which starts on the 13th February. I'm going to try to get the second drybrush coat done this evening if I can squeeze it in.

I've also given the bases of the finished stands a light drybrush highlight of GW Bleached Bone following the sage advice of the chaps over on the CWC Forum. It's definately 'lifted' the tone of the bases from red to orange, which is what I was after in the first place. Now all I have to do is add some static grass, foliage etc to finish the bases off. Before I dive in at the deep end with this I'm going to try out a couple of different approaches on some 50 x 50mm bases which I will subsquently use as the stands for the F5A fighters, if they turn out OK.

Finally, I managed to pick up a copy of the AK47 supplement for the old second edition rules today on Ebay. I've borrowed a copy of the supplement before to check out the rules for snipers, rockets, cavalry and the like but, as I'm not into gaming Lebanon, the rest of the book remained unread. However, as it's now out of print I thought I'd snatch up a copy! I'm sure it'll be of use for some extra add ons in future games of AK47, even if the bulk of the rules aren't of interest. It only cost £1.20 plus postage too.

Excellent!

Hotwheels Zotic

Whilst rummaging through my box of diecast Battlecars related stuff I found this converted but unpainted Hotwheels model. It's a Zotic, whatever that means, with a Dark Future gun stuck on the roof and extended by the addition of a long brass rod barrel.

I've also added some drop weapons pods on the back end using N scale oil drums, which make perfect 'depth charge' style drop pods for oil, spikes or smoke. I got to the undercoating stage with this one then put it aside for some reason and completely forgot about it. It shouldn't take too long to paint up alongside one or two other conversions that I have in mind.

ARVN Base Painting

Not a lot done today due to family stuff taking up most of the time I had to spare. I have had a crack at the ARVN bases though, with a heavy drybrush of GW Bestial Brown, followed by a lighter drybrush of GW Vermin Brown and a highlight of GW Vomit Brown. It looks OK, as you can see in the photo, but still a little too dark red and a little less orange than I'd like. Once I add some static grass and clump foliage it should look a bit less barren.

I also got some late birthday presents, including a £25 Peter Pig gift token thing from my sister, which I'm going to spend on extras for the AK47 army. I also had a parcel through the post of some bits and bobs I ordered from Peter Pig including some militia figures, Toyota technicals and an SU122 SPG, so a good day in retrospect despite the lack of progress on the ARVN.

J Wings F5A Freedom Fighter

I've already got one 1/144th scale J Wings Northrop F5A for the ARVN battlegroup but, when another one popped up on ebay a few days ago I thought I'd add to my ground attack capability. I'm allowed a flight of two VNAF F5A's in the battlegroup list so why not?

The model arrived from Hong Kong today, which was pretty quick! It consists of a prepainted fuselage with canopy, wings and tailplanes attached. The extra components including the nosecone, fuelprobe, undercarriage, hardpoints, tanks and bombs are attached to seperate sprues. There's also a small sheet of yellow and black checkerboard decals to apply to the fuselage.

It's a really nice model and will need minimal effort to assemble, although I'll need to make a new flight stand for it to replace the plastic one supplied in the box. It should look pretty good next to the other one I already have as they shoot across the table in a low level strafe run. The aircraft is in the markings of the VNAF 522nd Fighter Squadron which operated out of Bien Hoa air base in the early 1970's. There's some good footage of the unit in action in this clip: