Power to the Plastic ! ( 1/56 figure kit bashes )

[ripley]

I'm going to borrow Tracks idea and create  a thread on 1/56 plastic figure conversions . We've all done them , weather its just replacing a arm or head so your tank commanders look a little different , to full on butchering of bodies , arm and legs to get that unique figure for your squad . Everyone feel free to jump in and post pictures of dudes you've created . Would even like to see Frostgrave type mashups , I've got an idea of the Soldiers chain mail type  bodies with BA German helmets and gas masks , armed with a variety of German and Russian weapons  . Sorry I get side tracked sometimes . If possible tell us what parts you used on your conversions , of course if your like me you have a large stash of left and right arms with no concern from whence they came ,you just pick through the bin till you find one that fits , sort of ... and then you make it fit . Hopefully we get to see lots of neat creations and will be inspired by them to make more of our own . I'll start . I've always like the iconic look of the German mg teams firing over the shoulder of one of the crew . So I decided to make my own using the 2 kneeing Para figures . A lot of trial and error went into this with one arm ending up being made from parts of 3 other arms . Of course no pictures were taken during the kit bash , I've tried to note my progress on builds but I find as I think about what I'm doing , I tend to stop doing it . Creativity for me is just going ahead and doing it . Anyway here's my Para mg crew , and yes that is the extra  machine gun arm from the BA 251 half track crewman , finally found a use for it

[ultravanillasmurf]

Cool idea.

Nice conversion.

[ultravanillasmurf]

Well, here is a small squad of US equipped infantry, armed with M16s and wearing war time kit.


I bought a Warlord US Army sprue at Warfare 2016 and combined it with M16s from the Wargames Factory male survivors equipment sprue (now included in the Warlord Games Project Z survivors set).

The majority of the figures are unmodified, the left hands have been opened up to grasp the wider foregrip of the M16.

[ultravanillasmurf]

My commando lieutenant is using a captured weapon.

[ripley]

The Yanks look great , like something out a 60s Alien Invasion /  Monster Movie right down to having one kind of weapon and another kind of ammo pouches , well done . You meant to do that right ?  Don't know of any M-16 style looking pouches  in 1/56 , ( cut the BA Brit ones shorter and cast in resin maybe ) you might have to get out the green stuff . Italeri had some pouches in some of their 1/35 sets that were underscale that might work . The Commando looks awesome , very much Tiger Comic if you know what I mean . But he has a Thompson not a captured weapon , did you post the wrong pic ?

[ultravanillasmurf]

Embarrassing.



Yes, I have mixed up the lieutenant and one of the NCOs. Left hand figure above. I need to re-photograph them and also the SAS with the K-Gun stand in (MG-42 I think). The lieutenant at least has the right magazine pouch.

I was going for the B-Movie vibe, you are correct about the pouches but then they have infinite repeater magazines ^__^.

[ripley]

They look really good . Oh yes those special magazines that never run out ammo LOL . A lot like all those  German troops with MP38 machine pistols  and rifle ammo pouches . As kid you never even looked twice , you just drank in the action . Aside from the German grey painted M-47 Patton tanks , the infinite repeating magazines and  men in rubber monster suits those 60s B movies weren't too bad  . Wouldn't a Russian DP-28 machine gun and a Bren kit bash solve your K gun problem , or is the pancake magazine too big . Always fun to try and kit bash weapons from the variety we have in plastic to make something new .

I decided I wanted a Para Panzerschek team , in plastic . Checking out the US weapons sprue , I found a Bazooka , upon checking for scale I found it was too long ! But just the right length for the German weapon , So I trimmed off all the detail , added plastic bits and a wire ( paperclip ) shoulder rest , then the front blast shield was a thin square  with some strips glued on . I even added glass (white glue , dries clear )to the sight hole . Then it was find arms that sort of work , green stuff the gaps and add paint . Toyed with trying to make the wooden back pack for extra rounds but with only having 2 rockets I put one in the loaders hand and one on the base

I think the rear of the Bren and barrel of the DP might work , but you'll need to find a magazine

[ultravanillasmurf]

There are spare mags on the Warlord Soviet weapon sprue (plus potentially spare K guns in OGH's Commonwealth Jeep kit).

[ultravanillasmurf]

Nice Panzerschreck. Great conversion.

[ripley]

Thanks . The Russian pancake mag for the DP will be too big , maybe use the drum mag off that odd looking PPD sub machine gun ( part L ) . Your going to have to cut it up but its an ugly little gun so no loss .

[Tracks]

Great work with those figure modifications! They look fantastic.

When it comes to figure modifications, because plastic is an easier material to work with than metal, we sometimes get a lot more options with plastic then we can ever get with metal. That being said, it also depends on the plastic figure boxed set because a bad set is still a bad set.

There are a several reasons why I prefer plastic figures over metal. One of them is variety. With metal figures, you are pretty much stuck with whatever poses the sculptor created, but depending on the the plastic figures, sometimes its very easy to make figure modifications. Especially if the plastic figures have separate arms.

With plastic figures these modifications can be extensive, but they can also be simple and easy. Below is an example of a simple modification. All I did here to make this 28mm US Airborne medic was to add a left arm from the Fallschirmjäger plastic box set. That's it. Note that the cuffs for both arms are the same, so it looks like the part came from the US Airborne plastic set instead of the Fallschirmjäger plastic set.



For this next figure I had to do a little bit more work with some cutting and trimming. To make this 28mm US Airborne I used the grenade throwing arm (part 26) from the US Infantry plastic box set plus parts 19 and 30 from the US Airborne plastic box set. The only bit I wanted from part 19 was the M1 rifle, so I carefully cut it away from the hand and cleaned it up so you could not tell there was a hand on the stock. I then glued the M1 rifle to part 30. This sounds like a lot of work, but actually it was pretty easy. Power to the plastic



The one aspect about plastic figures that some people might not like is the extra time they require to get them ready for the game table. Unlike most metal figures, with plastic figures you first have to remove them from package, sort out all the bits, look at the instructions/parts and decide on how to assemble them, cut out the bits, clean up the bits, and then glue all the little bits together. After the fgures are all assembled, now you are ready to start painting them. Overall, plastic figures take more time to complete than metal figures. With metal figures, you just remove them from package, clean them up, and start painting.

[ultravanillasmurf]

Nice conversions.

That medic is such a clever but simple idea.

I have built a lot of plastic figures that have never got as far as undercoating, partly due to something shinier turning up, and partly because it is fun.

The preparation can take some time - about an hour a figure in some cases, but is often easier than dealing with a metal figure if there are any issues with it. Minor mould issues can often be dealt with by the application of a bit of liquid poly,  a lot easier than hacking at white metal.

[ripley]

The medic looks great . Fantastic idea to use the German grenade bag arm . Some of the pieces on the sprues really don't jump out and say variety in use . Are you going to use the arm once or have 3 or 4 guys running around  looking funny .Still haven't used the other bag arm with Panzerfaust . I used that arm , minus the bag on my Para holding the mg on his shoulder , only arm I could find that was bent that tight , remove bag , add hand holding mg bi pod . While I like newer sets with arms and weapons together , I still pick up a Russian sprue every once in a while , you  get almost 30 arms . great for kit bashing

[ultravanillasmurf]

Interesting point with the Russians (I have three sprues now).

[ripley]

Love the Russian plastics , so many variations can be made from 8 body types . The big thing is making sure you don't end up with a regular and quilted arm for upper torso and a tall boot and a short boot with putties on the legs . And yes I have a couple of guys like that ( leg wise ) riding in the back of my Russian half track . Both the Russians and Early / Late War Germans are real easy to convert leg wise , as you cut under the skirt of the tunic , not having to worry about trying to patch the crotch with green  stuff  ( like the British  ). Under the tunic you can just about place the legs any way you want .

Here my half track riders  ,built  with the idea being they have a bent leg / knee on the seat and a standing leg on the floor .So I ended up mostly  using both styles of kneeing Russians ( # 20 & 31 ) with leg swaps . The gunner was the # 25 standing figure with his legs moved closer together .Here's how the look heading into combat . The molded on packs are a bit of a problem space wise , they really only fit in the HT one way , and every time I take them out it takes me about an hour to figure out how to fit them back in , probbly should have gone with 6 in the back

Once you get bitten by the kit bash it's hard to stop . I cast up a bunch of 85mm ammo boxes for my T-34/85 and SU-85s . And I thought why not have a couple of guys standing or seated on them like you see in pictures of Russian armor in Berlin 45 . So with a standing leg added to each kneeling figure I have these guys spotting a sniper from the back of a tank

I decided to glue them to the ammo boxes so I could swap them around , here they are " dismounted "