My army has three types of operational flag.
The only other flag in my army is the red cross flag which is flown by all ambulance wagons. Other medical vehicles carry a small red cross sign on each side only.
My historic reference for many of the design ideas of my flags is based to some degree or other on the US army of the Civil war period.
The strip of paper is then glued and wrapped round the pin as shown below. I then cut the flag to finished length and in the case of triangular flags I then cut the angles.
A drop of glue is placed in the groove on the screw soldier and the pin flagstaff attached. After half an hour or so I then apply a big blob of glue ( UHU HART ) to smother all round the flag staff ensuring the glue goes well into the thread of the screw. Don't worry if the glue goes right round the screw or how big a blob you have as it shrinks as it dries as shown below.
The next step is to apply primer to the whole of the flag, staff and the glue joint as shown on the left below. Its then just a matter of final painting of the flags which in this case are for 28th Infantry Command battalion.
The national flag is carried by all battalions and regiments and is oblong, solid blue in colour with a single white star in the first hoist area of the flag.
Each battalion/regiment also carries a battalion/regimental flag which is triangular, with a blue field and the battalion/regiment number in white on the field. The staff is coloured to the arm of service for that particular type of battalion/regiment. In the case of brigade command battalions the main part of the staff is coloured red for command but the top of the staff is coloured to the type of brigade, infantry or cavalry.
The third flag is the general's personal flag. These are also triangular with a blue field but the staff is gold and there are small stars across the field, either one, two, three, four or five to represent the general's rank. All the stars I use are decals purchased from Fantasy Printshop of Cornwall, hand painting small stars was just a step too far for my skills !!!!
This photo shows from left to right, the national flag, the battalion flag of 7th army command battalion, a two star major general's flag and lastly, a three star lieutenant generals flag.
This photo shows from left to right, the national flag, the battalion flag of 7th army command battalion, a two star major general's flag and lastly, a three star lieutenant generals flag.
The only other flag in my army is the red cross flag which is flown by all ambulance wagons. Other medical vehicles carry a small red cross sign on each side only.
My historic reference for many of the design ideas of my flags is based to some degree or other on the US army of the Civil war period.
CONSTRUCTION.
The construction of flags is straight forward and is in fact, based largely on the 1969 Miniature Warfare magazine article that originally introduced the idea of using screws as soldiers.
I start with a pin and a piece of ordinary copier paper, that is 85gsm for the paper experts !!!!! I usually use scrap from the printer but avoiding any printed areas. Flags are 12mm high by 18mm long when finished so I cut strips at least 50mm long so as to allow for wrapping round the flag staff with a bit left to cut to length. As for the flag bearers, I file a groove in the screw at about 20 degrees off vertical. I hope the groove can be seen in the photo below.
A drop of glue is placed in the groove on the screw soldier and the pin flagstaff attached. After half an hour or so I then apply a big blob of glue ( UHU HART ) to smother all round the flag staff ensuring the glue goes well into the thread of the screw. Don't worry if the glue goes right round the screw or how big a blob you have as it shrinks as it dries as shown below.
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