Afrika Korps Sdkfz.251/1 'Hanomag'

[Liamcraven666]

Hello
I bought this kit a couple of months ago for pretty cheap with the intention of building during the evening while I was on holiday in scotland but I never did.
I've came up with the idea of building a small DAK diorama using this and some figures.

Here's the box:


The kit also comes with 5 figures with some really dramatic poses which is a shame because I won't be using them. The detail on the figures is lacking (which should be expected of an old tamiya kit) and they're a bit out of proportion.
Instead I'll be using a set of Master Box set:


Here's the kit so far , the interior is mostly done.
There would be more pictures but PhotoBucket deleted my photos for some reason

The detail is very nice for an older kit


If you look closely at this picture you can see that the kit is from 1973:




The drive shafts are held in place by this long piece (circled) which caused some problems because my part was warped meaning the drive shafts could pop out. If you're building this kit make sure you glue this part as flush as possible.

[DownUnderDan]

I've got this kit in my stash, so looking forward to seeing how yours goes together. Looks very nice so far and I for one appreciate the construction tips as you go along! Look forward to seeing the next stage.

Dan

[privatepete]

Hi Liam are you building the 251/8 ambulance if so you are ok, but if not the 251/8 ambulance was the only one to fit a water tank between the front seat's,sorry to be the bringer of bad news,I mean its up to you want to leave it in or not. But its still a great little kit and good luck with the rest of the build.
Pete

[shortCummins]

this might be of interest...

[Liamcraven666]

Hi Liam are you building the 251/8 ambulance if so you are ok, but if not the 251/8 ambulance was the only one to fit a water tank between the front seat's,sorry to be the bringer of bad news,I mean its up to you want to leave it in or not. But its still a great little kit and good luck with the rest of the build.
Pete

Thanks for the info pete ,I'm building the standard engineer vehicle so I'll take the water tank out.
I really appreciate the advice

[Liamcraven666]

this might be of interest...

Thanks for that!
I've bookmarked the link for when I'm painting the interior.

[Kevthemodeller]

I had that kit as a lad back in the 70's, it was one of the first Tamiya kits I bought love it made a very nice model.

[chalkyw]

Great start Liam, looks interesting

[Liamcraven666]

I had that kit as a lad back in the 70's, it was one of the first Tamiya kits I bought love it made a very nice model.

It may be a old kit , but It's a fun one!

Some of my favorite kits are the old Tamiya ones.

[Liamcraven666]

So I've made a little bit more progress on the half track , The rear doors , suspension , and gun mounts have all been assembled.

Here they all are together:


The doors close up:

(It's very faint , but the doors have sink marks on them so hopefully they can't be seen when painted)

I've also filled in the holes left by the fuel tank and hid my messy work with a pair o binoculars:


And the front gun mount:




Is it just me? Or does the front gun mount look a little inaccurate?
I personally feel like it's too tall , what do you chaps think?

I'll hopefully be painting the interior tomorrow if I have time , Can't wait!

[chalkyw]

Good job Liam......I don't know enough to say if the gun mount is right or wrong but looking forward to see what you do tomorrow

[Liamcraven666]

Some more progress this morning , The interior has been base coated and given a little highlight.

Primed in flat black:


Basecoated in Tamiya XF-59 (Desert Yellow):


And highlighted in Tamiya XF-57 (Buff):


The colour of the interior, as it is now is a little light but it'll be dulled down once I give it a wash and a clear coat it.

[Liamcraven666]

Here's how the finished Interior looks , I'm pretty happy with it!


(The actual colour is lighter in person)

The next thing I'm going to do is *try* to build a driver and add some stowage.

[Liamcraven666]

Here's the finished interior! I couldn't find the right parts to make a driver figure because the figure parts in this kit are way too big.
Anyway here it is:

[chalkyw]

Looking good Liam

[Liamcraven666]

Looking good Liam

Thanks chalky!

[Liamcraven666]

The top part of the hull has been attached, there are some gaps and the doors were a bit fiddly to line up , but it's nothing too hard to manage.

[digger303]

Not sure but, But I think the Germans would have made it so it could be peered over and high enough to give protection whilst in use.
you may find something in amongst these reviews as he is quiet good.
http://www.perthmilitarymodelling.com/r ... arison.htm

[Liamcraven666]

Not sure but, But I think the Germans would have made it so it could be peered over and high enough to give protection whilst in use.
you may find something in amongst these reviews as he is quiet good.
http://www.perthmilitarymodelling.com/r ... arison.htm

Thank mate

[Davethepitch]

I did not realise this kit was that old.

[AgentG]

Looking good!

What colors do you plan on using?

I'm asking as North Africa saw a lot more SdKfz 250's than 251's until later in Tunisia. There are photographs of what may be the very first Dunkelgelb 251's in Panzer Regiment 7 after Kasserine. They were camouflaged with, of all things, thin stripes RAL 7008 and cactus.

You cannot go wrong with any camo scheme, just adding my 2 centavos!

G

[digger303]

I did not realise this kit was that old.

A lot of the Tamiya kits are. I think there is a program in place within Tamiya company now to do a revamp, but this is only my speculation.

[Liamcraven666]

I did not realise this kit was that old.

Neither did I.

[Liamcraven666]

Here's how the completed model kit looks, the build was pretty simple (apart from the various gaps that had to be filled) and I'm pretty happy with it.
Sorry for the slow progress , hopefully I'll be working a bit more on the model over the next week.





Now for some stowage!

[Liamcraven666]

Looking good!

What colors do you plan on using?

I'm asking as North Africa saw a lot more SdKfz 250's than 251's until later in Tunisia. There are photographs of what may be the very first Dunkelgelb 251's in Panzer Regiment 7 after Kasserine. They were camouflaged with, of all things, thin stripes RAL 7008 and cactus.

You cannot go wrong with any camo scheme, just adding my 2 centavos!

G

Thanks for the input , I'm not exactly sure what colours I'm going to use but the plan is to paint it in the standard desert yellow scheme with a bit of colour modulation. Like this:

But I'll look into some of the later schemes

[Liamcraven666]

Here's the model after some stowage from tamiya's jerry can set has been added with a bag from my spares box.
Now for some priming!





Sorry for the blurry pictures.

[chalkyw]

Lookin very nice Liam

[Liamcraven666]

Lookin very nice Liam

Thanks chalky.

[Liamcraven666]

Here's the model after a base coat, It was painted using a mix of XF-57 (Buff), XF-59 (Dessert yellow) and XF-60 (Dark yellow).

[Liamcraven666]

A little more progress on the halftrack , chipping made with a sponge and German grey and the roadwheels have been painted.
The base colour has also been made slightly lighter.

[Liamcraven666]

Tools and guns painted and attached:

[Liamcraven666]

There's been big bit of progress today, I added some more chips to the model using my airbrush , added some grey spots where the afrika korps emblems go to make it look like the paint has been taken off for the markings and applied the decals.

(the back decal isn't straight so i may take it off and use one from my spares)


(the back decal isn't straight so i may take it off and use one from my spares)

I then faded the decals tracks and tools with a light coat of XF-57 buff and also base coated the little bag on the side.



(another thing to note when building this kit is the sink mark on the left side)

The next steps are to apply some wash/streaking and a little bit of pigment, then the model will be finished and I will start on the figures and base.

[skidsolo]

Looking good Liam.

[Liamcraven666]

Looking good Liam.

Thanks mate

[digger303]

watching with interest

[Liamcraven666]

So , the half track is finished. I applied some very subtle streaks , a wash on the road wheels and tires , painted and shaded the little bag on the side and made some rust effects on the exhaust.
The difference is pretty hard to notice and is probably near impossible to see in my bad pictures , but here's how it looks:

(This part was hard to get in focus)






I also assembled the gunner figure , because I'm cheap and didn't want buy a resin gunner. The detail is good and I'm not to worried about the face detail because it will be covered by the gun ,the proportions seem a little bit strange so I'll compare his size to the master figures that I've ordered.
He also required quite a lot of work to get him in the right position.


I've also got a question regarding photography, would it be better to have a white background for the build photos, or doesn't it matter?
Thanks in advance for any advice.

[skidsolo]

This is looking great Liam, may just have to get one of these.

As for the photography, I always use a plain seamless background for two reasons. It focuses the attention on the modes and not the background and by using white, black or a neutral colour, you can control the exposure much better. Cluttered backgrounds can make it hard for the camera.

Just my tuppence worth.

[InitialProduction1]

Great looking Liamcraven,

[OliveDrab]

A wonderful job with the 251, really like the finish and the Africa Korps theme

[Liamcraven666]

This is looking great Liam, may just have to get one of these.

As for the photography, I always use a plain seamless background for two reasons. It focuses the attention on the modes and not the background and by using white, black or a neutral colour, you can control the exposure much better. Cluttered backgrounds can make it hard for the camera.

Just my tuppence worth.

Thanks for the feedback skidsolo , I'll try using a white background for the rest of the build

[Liamcraven666]

A wonderful job with the 251, really like the finish and the Africa Korps theme

Great looking Liamcraven,

Thanks guys

[Liamcraven666]

My figures arrived today! I got them from https://www.modelsforsale.com/catalog/c ... uccess.php , I'd definitely recommend this website , they have a lot of new ,second hand and discontinued kits for reasonable prices.


The figures come on one sprue and definitely look alot better than the Tamiya figures.

My phone camera even recognized one the heads as a face.


I also finished painting the gunner last night whilst watching the live stream. I think the figure turned out okay though the detail is lacking compared to the Master Box figures. But It is pretty good for the price, not to mention it's age!




I then built up one of the Master Box figures and compared the proportions with the kit gunner.

Not bad

I'd also like to see your opinion on the uniform colour , I'm thinking it may be a bit too dark , yet I used the colours used in the AK interactive Dak paint set...

[Liamcraven666]

So I thought I'd do a step by step on painting the figure , just to show you the colours I use.
So naturally I start off with some primer , in this case some Tamiya spray primer.
I think the primer shows off the figure detail really well

[Liamcraven666]

Skin tones and face have been painted.

The face and hands were painted with AK3011 (Base Flesh)


The first highlight using AK3012 (Light Flesh)


And the second highlight , eyes and teeth were painted with AK3013 (Highlight Flesh) then the eyes and teeth were highlighted with an off white bone colour.




Is it just me or does this particular figure look evil?

[Technophobe]

Can I say that he looks like Anakin Skywalker, just after Luke has removed his mask in Return of the Jedi!

Not that, that is a bad thing, your painting is great

[Liamcraven666]

Can I say that he looks like Anakin Skywalker, just after Luke has removed his mask in Return of the Jedi!

Not that, that is a bad thing, your painting is great

Lol , I can see the resemblance now!
I'm probably going to strip the paint and re-do it,I can see him in the corner of my eye , and he's been scaring me

[Liamcraven666]

I wasn't too happy with the result of the face , so I striped the paint down with Tamiya thinners and started again.
This time I used a different order. First,I painted the eyes. Then I painted the base colour followed by subtle shadowing using the base colour mixed with a little dark brown. Then I used the light flesh colour as the first highlight and then used a slightly lighter colour for the second highlight.
I think the result this time is a lot better and looks less evil.

Here's some useful videos that I found useful:





Then I base coated the whole uniform in Ak3111 Desert uniform base ;


And after that, applied a brown wash to the whole figure, I used citadel's Agrax Earthshade:

[Liamcraven666]

After the wash I came back in with the base colour to clean up the figure and define the shadows,




After that I base coated the smaller details like the bags , water cans , straps and belt
The leather parts like the solder strap were painted in AK3073 Red Brown Leather. And the belt was painted in AK3072 Uniform Green Ocher Khaki.


I then washed the bags and straps with Agrax Earthshade , then highlighted them.
For the leather I used AK3075 Us Field Drab and the Khaki was highlighted with Citadel Ushabti Bone (heavily diluted)

[Liamcraven666]

I then highlighted the uniform with AK3112 Desert Uniform Lights , and then the model is pretty much finished , apart from the gun.
Sorry for the bad pictures , I'm waiting to get an extra light for photos, but that won't be until after telford.
Anyway, here's the finished model:

[Liamcraven666]

Another figure painted, this one went considerably better and the face looks more like a human!
Here it is (right);


Until I get a second light , I'm not going to use a background because I've found that the white background needs more light to see the models. Especially with these light uniforms. Sorry for the bad picture figures so far, hopefully I can figure out how to take photos.