More Atlantic Maxim Wheel

This poor Dapol civilian figure was cast without legs.

So I took some Atlantic Maxim gun wheel and some Esci hard plastic Maxim gun wheels and made him a wheelchair.

 A few bits of scrap plastic filled the other requirements for construction.

Here at The Bunker, no man is left behind.

Perhaps an old veteran of the Great War out for some sunshine.

Airfix MP pays his respects.

I made a battery of four of these 1 inch Maxim guns.

Here are all the Atlantic Maxim gun projects together.

Two Mountain Guns

Here is another version of the Atlantic Maxim gun converted to a mountain gun.

Barrel bored out for more realism.

Airfix USAAF MP for size.

Note some differences in the carriage, the newer gun is mounted a little higher up.

This is part of my project to clean up some of the spares box and make a few interesting items out of the bits whenever possible.
 

Maxim Cannon

I took one of the 12 pounder Napoleon guns from the Eagle Games cannon and mounted it on the Atlantic Maxim gun carriage.  I drilled out the barrel so it looks a little better.

It makes for an interesting little mountain guns.

Until at least WWII National Guard units and even local militia units and private citizens purchased their own artillery to supplement whatever the Federal Government had or provided to them.

This does not represent any specific gun.

Perhaps it was manufactured locally by local craftsmen to support their state or local militia.

There has been an American tradition of local arms makers all over the nation, even today.  Airfix USAAF MP for size.
 

Mounted 1 Inch Maxim

One inch Maxim gun.

Atlantic Maxim gun and Eagle Games carriage with the 12 pounder Napoleon cut off.

I am sure this is not an exact replica, but it's close enough for my purposes.

I plan on using it for US Army for my War of the Worlds project.  I have a small battery of them.

1898 it will be used by the Regular Army.

1918 it gets used by National Guard.

1938 it belongs to local militia forces.

It's a big gun, here with an Airfix USAAF military policeman.
 

Bug Hunts Service Guarantees Citizenship, Camrade

In 1952 Joseph Stalin had his scientists working on atomic bombs in Chelyabinsk.

But the villagers in the area were reporting sightings of strange giant things in the forest.

Concerned about these reports Stalin directed Lavrentiy Pavlovich Beria to discretely find the giant thing and destroy it.  Not wanting to deploy substantial resources to the project, he had .50 caliber Maxim guns places on wheeled artillery carriages and sent to the area to deal with the problem.

The US Army had also deployed such weapons in the past.

During the First World War these guns were taken from storage and were intended for coast defense against landing boats, or with their powerful .50 caliber cartridge, to cut down massed horse cavalry charges.

The gun crew consisted of a gunner who fired the weapon, two loaders, #1 to carry ammo from the limber and #2 to feed the ammo to the gun.  A third man was the gun commander who would observe targets and direct the gunner.  There was also a horse holder who maintained the horses, limber, caisson, and sometimes would help bring ammo forward. 

The men were trained in all the positions and could take over for one another in the event of a casualty.

None of these served overseas but were deployed around the coastal perimeter, southern border, and Canal Zone of the United States.

The unexplored jungles of the Canal Zones were particularly dangerous.

It's the only time these guns were fired in anger by US forces when gun #2 of a four gun battery defended the Canal Zone from a giant tarantula.

In the early 1950s a similar weapon was used by the Soviet Union to dispatch a giant tarantula that was ravaging cattle herds in Soviet Chelyabinsk.  The cause of the giant in the Soviet Union was thought to be sloppy atomic research contaminating the local area with radioactive waste.  The cause of the giant tarantula in the Canal Zone remains unknown.

Soviet figures by Atlantic, and generic civilians, US Army by Hat WWI US artillery crews, gun carriage by Eagle Games and giant Maxim gun by Atlantic WWII Russian set, all in 1/72nd scale.
 

Photo Techniques

To take these photos I go outside, late in the day.  It means no shadows, so the light consistent.   The models are placed on a painted terrain board on a table.  I have a small step stool to lean on or sit on.  Having the models off the ground makes it easier to bend over to photograph them.

Hold the camera still, and get low and close to the models.  Use the macro setting on the camera.  I hold the camera in close to my body.  I take lots of photos and often they don't all make it onto the blog.

Many model builders take photos from above.  That's great to give an overview of the set up, or to give the view from a reconnaissance aircraft.  But they don't allow the close up detail of the models.   I also use the edit feature to trim the edges of the photos so the subject is centered well.

The base board I use is simply a thin sheet of plywood that has been painted grey and green.  In fact, I used it to primer paint and olive drab paint some vehicles.  The randomness of the colors works well for a photo base.

Welcome readers from Poland.

Fire Mission

An M40 battery stops and begins a fire mission.

A self-propelled battery can drive down the road, pull over and conduct a fire mission in only a few minutes.

This makes it difficult for the enemy to conduct counter-batter fire against them.

Highly trained crews make this possible.

A large logistics train is needed for these guns.

They can conduct sustained fire of 40 rounds per hour. 

M40 Gun Motor Carriage

Roco Minitanks M4 high speed tractor, Corbitt truck, and M40 155mm guns.

Atlantic 1/72nd scale figures Modern Artillery crews.

The stack of supplies are resin.

I take model barrels, and crates, and boxes and glue them to bits of sheet styrene cut to fit into the beds of trucks.  Then they can be used as supplies in the trucks or as a supply dump.

Four guns of this type make up a battery.

These self-propelled guns were first fielded in World War Two by the US Army.

They saw only very limited service in Europe before the war ended but served in Korea.

They were also used by the UK.

Welcome to my readers from the UK!