28mm Em4 ACW conversions

Bob bought a bag of each of Em4's confederate and Union infantry.   20 figures for £5 is excellent value for money and can be used to 'bulk out' any ACW army.  I have to confess that I prefer the Union figures as the Confederate 'hat' reminds me more of a 'bush hat' than the sort of headgear that one normally associated with the war.

http://www.em4miniatures.com/acatalog/American-Civil-War.html.

In case you haven't seen them before, here's how they compare with Perry's ACW figures.

.

The plastic is soft and can easily be cut and shaped. I have mostly experimented with the Confederates as I personally find these the less attractive and with 20 Figures from  £5, you can afford to mess around. 

 Here are some of the changes that I have tried to date.

Officer with Perry hat and sword arm

Original figure and figures with Perry hats.  The figure with the bandaged head is just the existing hat trimmed to leave the 'hat band' which forms the bandage. 

One of the figures in this picture has a Perry Kepi and the other is one I did simply using a scalpel - in case you can't tell, mine is the one with the blue kepi.  

TIP: If you want to use a Perry hat/kepi shave away the existing EM4 hat to leave a 'dome' on the figure, this fits inside the Perry hat/kepi and leaves something for the glue to bond with.  I tried simply cutting the EM4 hat of leaving me with a 'flat surface' so to speak and stuck the Perry hat/kepi to it.  Whilst it worked, I found that the small surface areas in contact meant that after a little handling the the hat and head came adrift and I had to keep sticking them back together.

Converted to make a sapper using an Irregular Miniature pick-axe and a Perry hat. Just a simple cut away of the rifle, a hole drilled through each of the hands with a 'pin-drill' and the pick-axe push through. 

From Prussians to British - an S range paint conversion

I am nearing the end of the build of my S Range Franco Prussian armies and looking around for what next?

As I get older I don't feel like starting another army from scratch.  The Franco Prussian War project came about because I had the nucleus for the French in my Crimean War forces so I could 'recycle' many of them them into another era and build an army without painting hundreds of figures.

Whilst painting some Prussians I found I had a couple of figures undercoated and spare, the red and blue paints were on the table, so I just wondered, could the Prussians be painted as British Home Service units?  If so, I could use my Crimean War Guards and Highlanders and the heavy and light cavalry units to form the basis of a new force.

So I painted these figures.  I know the 'picklehaube' isn't right, but it isn't quite right for the Prussians either.

The mounted officer is the Russian General from the Crimean War range, if I don't proceed he will fit into the Crimean War force as a cavalry or staff officer.  I have also painted this figure as a General for my Prussians.

We could wargame the fictional invasion of Britain by the Prussians and their allies following the Franco Prussian War.  The Silesian Rifleman would paint nicely as a Volunteer Rifleman just to mix things up.

Maybe this could be a project........

British and Chinese river naval action

Some time ago Jack made me 3 Dapper Class Gunboats and some Junks.  Bob and I decided to try a game using them.  It was a bit of an experiment in terms of what each side should have by way of forces.

The scenario was a British punitive raid up river to take out a rebellious Chinese fort and supporting naval force.  The British figures were made up of Jacklex sailors and a unit of Rose Miniatures redcoats.  The Chinese are Orion Boxer Rebellion figures and some metal figures which I think were B&B Miniatures.

The British flotilla approaches and the Chinese Junks emerge from the tributary river.

One Junk was moored to the jetty and immediately tried to move off.

We discovered that we had under powered the British guns as they failed to blast the Chinese out of the water as expected.

Bob watches on as the Junk with fled the jetty at the start of the game ran aground.

British sailors and infantry are launched to tackle the Chinese forces.

Boxer Infantry prepare to repel the British. Their musketry was poor and the better armed British sailors and drove them off with a well aimed volley.

The Chinese Imperial forces in the fort came under bombardment from the British ships taking regular hits without being able to respond.

The naval fight with the Junks continued with one Junk being demasted and others turning tail as their morale faltered.

The game looked good and the models Jack made excellent but the rules we used and tried to adept didn't work. They were meant for early/mid 19th century ships but not for steam or the types of guns the British ships carried.