Nam ’68: Major Malfunction

Next up for the project was working on Rubicon Models M48A3, just released which was perfect timing I quickly ordered one and it arrived this week. Friday evening saw me sat back watching the Weekender and assembling the kit and it was an absolute pleasure to build.

The kit has a number of options, allowing you to build the M48A3 or the M67A2 Zippo variant, includes an the option of the mantle and search light with or without canvas cover and presents a few options for the commander’s copula / mini turret, which can be with or without MG. All of which is great for Vietnam were using the AK Armour book as reference it really depends on the crew and unit how its configured.

Overall, despite the level of detail the kit was relatively simple to assemble, the only real tricky part being the crew figures, which would really benefit from keying on their arms to get them in the right position easier. The sprues where well throughout and organized with clear labels and the instructions as always for Rubicon where excellent, with clear parts and options marked. It would perhaps be nice to have had a few stowage items included but the sprues where pretty full and I’m sure “rubi gear” kits will be available in the future.

Rubicon use ABS for their plastic kit’s so you’ll need a glue that works with it, your usual Poly Cement won’t work. Rubicon sell and recommend Plastic Magic and since I started using it its quickly become my go to for all plastic kits as it works great giving a quick and solid bond. As a bonus there’s minimal odour to it too!

The track assembly on the M48 is a really nice single piece and much easier to assemble than the m113, though less detailed as it reflects the real life simplicity and rubber tracks.

One of the great benefits of building Rubicon’s slightly more detailed kits is you can learn quite a bit about a vehicle during the process. Despite being pretty familiar with the M48 from film and photos you really gain an appreciation of the size and scale when building the kit. It also lets you realise that despite its huge appearance the actual hull is quite slim, with the track and guards making up quite a bit of its imposing appearance!

Kicking this project off actually reminded me I have this Giant in miniature figure from Wargames Illustrated in the stash, so its about time he gets a coat of paint!

Sadly I believe this has gone past the production run limit of the range and is no longer available.

Another iconic vehicle of the Vietnam war for me is the CH-46 Sea Knight, used heavily be the USMC, it shows up in many famous photos from the war and to me has a very distinctive look, a sleeker looking smaller brother of the CH-47 Chinook.

Off i went looking for suitable model kits to add this to the expanding collection read for this project. Sadly I didn’t find many options, theres a few 1/48th scale kits but these are pretty pricey and also being model kits more fragile than I would like.

My search eventually found me on Amazon US, and I spotted this 1/55th scale diecast model from NewRay. It very much has many features of a toy but looked like it should be a good basis and would certainly add some narrative and scenery on the gaming table.

Taking a plunge into this side of the project was very much inspired by @warzan and his excellent use of toys as a basis for repaints and conversions so I after a few beers watching the UHH ordered one.

It arrived today, and much to my surprise its rather good. Testing it out against a few of the Empress USMC miniatures (28mm) its pretty much an exact match when you use photos as a reference to see how high a person is against it.

Its not without issues though. As from the stock image, the colour scheme is a modern USMC one and the markings are not the best, but I already knew a repaint was necessary so no problem there, it will certainly be passable at a push in the meantime.

As from the stock photos, all the windows are solid and painted in, not a huge issue but obviously not as great as being able to hang door gunners out the side!

Theres some defects, flash, mould lines, paint marks and what looks like paint that was still wet when packaged getting deformed, all things that should be easy to fix up!

I wasn’t expecting it but the rear hatch does actually open! It will needs some modelling but this was a very pleasant find!

Overall though it feels like a very decent starting point for the price paid, the scale seems pretty much spot on and it was a lot cheaper than buying a 1/48th scale model kit that would both be too big and also much less robust on the gaming table.

At the time of ordering the mini was $28 (its currently down to $23), after shipping and import fees (all handled by amazon) the final price work out just over £33, that was under half the price of the few I could find from UK sellers or getting a 1:48th kit so a hefty saving.

This absolute beast of a book arrived this week. AK’s American Armour in Vietnam by MP Robinson. A hefty hardback at 244 pages, its not a cheap book but well worth the money just from first impressions alone. I’ve only just touched the surface of it and look forward to giving it a full readthrough, so for though this would seem to be the book to get if your interested in US armour in Vietnam.

The book is broken down into several sections with the fist half working through the war, breaking down units, areas of operation and going year by year. Its lavishly filled with many fantastic historical images and a superb reference resource.

The latter half is dedicated to AK’s usual excellent vehicle profiles, broken down into various usages and units each based off a historical photo as a reference point.

All round a fantastic resource I’m sure is going to be very useful for this project!

I picked up my copy from Panzer Wrecks for £44.99 via their ebay store which has free postage.

Things have been progressing pretty quickly with this project. I’m going to try and keep this updated as things happen, with unpredictability of the project system I’m hopefully going to try and keep updates short and sweet, and throw in longer form content once I’ve drafted in first in a google doc.

After a few weeks delay my order of the USMC platoon from Empress miniatures has arrived and I have to say the minis are fantastic sculpts from Paul Hicks. I’ll follow up with another post with some more details on the miniatures but heres a look at the pile of glorious metal.

From what I understand there was limited use of the M113 by the USMC in Vietnam but for me its one of the iconic vehicles of the conflict, so its long been on my list since Rubicon Models released it.

My first impressions of the kit where somewhat marred by the many piece track assembly but all went together fine it just took a bit of time, after that though the kit was a joy to work with and a fantastic piece of precision engineering. I’m sure I’ll be picking up many more, and not just the ACAV variant

This projects start was the long-awaited delivery of the Nam ’68: Tour of Duty by Warwick Kinrade and published by Plastic Soldier Publishing. I’d long been wanting to start a Vietnam war project, but just hadn’t been able to settle on either a scale of gaming system so it just kept getting pushed back, when this came up for pre-order I was a easy decision, I love Warwicks rulesets, both the Soldiers of and Battlegroup series of games are in my view some of the best going, and I couldn’t wait to see his take on Nam’.

The book is an excellently produced and quality hardback book, featuring many period photos for inspiration along with some great miniature photography from @piers the layout and presentation will feel very familiar to existing publications.

The rules are set at a skirmish level with you commanding up to a Platoon sized force, from small firefights to the full platoon in action and are very flavoury set within the often asymmetric warfare that marks the conflict. A particular highlight from first glance looks to be the ‘Tour of Duty’ campaign system that sees your platoon in action through 12 months of the war.

I’ll be posting a more Indepth look at the rules and a review of them later in the project.