Saracen from the Garrison

Mossie · February 24, 2008, 01:13:14 PM

My entry is going to be a bit more sober than some, never mind eh? It'll be be OOB except for the paint job, a British Army Berlin Garrison battle-taxi.

The Saracen entered service in the 1950's & was largely withdrawn from frontline service when the FV432 was introduced. The Saracen continued in British Army use into the 90's, especially in Northern Ireland, despite the Warrior being introduced in the 80's to begin replacing the FV432! The Berlin Brigade's vehicles were painted an urban camouflage that distinguished that units vehichles from 1983 until the British retired from Germany after the fall of the Berlin Wall. The Saracen did not serve with the Brigade during this period, so never got painted up in this camo.

Here's the Inspiration, thanks Mark!

Here's the kit:

And I'm getting a little help from this:

cthulhu77 · February 24, 2008, 01:20:09 PM

Gonna be cool!

Mossie · February 24, 2008, 02:35:48 PM

Thanks Greg!

Here's the progress so far:

Main parts together:

Primer/base coat on:

The Saracen really says 'Military Vehicle' to me, it's bulky, tough looking & looks like it could ride out a nuke. The kit's pretty simple to build, four main parts to the hull, three to the turret, two each for the six wheels & a handful of detail parts. There's enough going on for it to look like a Saracen in 1/76, but if your a detail freak, then there's fodder for you here too.

I cleaned up & got the main parts together pretty quickly. There's a small amount of PSR to be done, but the parts hide some of the seams anyway. Saying that, the running board makes it difficult to fill the gap there, but I 'm hoping it doesn't show too much after the paint proper is on. I've primed it with Halfords White Primer, I'm also using this for the white panels.

Being a 1/76 kit, some of the parts are tiny & I pinged one the headlights out of the forceps & into oblivion, so I had to scratch a pair from some spare parts from a 1/48 Spitfire kit, basically rod shaped pieces with rounded ends. I cut the ends of these & hey presto, new headlights, if not quite perfect!

Now, I'm going to stick my guns on this one. I started to get away from my original purpose with my F11F Tiger kit & nearly didn't finish it. I still intend to just 'finish' a few kits & do nothing fancy yet, although I've picked a bugger of scheme to mask (any tips are very welcome), especially with the angles on this machine & those running boards! It's not going to be a competition winner, but I'm enjoying it.

HOG · February 24, 2008, 05:16:03 PM

Hiya Mossie,

"but I'm enjoying it."

Nothing else matters.

Mossie · February 25, 2008, 01:02:56 PM

Thanks guys! I'm a bit knackered tonight & the idea of masking this scheme is giving me the heebie jeebies! I've found a two-view diagram which I'm going to try & plan the scheme on, but if anyones got a better one please let me know! Anyone got any tips???

BlackOps · February 25, 2008, 09:34:24 PM

Go Mossie Go! This is gonna be cool.

As for Tips, I like fortune cookies myself, always packed with wonderful advice and insight

ysi_maniac · February 26, 2008, 05:56:05 AM

Quote from: Mossie on February 25, 2008, 01:02:56 PM
Anyone got any tips???

Not for masking, but ... what about a recoilless gun?

Mossie · February 26, 2008, 07:12:23 AM

It sounds good Carlos, but I don't have any parts I could readily convert.

Mike Wren · February 26, 2008, 08:12:50 AM

I started building a Saxon APC for just the same scheme a while back, never finished it though... other candidates for Berlin camo would be trucks & Land Rovers as they remained in standard green/black

anyway, try to make painting as easy as possible for yourself my making sure and colour breaks are along nice flat surfaces so its easier to mask/paint them, other than that all I can do is wish you luck!

ysi_maniac · February 27, 2008, 06:23:09 AM

Hi Simon,
Take into account that in real world, wheels use to be painted in only a colour, no matter the scheme.

Mossie · February 27, 2008, 07:53:36 AM

Thanks Carlos, you've just helped me out there! I realised they should be one colour, but I thought it should be black. After you're comment, I looked again at the wheeled vehicles in my reference book & realised they should be the brown shade!

Mike Wren · February 28, 2008, 04:41:57 AM

road wheels should be black

Mossie · February 28, 2008, 05:27:14 AM

Mike, the pics of Foxes in the book I showed in the earlier post definately have brown wheels, there are also pics of Foxes in standard British Army camouflage, these have black wheels of course. There's some pics of a single Ferret as well, it's more difficult to tell with this one as the paint is a bit worn but I'd say they were brown too. The road wheels on the tracked vehicles are black however.

Mike Wren · February 28, 2008, 07:31:05 AM

ah, I knew tracked vehicles had black, assumed wheeled ones would be the same, then again... never assume...

HOG · February 29, 2008, 07:26:00 PM

Hiya Mossie,
Regards painting/masking your model, the worstist place looks to be the running boards/mudgaurds over the wheels where the stiffners are.Unless theres room to rub down masking tape might I suggest bluetack here. A trick I use is to place along the line a straight edge (small wood block, ruler, plascard,etc) and push the bluetack against this to form a straight masked edge. Any little iregularities are pushed into place with a small jewellers screwdiver knife blade or whatever.
Hope this helps,
Gary