1/87 - Red Army Germany 1945 - "Hitler kaputt"

[Christian]

Hello together,

I would like to introduce my current diorama project here with a few posts, which I have been working on for about 4 weeks and which will take several more months.

The scale is 1/87 (= H0), which is the most widely used scale in Europe for model trains. Therefore, the general supply through the accessory market such as houses and landscaping is very good.
A few years ago the military vehicle market looked extremely good, but somehow this has changed somehow a little bit to the worse, because there was a lot more to buy as now. The reasons are not very clear, but one point is that one of the major manufacturer - Trident - quit the operation because the owner is now over 70 years old and can not find a successor who takes over business / buys the company.
For my project here, there is still everything I need.

I want also to tell that in origin I wanted to make the project with British Army instead Red Army, but due to the more bad offer it had to be cancelled and so Red Army was chosen here.

The diorama has the dimensions 78 cm x 38 cm.

Decisive for the project is a now about 40 years old Top 1/87 Diorama which I admired as a child (I'm age 48) in my local model shop.
Here are 3 pictures of this old diorama in the shop made with the smart phone for better understanding what I take as a role model for my project... Unfortunately, it is a bit damaged by the age as you can see on the photos.







In short: I will do that too ... but just Russians instead of Germans. Funny is ... 3 of the 4 houses / ruins above I use too for my project. [biggrin]

In total there are about 100 - 150 self-painted figures on it and on vehicles are planned:

- 3 x JS-2 tanks
- 1 x Willys jeep
- 1 x Dodge 3/4 ton Command Car
- 1 x Zis-5 truck with flatbed
- 1 x Zis-5 truck with box body
- 2 x Studebaker truck with towed 122 mm howitzer
- 1 x downed Panther G tank

But that can change maybe a little bit in the course of the project, because often arise in such a project ... let's say ... "new views"

The houses are from the company "Faller" ... but are actually from the company "Pola", which went bankrupt many years ago and where Faller had bought the molds. In addition, of course, a "pile" of other accessories from many manufacturers will be bought and used, or even I make several things scratch.

[Christian]

The basis is a 9 mm wooden plate, to which I stuck Styrodur boards. The area of sidewalks and where the 3 houses come is about 1-2 mm thicker.

Sorry for the dark photo, I had done quickly in the morning.



In the railway accessories market, there are of course also ready to buy streets and sidewalks in various forms, but why buy, if you can do it yourself?

The cobblestones of the street, as well as the pavement slabs of the sidewalk can be with the so-called "stamp method".
When cobblestone I took an old, matching from the size flat brush and then burned away the brush hairs. What remains is then the sheet metal surround and you can then bend with the pliers then to the seize and shape as wanted.



With this method, the entire street is then made, row by row. Of course this is expensive, but since when does time play a role in model making?
Cobblestone streets are all old and over time, parts of the street lower, sometimes completely apart from damage. That's why I used a bullet in many places in the Syrodur before I made the cobblestones over it. That will be much more realistic.
On the sides the stones run differently in 2 rows, the rainwater trickle.







For the sidewalk plates, I have taken another stamp. After a long search I found in our kitchen a small plastic container where toothpicks were in it and fits perfectly as a stamp.
The sidewalk I have where the buildings come to are made about 2 rows wider than necessary. This saves me for unnecessary gaps to the house kit bases that need to be modeled after.

[Christian]

Next comes the painting.

Basically, I only use Revell Aqua Colors, Oil Artist Paint and a few other colors like Enamel from Humbrol or Revell.
I am in this regard of the "old school" in terms of painting methods and very rarely use these ready-mixed colors and stuff for weathering the models etc. that are numerous in accessories offered by several amucactures.

First, I painted it with a simple medium gray with the airbrush. Thereafter, the aging took place. I bought emir from the company Mig tentatively a ready mix for the aging of vehicles, which does not convince me ... here for the diorama base but perfect and was therefore used. I painted some of the sidewalks with slightly different shades of gray.







It is far from being ready, but here in the further painting and aging / wethering I have to stop first, because from now on it must be coordinated with other things that still have to be made, for example, rubble and debris etc.


The accessories market in the model railway at houses has for a very long time shared 4 large companies and a few small ones in Germany and in a few parts of Europe ... Faller, Kibri, Vollmer and Pola.
This has changed a lot in the meantime ... Pola went bankrupt and was bought by Faller, Kibri and Vollmer were bought by an initially small, more specialized in technical accessories manufacturer - Auhagen - and are now under one roof.
In short, the market has been quite mixed up in recent years ... including many new companies ... and of course these companies also make other things in model making, or are for Germany and some European countries the general importer .... Faller is also the importer and distributor for the brands Meng, Hobby Boss, Hasegawa, Merit and others.

The 3 houses I used are originally from the company Pola and are sold by Faller as a set "Germany 1950's". They were used together with a fourth house also on the old diorama, which serves as a suggestion and I have shown in the first post.

The assembly took place first "out of the box", so nothing special. However, the houses are far from finished, because even if they are already well done, the aging and detailing is done now. For a better idea and impression here once the houses simply put loose on the diorama, where they will be placed later.










The house in the middle I has not yet a roof on it, because I had to install a light damage in it first.

As I said, they are are built "out of the box" status as seen above ... now it goes to the detailing and aging.

[Christian]

It starts with the middle house, where I first made the slightly damaged roof ...





The aging takes place mainly with "Artist oil paint", as a thinner I use lighter gasoline for Zippos instead of the usual turpentine oil ... dries faster and is easier to work
In addition, of course, various Revell Aqua colors and homemade color mixtures.












And here for comparison right next to it, the neighboring house without any aging work done ...



And now to the right house ...

Here I would like to show in detail the painting and aging of a brick wall. Only so that the dimensions are clear. A brick here is about 2mm x 1mm in size ...

This is how it looks after assembly ... not bad and partly pre-aged / printed, but the brick wall is an ugly dark red part ...





First, the wall is painted entirely with Revell Aqua paint, here a mixture of brick red, which was revived with some beige. Afterwards, some bricks are painted with slightly different colors.
If you look at such an old original brick wall, then you will see that there are always some bricks lighter and darker than the rest, in different shades.
It is recommended here to limit to 4-5 shades, otherwise it will be too colorful. The painting of the individual bricks does not have to be 100% accurate, 95% is sufficient ... ... because with the next step this will be corrected again.





Now comes the washing with "Artist Oil Paint" ... diluted with lighter gasoline for Zippos. Here are several washings with black and gray ... Gray is simply black with a little white and should represent the mortar of the joints.

The preliminary final result is then this:





Here the back / back wall with the intermediate result and the final result underneath. As you can see, the door made directly too and also the roof of the extension building behind.

The transition from the base plate of the house model to the diorama will be later of course "smooth" ...








The rest of the house has of course been edited ... here then the state afterwards. Also, I have ever set the street lights (the white at the bottom of the lights is still wet glue).





The company signs on the houses (car repair shop on the right and and plumbing on the left) are only placeholders and basis for the later following correct signs ...







Here on the roof I have a little bit to re-work ... not fully pleasing me as result...

[Christian]

Both houses are not completely finished yet ... in a diorama it is always the case that you have to stop at some point, because it has to be adapted to other parts and areas of the diorama in all respects. And these other parts of a diorama have to be on the same level for that as well.

Next comes the most elaborate building ... the semi-detached house ruin, most likely a victim of a RAF or USAAF bomb raid. [glare]

This is the house after normal assembly "out of the box" so far ...









That may be enough for a normal model railroader, who cares more about driving the trains, etc. ...
Of course, that's by far not enough for me and there's a lot to do ... [biggrin]

Where should I start...?
If you look at the gable wall in Figure 2 above, it actually shows the inside wall of the collapsed house, but looks like an outside wall.
If you look at images of ruins ... whether from a war or demolition work of today, then completely missing here are remnants of the inner walls of the rooms. Then there are always remains of the plaster still present, sometimes with remnants of wallpaper still on it. Also details and remains of the double T steel beams of the floors and many more issues ... In short: much to do!

The interior plaster I took with simple putty Revell and plastered the brick walls, etc. according partially. But here are also recesses for the floors of the floors and the inner walls in it and to see what makes the work easier. The inner walls I have partially made with putty and also with small strips of Styrodur.









Then it was sanded fairly smooth with sandpaper and some areas painted light blue, others white or light gray.
Afterwards, Evergreen cut plastic profiles for the double T steel girders and also installed them. Last but not least heaps of debris and scrap ... partially included in the house kit .... and heavily aged. First of all, I have been intensively concerned with the almost completely collapsed half of the house and the current result is this:











In the moment I make a little break at the ruined house and will start with the JS-2 tank model. It is a kit of about 30 parts + some PE parts ... so a building log wil not be done, but for the painting and agig etc. I will do.

This is the kit I bought ... for the first only 1 kit and not odrectly all 3 needed for checking out if the kit ok or only crap ... but kit is OK [glare]




Due to the current hot weather in Cologne ... yesterday we had 40° Celsius (= 104° F!) and today it could be 41-42° Celsius ... I made not much the last days.

But during the warm late evening hours I build so far the first JS-2 tank, so I can start painting soon.
The upper hull section is Resin, the rest is plastic and also some PE parts are included. Without PE parts, there are 29 pieces to assemble.

The 2 towing cables on the rear will be installed after painting ... the single headlight which should be next to drivers hatch has fled the tweezers and landed somewhere in the carpet monster. No matter ... I saw enough pictures of JS-2 without the headlight ...

The two-part hatch of the Kommandantenkuppel are unfortunately at the kit too. So I drilled them out and then made new ones with plastic sheet to open them. However, I have now seen in the pictures that I have to correct the rear hatch again something ... which sits a little bit wrong.
At the other two, later following JS-2 which also come on the diorama, I will also make damages to the track covers. Here at the first vehicle I have renounced it ... not all JS-2 looked messed up and like being in battle since a decade










So ... this is the actual status of my project as it is right now.

[Christian]

Good Morning

Yesterday I started painting the JS-2 tank.
First, the whole tank was painted completely flat black as a primer. In Russian / Soviet tanks and vehicles of WW-2, there were a variety of different color finishes. The most common was a greenish color shade (Russian Green shades) and a color that corresponds to an olive green (olive drab). After my research, I found that the JS-2 tank had this olive green shade nearly always.
Therefore, I have then mixed a corresponding shade by using Revell Aqua color. For this, I took NATO Oliv and mixed a bit of bronze green (NATO Green) in it and painted the complete tank with this color. After this layer was dry, I took yellow oliv (olive drab) and added a little bit of beige to lighten it slightly. Here were only some areas painted partially to get the lightning effext of fading.... Of course, everything painted with the Air Brush.





Then it went on with artist oil paint. With heavily diluted black I have filled up the wells ... where you have to blunt this heavily diluted black just close to the desired area easily with the brush and then it runs its own way as it should automatically.
Subsequently, the turret sides were painted with glossy clear coat (also Revell Aqua) and after that was dry, the decals were applied. Now followed with white oil paint the white turret mark. Not all but most Soviet tanks had had this mark at the battle in and around Berlin. This was used as recognition sign for the own Air Force, so that not some IL-2 "Stormovik" make out of own tanks war waste.
At scale 1/35 I would make this by means of masking and Air Brush ... but on a small scale 1/87 as here and also with regard to the original photos, I took the brush. The mark was partially and often quite hectic just "between 2 Vodkas" been applied.









What's next?
First of all I will paint the tracks and the drive, then the detail painting, the aging / wethering and some dirt, etc. ... and then finally the figures (2 man tank crew in the 2 hatches an behind the tank turret, some sitting infantry).

[alextheblue]

Wow! That's some incredible work. This is going to be epic!

[Christian]

Thank ... you

I have done some further work on the tank ...

Here the sprue of the Preiser figures for Russian tank crew... unfortunatley photo isn't really sharp, sorry ...





The 2 one chosen for the JS-2 ... to show seize a 1 (Euro) Cent above ...





And here painted ...





And placed in the hatches ...











Next would be the infantry sitting on the rear ... but I think I work first with ruined house further ...

[digger303]

This is going to be huge and your doing a great job. Shame about the heat, pity you don't have a basement workshop. Much cooler under ground.

[Christian]

Thank you ... heat is for the first now over so far. Problem was, when you get map of Europe in mind that due to low and high weather situation, heat from Sahara desert in Africa could crawl across the Mediterranean and France to us and record was locally 42.5° Celsius in Germany (we had 40.2° C in Cologne). On the weekend a low came from the UK to us and there was some rain and locally violent thunderstorms. Now we are at a normal level between 25 ° and 30 ° Celsius for the summer... but humid as in the Amazon with higher humidity.

Anyway ... this week to work and then I have 3 weeks vaccation

As told, I worked some further with the ruined house.

Current staus is this ...







To the neighbor house right, I have made the remains of the gable wall of the collapsed house from Styrodur on the gable wall ... first roughly designed.





The section of the sidewalk, which is on the base of the house, I had cut off at the other two houses. Here I leave the area on purpose and do not cut off, because of course there will be still a lot of debris and rubble in front of the house being made by me ... which will cover this section at least.
So ... not doing more work as necessary at least









Of course the ruin is far from being ready ... a lot of of more smaller things to do, aside the rubble and debris area.

[Christian]

Time for a new little update ...

I worked a big part further on the ruined house and it looks now "ruined"

[Christian]

Hello,

time for a new update ...

First of all I will show the building of the Studebaker truck and the 122 mm howitzer.



Here the parts of the truck ...



The front window of the "Stude" could be opened to the front / above, so I want to make this too. I made a new frame scratch.



The stirrups of the back board wall are much too large, so i remove tem and make them new scratch.
In general has the ADV kit a more rare loading area of the Stude included, which was used in early times. Later Studebaker trucks had the same loading area as the GMC 2.5 to trucks due to simplify the production in the US.
But I have no desire to buy extra 2 GMC trucks for changing the loading area ... hell on it, I use the included one.



At the chassis the exhaust pipe is unfortunatley not correct, so I made a new one from Plasic rod so far as it is visible later on the diorama.
Also, the fuel tank is in the kit out of whatever reason above open, so it must be closed.






The first one of the 2 "Stude" will have an open loading area. So I made the bars of the tarpaulin from copper wire and plastic rod. it is, as told, other like the usual one of the well-known GMC truck of the US Amry.



Of course, a driver figure is inside too. unfortunaly there is no spave for a co-driver figure ...




Some further small details followed, as for example wipers and mirrors for the front window ... made scratch from plastic sprue and then all parts were painted with 2 layers / shades of oliv drab.
It is the same color as used by the US Army in WW-2 , because Red Army does not re-paint American equipment after they were deliverd due to land-lease agreement.
Some aging and outlining was done with oil colors too.






Next comes the 122 mm howitzer from Trident. It is a resin kit ... and honestly, I have no clue why people so often tell that resin is better as plastic in modelling. Sure, for larger figures it could be or is the case, but for vehicles I have more disappointment moments like here.
The list of errors, wrong or missing details is long and the quality of the comparable German 7.5 cm Pak 40 from Preiser in plastic makes a clear rating result of plastic is better.

Anyway, there is no alternative for it, so going ahead...






Also ... in meantime, I painted some soldiers from Preiser for the loading deck of the truck, out some ammo boxes on it too and the current result of the truck + howitzer is this...

[Christian]

At the diorama itself, the cobblestones were further detailed ... a very tedious painting work, also I had to re-stamp the stones here and there again, looked in some places not so good at closer inspection.








By the way ... there was on another German forum where I'm "at home" a little bit of discussion because of the plates on the sidewalk, if they are too big for scale 1/87.
As you can see on the photo below, 4 of the square plates on the diorama are about 3 cm long.
Now with simple mathematics calculated how big a plate on the diorama would be in the original ... and we come to about 65 cm. In and around Berlin, this is just the seize of the very often used plates since the 1920's.
Research before doing is just important ... what I did and do here and in general ... it saves you from stupid mistakes ... and you can easy explain things.

[Quax]

Absolutely immense Christian, I had to double take it's 1/87 scale
Cheers Paul

[Christian]

Thank you Paul ...

On weekend I build the abandoned Panther G tank.
In the original planning, the Panther should have been shot down, but then it occurred to me that it is quite elaborate and the bullet hole (in the turret) is also on the other, invisible side. So I decided to depose him after a loss. The story is that he had a technical defect and there was a tow attempt ... but then suddenly the Russians were there and the crew + recovery tank decided to run off better ... where the tow bars were left on the front of the Panther.

The kit is from Arsenal-M, plastic and is very good done. There is an alternative model existing from Trident, which is same way good ... and of course further manufactures. All have normally also Panther A, D and Jagdpanther in their stock.
Aside the kit, I used PE part set from Hauler for the grill on the motor deck too...

Here the kit and it's parts ...













Because all hatches will be open ... all aside hatch on rear of turret and motor hatch ... I decided to build somehow a little bit of the interior of driver and radio operator area from srap parts and plastic sheet .. so the view through their hatches will not fell into deep emptiness. It was roughly painted white too... roughly is enough for it.



Then the assembly of the tank follows ... whereby the tracks and running gear will be painted seperated and installed later.
The cover plate on the gun cover is missing, so I imitated it with Plastic Sheet and dented it directly a little bit too.



The storage boxes at the rear I have shown open, so cut open at the top, the flaps made of Plastic Sheet and pulled sprue the brackets. The late exhaust pipes, I have slightly drilled at the top ... usually there is a rotor, but I do not get it made in the small seize ... so only a hole now.
Note: Yes ... the right PE lattice is not sitting correctly, I first noticed it myself in the photo and was then corrected.



The mount for the AA MG at commanders cupola is in the kit massive = wrong. So I corrected it with sprue. The insides of the hatches of driver and radio operator I have also provided with the inner workings made out of sprue.




Then followed the painting, done with slef mixed colors on base of Revell Aqua colors, aging and weathering done by oil paint. AND NOW you can also see, from where the title of the diorama comes!
A Euro 1 Cent coin in front to show the seize of the model fro better understanding ...
Note: I made the tracks completly in light / orange rust, because the tank still stands some days here and due to my own military experience I know that tank tracks start directly to rust if not being moved.
Also, the bow MG and AA MG are removed ... taken by the crew when they left their tank.

[Christian]

Thank you guys

I have worked some further on the vehicles for the diorama and made the second IS-2 tank.
Opening the box there was a somehow wondering, because a different upper hull as on the first IS-2 kit. Well ... as far as I have investigated, the first kit I build is an earlier IS-2 tank and the the one now is a later version.

Here on this phote you can see the difference ... note the hull side below the turret.



Assembly was so far the same as on first IS-2 ... painting is a little bit other, but again done with Revell Aqua colors and oil artist paint. The tank is not yet ready in paint and weathering job etc., in moment the oil color has to dry before I can work further on it.










And here both IS-2 tanks together again ...






Even I have no big problem with 2 different versions of the IS-2 ... it is on the other hand a little bit annoying that the kit does not deliver the same content in one and the other box ...

[Christian]

Last weekend was also a second vehicle on the work bench ... the ZIS-5 truck with box cabin. I have the model changed to become a radio truck...

Here the model...






First step was to de-assemble the complete model in single parts ...




The the box cabin was modified ...
First of all I va cut out the back door and bended it a little bit as open.




And then I made the antenna mast out of pastic profile and streched sprue and as antenna head I used something out of my spare part box... everything build due to a photo of an original truck found in internet.




Then all parts were painted. As color I used as always Revell Aqua and for aging and weathering etc. artist oil paint. Decal on the doorys was from the decals of the IS-2 tank ...
Currently the paint must druy before I can work further on it.








At the backdoor, I made a small wooden staircase from plastic sheet ... is on purpose a bit "skewed" ...




And of course a driver figure is inside ... even the truck will be shown in parking position on the diorama with a staff officer meeting scene around.

[Gregwatters]

wow, what a fantastic set of posts to look and read through full of context and descriptions. the buildings look great so far and the addition of vehicles and soldiers etc will really make this into a special dio.

I am looking forward to seeing the rest of this build.

[Christian]

Thank you

[Christian]

Little update ...

I build yesterday the first group of German POW figures from Preiser ... some as Prieser instruction tells, somw re-build by changing arms and heads etc. ... in total 15 figures now.
Later a second group of further 10 - 15 figures will follow, these mostly re-build figures and of course Russian guards come too.

Painting fill start this evening and on the weekend...

[Christian]

Hello,

time for an update ...

First of all, the 15 x German POV are now painted and put on the diorama.
Sorry for the not so well photos ... I will deliver better next time.








Next "job" was to make the ZIS-5 Cargo Truck ... as the other one with radio cabin from Busch. Only modernization was done at the side walls of the loading area with some plastik sheet from Evergreen.
And of course the model was completely disassembled for the paint job.




The Loading area was painted with a dark yellow, then whgen dry I took hair spray before putting final Russian green on it for chipping it to get scratches where the wood shines through.



The current status is this, some fuel barells put on it ... model is of course not yet ready.




Then I decided that vaptured German VW "Kuebelwagen" should come on the diorama too.
Unfortunately, the model of Roco / Herpa Minitanks is currently not available again (not even the VW "Schwimmwagen") ... so I took the much more expensive finished model (Resin) from Aritec.
The gray livery with winter camouflage I could theoretically, because the air defense units (Flak) of the Luftwaffe around the German cities often had even older vehicles and / or vehicles in gray ... but I decided to repaint the vehicle on Dark Yellow.
The model maker is also lazy ... at least I ... and since I still had enough paint in the container of the airbrush after painting, I had painted with the rest of the back of the ZIS-5 truck.

Here the model as bought ...



And after giving dark yellow color ...

[Christian]

Hello,

Time for a new update ... a bigger one this time.

But first of all I will show a sprue of the Preiser figures. As you can see, they are not really different to those of the 1/35 figures from Tamiya and others ... only in scale much smaller, but also good quality.



I also build a Red Army officer on a horse. Therefore I take one of the officers out of the various sets i use and a ready painted figure + horse. I cut at both the upper body and the glue toe officers one on the legs of the lady. because the legs are then much to small, I took a small layer of tissue paper with white glue and modelled some bigger legs.



And the ready painted an placed figure ... sorry, but due to bad natural light conditions due to bad grey weather I don't get a sharper photo in moment.




I also build the T-34/85 now with basic painting...





Both turret hatches were drilled open and hatches were made outof plastic sheet...



And basic painted with decals placed...





But now to the diorama itself ...
There is now much more "life" on it ... currently 56 figures, 9 vehicles and tanks and 1 howitzer.






Both IS-2 tanks have now their crew in the hatches and also mountained infanty on it...










Also the T-34/85 hasits crew now, but the mountained infanty is not yet done.



But the tanks are forced to hold by Svetlana Ivanov ...






Also a first group of civilians was done and placed ... forced to clean up the debris with 2 guards ...






I also build a Zis-5 cargo truck loaded with fuel drums and the second Studebaker truck (the 122 mm howitzer towed is not yet done). Both trucks are basic painted and you can see good the different green shades of US olive drab at the studebaker and the typical Russian green at the Zis-5 too.
The scene will be that a hand pump will stick in one of the barrels, operated by a soldiers kneeing next to it. A hosepipe / tube will run to the fuel tank of the Studebaker too...



Next to the Zis-5 radio truck I placed 3 higher Russian officers. Further figures will come here too, as well the VW Kuebelwagen and a Willys Jeep too.






I hope you enjoy it ...

[Christian]

Hello ...

time for a new update after a longer time ...
























End part 1

[Christian]

Part 2