North Vietnamese decals - I-94

 Decals for 28mm vehicles are a bit scarce. I have used a lot of Warlord or Rubicon 1/56 scale decals on 1/48-50 scale vehicles.

For North Vietnam vehicles, the I-94 set MI-106 might come in handy.

T-55 Soviet Main Battle Tank

The Soviet T55 main battle Tank was  one of the first MBTs to be fielded, and is still in service with may armed forces.

 The Empress Miniatures model is supplied as a multi-part resin and white metal kit.

The model is easy to assemble, with the following notes. the turret plug was slightly too deep for the socket, I had to cut about 5mm off with a razor saw. There are some mould lines on the auxiliary fuel tanks which are difficult to remove.

I replaced the white metal hand rails on the turret with 0.7mm brass rod for durability (being clumsy).

I also added the Coax machine gun and the stub of the aerial using 1mm brass rod.

The fore and aft mud guards were reinforced with green stuff and milliput to keep them in place.

A tarpaulin was added to the rear of the turret and another was added to the two auxiliary tanks. Strapping from Slater's microstrip was added to the tanks.

The model was assembled into four block, the complete turret, the hull and the two track units. After masking the hull nd the track units, the whole thing was sprayed with Citadel Chaos Black.

The turret and hull were then sprayed with Humbrol 86 Light Olive from a can.

The tarpaulins and the mantlet were painted with Citadel Death World Forest and the whole thing dry brushed with Citadel Nurgling Green.

The tracks were painted (before adding to the hull) with a mix of Army painter Black, Army Painter Chaotic Red and Vallejo Black Grey using a wet palette. This was also used on the exhaust. The wheels were painted with Humbrol 86 Light Olive.

Numbers were added to the turret side from the Rubicon Soviet Tank decal set.

The straps were painted with Citadel Dryad Bark.

The tank was weathered using Humbrol Dark Earth Weathering Powders, hopefully held in place by a combination of Citadel Lahmian Medium, Agrax Earthshade and Army Painter Strong Tone.

T-55 Soviet Main Battle Tank

The T55 Main battle Tank was the Soviet Union's primary tank for a number of years, and was still in production (for export) after the T62 (its successor) ceased production.

This is the Empress Miniatures T55 model. It is a multi-part resin and white metal kit. The resin is a slightly yellowy white and seems to take superglue well.

It comes with loader and commander hatches, a DSHK machine gun, two rear fuel drums and white metal had rails for the turret.

I replaced the white metal had rails with 0.7mm brass rod.

I also added a coax machine gun from 1mm brass rod. 1mm brass rod was also used for the (stub) of the aerial.

I have still got to add some restraining straps on the fuel drums.

What is not shown is the plastic rod I have used to secure the unhitching beam.

Soviet tanks - Bovington

Two of the Soviet tanks in the Tank Museum Bovington.

A T62.

A T55. This has been cut away for training purposes.