Peter Laing WW1 -A trip down memory lane -Part 1 The British

In a response to a post one of the comments mentioned Peter Laing figures and this set me off on a trip down memory lane and I thought I would share some pictures (a lot) with you.

These were my WW1 British French (some FPW), Belgians and German Peter Laing figures and vehicles.  I say my figures, almost all came from Stuart Asquith many years ago.  I added some of the vehicles and a couple of tanks some were Peter Laing originals and some I made from plastic card.  Those were the days.  Bob had the Russians and Austrians, unfortunately I don't have any pictures of them.

The last time they saw any action was at the time of the Falklands War in 1982.  At the time they were reporting casualties and this all seemed too real and they got packed away and left in boxes until 2012 when I sold them to Ian Drury.  If you have ever seen any of Ian's Peter Laing figures you will realise just how well these figures can be painted.

As I said there are a lot of pictures so I have broken this down to 3 posts (sorry they aren't better but hopefully they are enough to evoke memories).

The British.

(I can only claim a couple of lorries and tanks from this array including the anti aircraft gun on a lorry)

There were also a few British Colonials

Next the French and Belgians

Peter Laing WW1 -A trip down memory lane - Part 3 The Germans

 Part 3 - The Germans

Mobile Machine team

Flamethrower teams 

I hope this 3 part trip down memory lane has conjured some good memories of owning Peter Laing figures and if you have never seen them before an idea of just how large the range was!

Peter Laing WW1 -A trip down memory lane - Part 2 French and Belgians

Part 2  French and Belgians

French Guards FPW

FPW Zouaves

FPW Marines

Cuirassiers

Dragoons (FPW?)

Dragoons

 

The Belgians

Belgian Carabineers

Belgian Jagers

 

Belgian Guides

Next the Germans

Mexican Adventure - S Range Belgian Voltigers and Grenadiers

Some time last year I converted a number of S range figure for John Cunningham to put together some figures that a friend of his wanted to try the Mexican Adventure..

Whilst I was in hospital earlier this year a large parcel arrived from John with lots of castings of these figures.  To be honest with what has been going on in my life of late, painting figures has been low on my priorities and starting a whole new period against a time clock of months seems a little mad.  However, I thought the figures deserved to be painted and since they are now available there may be some of you who fancy delving into this colourful period in Mexican/European history.

Here are the first of my efforts. My eyesight seems to be getting worse of late due to a cataract in my left eye and the paintbrush is more like a 'yard broom' so apologises for some of the painting but I hope you get an idea of the figures.  I also managed to wind up one figure short, hence the final stand of three!

 

From the various picture I couldn't decide whether the plume on their hats should be black or green.  I left them black but on reflection I think they should be green - they would also stand out more, so maybe a repaint job!  The officer is usually shown in a black hat as well but for variety I have given him a white one which is also shown in various plates.

The same figure can be used for Belgian Grenadiers just by painting the lace and the band on the hat red.

The website 'The Mexican Adventure or: the Phantom Crown'  http://gisby.info/mindex.htm     has lots of information on uniforms; flags and a history of the conflict.

I also made some Mexican 'irregular infantry' and a lancer in sombrero to add to the opposition.

'Can You See What I See?'

Some time ago I made some conversions to create a mounted Prussian and French Officer with binoculars - well what I was prepared to accept looked a bit like them.

I always fancied an infantry officer with binoculars.  Before I got my recent diagnosis, I had started hacking a figure about to try to make one.  For some time now the various bits - arms and bodies have sat on my desk waiting to be put together.  To be honest I couldn't be bothered to complete it.  But in one of my brighter moments I thought 'why not'.

So I set about joining the arms to the body.  Needless to say they broke, fell on the floor and I was left crawling around trying to find the two parts of the arms.  I eventually found them more by luck that judgement.  My big problem now is that I have a cataract in my left eye.  This is the eye I use for close up work.  I do not mention this to solicit yet more sympathy but to explain what happened next.

I set about fixing the arms in place with superglue and green stuff.  Having completed this task which I thought seemed more difficult to line up the arms than before and leaving everything to dry off. I picked up my finished creation only to discover that I had stuck the arms on upside down!  I blame this entirely on my eye! 

Having got this far I really couldn't be bothered to try to undo the fixing or start again so I just proceeded to paint what I had done.  Again painting is a real problem the brush seems to have turned into a broom!  Anyway this is the 'finished article' which just goes to show how wrong you can get it!

'Can You See What I See'

 

Needless to say, I won't be making anymore versions of this particular conversion!

Best Guns for FPW Period - follow up

Following on from my blog 'Best Guns for the FPW Period', I decided to buy the Foundry 15cm Krupp Siege Gun FPPG003 to see what it looked like and to get an idea of its scale.  Not because I need any more Prussian artillery!

It has a platform behind the gun which suggests that a gunner or gunners could stand on it at some point in the loading; siting or firing process. To take advantage of this, I cut the the base of one of the Prussian gunners I had converted and struck him on. It also gives an idea of the scale of the gun. I am not convinced this would work with a 28mm figure. It also looks as if the is firing the gun rather like a machine gun!

Surround by a full crew.  I suspect the horse would do a 'runner' rather than wait for the big bang!

Update: Gun size.  The wheels are 20mm high.  the Gun carriage is 50mm.  Including the barrel the overall length of the gun is 60mm.  The height from ground to barrel is 30mm.

The gun itself looks very like the picture from the Minifigs catalogue which shows an S range FPW artillery FPA1 Prussian Siege Gun.

Thanks to the Lone S Ranger blogspot.com for the use of this picture.