FORGE WAGONS.

Forge wagons in my Army are allocated to the Veterinary/Farrier companies of Quartermaster battalions. Each company has four of these wagons which tow a light GS trailer carrying fuel supplies. The principles of operation are that Veterinary/Farrier platoons travel to all the Battalions supported by that particular Quartermaster battalion to "service" the horses of those units.

The historic reference for these vehicles is the German Vorratswagon 96 n/A of World War One as shown in the pictures below.

My vehicles are based on 5mm balsa slabs to my standard size of 30 x 15 mm. I cut two such slabs for each wagon. The second slab is cut into three parts, one of  15 x 15 and two of 15 x 10 all as shown on the left side of the photo below. These parts are then glued together to create a forward storage locker for raw materials with two side lockers for tools etc as shown in the centre of the photo below. I then file the ends of the side lockers to give a rounded profile, add a chimney made from a piece of plastic straw (or environmentally friendly paper straw!!!!) , a shaft with horse mounting block, wheels and towing hook. These operations are clearly shown from top to bottom on the right side of the photo below.

The photo below shows the whole batch of 24 vehicles with all plastic and metal parts primed. If there are any gaps between the lockers, I fill them with Milliput,  file smooth when dry and prime these areas too.

This next photo shows the batch of vehicles painted olive drab.

Here is the whole batch fully painted with horses and harness wire fitted. In case it is not clear in the photo below, I paint the chimneys black both inside and out. For the methods of manufacturing and painting of horses and the fitting of harness wire see my posts on horses and GS wagon construction..

Finally a close up of a single vehicle which hopefully will clarify any lingering construction questions.

When I first started building my Army my standard supply vehicle was a covered wagon. These were made using bits of wire to create the hoops over which was glued tissue paper to give the covered wagon look. Over the years my army was in storage, most of these fragile tissue tilts got damaged. In addition I realised that covered wagons were just too awkward to build in any quantity hence the GS wagon that I now use. However I was left with a number of covered wagons. These became my first Forge wagons as shown below.

 The rear part of the tilt was removed and a chimney added. The remainder of the tilt was repaired with more tissue and lots of super glue, its amazing how strong tissue becomes when soaked in super glue!!!!!!! These old converted vehicles bear a striking resemblance to the Vorratswagon.

Within the whole army group I have a total of 72  forge wagons of both old and new versions.

BOOKS.

THE GERMAN ARMY HANDBOOK OF 1918

This week I have read a new book found in a second hand book shop during a recent visit to the seaside.

Based on the British War Office handbook of April 1918, this is a gold mine of useful and interesting information. The level of detail is extraordinary. Strangely this bookshop also had a copy of a reproduction of the 1913 edition. Although both books were the same original price, in the same "as new" condition and virtually the same size, the 1913 version was three times more expensive. The bookshop owner could only refer me to the prices quoted on line, which he followed, with no other practical explanation of the price difference. As the content of both books was clearly very similar I elected to purchase the cheaper version. I have to say, the bookshop in question had one of the best collections of military books I have seen in a long time. I may have to go back one day !!!!!

I like these old War Office publications very much. I have a number of them including reproductions of the 1914 Field Service Pocket Book, The Employment of Machine Guns 1918 and the Field Service Manual for Infantry Battalions 1914. I also own an original Field Service Pocket Book from 1932 and an original Royal Army Medical Corps Training manual from 1911. All have splendid levels of intricate detail. 

I am pleased to report that, as predicted, I have enjoyed more modelling play time this week. As a result I have been able to half varnish the 500+ soldiers required for the Command battalions upgrade. In addition the 34 office and signals wagons have now been painted olive drab and the horses for these vehicles have also been "browned" in my standard horse colour. Finally I have completed the first batch of three Cavalry squadrons for my Cavalry regiments upgrade. Only another 15 squadrons to go !!!!!!

I am still working on the post about forge wagons that I mentioned back in May. The vehicles themselves were finished and issued months ago but other matters intervened to delay the "how to make" post. Anyway, its finally almost done so I expect to publish shortly. I am pleased to say I have now had my first couple of comments. As a result it was suggested to me that I  remove the moderation setting to enable comments to be added to the blog instantaneously. This I have now done. I hope it generates more comments please.

BOOKS.

SALUTE OF GUNS

I have just re-read a book from my library that I have had for some time.

This is the story of a Lieutenant in the Royal Artillery in World War One. The book is not the best from a military history perspective in that it is very literary, the author became a reporter at the Manchester Evening Post after the war and the book is full of dreamy descriptions of sun rises etc. There is however, a lot of interesting stuff about day to day experiences but the main focus is on the authors two nervous breakdowns during the war.
I have read other autobiographies where the author has had a breakdown or suffered PTSD as a result of their experiences. I have also got books describing similar experiences where the author has apparently sailed through a war and come out it seems, almost untouched by the horrors they suffered. It makes me wonder why some are so traumatised and others not. It is impossible to be sure as , I am pleased to say, I have not had any traumatic war experiences and additionally, I am not a psychiatrist.  However I think it comes down to the personality of the individual. It seems to me , from what I can gather of the personalities of the various authors, that those with a strong intellectual leaning are much more likely to suffer than those who are more matter of fact. I do believe that the greater a man's imagination, the more likely he is to suffer PTSD.
Anyone got any thoughts on this issue ?????

After a busy domestic week I have not managed to get much modelling time. In fact I have made no progress at all with the things I posted last time as work in progress!!!!! What little time I did manage at the work station was spent implementing the changes to Command battalions previously mentioned. For some reason or other I decided not to carry on with the several jobs on the bench but instead decided to collect the 300 odd soldiers currently with Command battalions that required repainting, which together with another 200 new soldiers, actually represents the organisational changes. I have managed to carry out most of the repainting, which was around changing arm of service  and rank colours.  I now have about 500+ soldiers to varnish !!!!!!! That's what comes of deciding to make changes that affect 19 battalions !!!!!  I hope to get more "play" time later this week at which time I hope to make some progress with the other outstanding tasks.
 In the meantime I see I am still getting a lot of visitors to my blog yet no one seems willing to leave a comment on what they see or read. I am at a loss to explain this, please let me know what you think of my ramblings, good bad or ugly, I really would appreciate some feedback please.

Although I have had little time recently to model I have managed some progress. The Quartermaster Transport battalion has been completed. This is the last battalion to complete the Army Group at this time other than three Command battalions that are on hold pending the organisational changes mentioned in previous posts. With completion of this battalion the Army Group now numbers 45,172.

The photo above shows two of the three transport companies with just 5 more GS wagons needed to complete the equipment.

This photo shows the third Transport company on the left with the headquarters company on the right.

Other tasks currently in hand include the building of a batch of 34 office wagons to complete the equipment of Command battalions.

This batch includes a number of signals vehicles which can be seen on the top row equipped with paperclip aerials. These vehicles now await painting in olive drab. The horses for these vehicles are made and primed on one side.

These horses are waiting to be painted "horse" brown after which they will be glued on the painted side to the wagons. I find the painted side gives a good key for the glue. The rest of the horse is then primed and "browned".

Finally I am well advanced with the first batch of three new Cavalry squadrons also mentioned in a previous post.

These 66 new Cavalrymen are complete apart from the "browning" of the horses.

BOOKS.

PANZER ACE

This is the first post I have made covering the books I am reading. I intend to do more posts in the future on what I think are interesting books that I acquire or am re-reading. I am fortunate enough to have a very extensive library covering all sorts of military subjects although with an emphasis on the subjects that particularly interest me including 19th century warfare, World War 1, horse drawn military vehicles and logistics of all periods. To start the ball rolling I have to mention the book I am currently reading, which typically is not from those areas !!!!!!!!!!!

This is a newly published book, face value £25, which I picked up in The Works for £4. I often ;look at the books in this shop as they are so cheap. They seem to bring out a new batch of books every three or so months and often include subjects I find of interest but for which I may not be willing to pay the full price. This particular book is one of the best I have read recently. The author survived the war to become a General in the Bundeswehr and includes some amazing photos and descriptions of day to day service life with many references to the vehicles within his unit. These vehicles will be familiar to the WW2 German army enthusiast but to read about the daily use of these vehicles is very interesting indeed.