Sdkfz 222 5. Light Division, Libya 1941 Tamiya 1/35

Modeling Subjects Armor
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I built this for the 12 Days of Christmas Challenge. This is Tamiya’s 1/35 scale Classic 1970s vintage kit of the German light armored car. This issue of the kit included photo etch grenade screens for the turret and a metal barrel for the 20mm main gun. I modified my kit to be an early phase 2nd batch vehicle with no armored cover over the radiator slats, but still having the additional plates over the hubs. I also left off some brackets on the front fenders, added another shovel, and moved the jack, all based upon some photos that I found. I did the car as when the 5th Light Division (which later became the 21st Panzer Division) first arrived in Libya as the beginnings of the Deutsches Afrika Korps in February 1941. The vehicles arrived in Dark Gray, and still wore their old 3rd Panzer Division markings, as the nucleus of the 5th Light was taken from 3rd Panzer. Once in Africa, the crews quickly made up a mud slurry to apply to the external surfaces of their vehicles to better blend with the local terrain, until appropriate camouflage paint was developed and issued to the troops… anyways, here is the finished vehicle and little base… I still need to paint up a figure or two for the crew.

Thanks for looking, comments and critiques are welcome…

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That is very nicely done, the field applied camo looks really nice over the grey.

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Thanks Bish. I am really happy with how this turned out. Especially for a “speed build” project. Until I started putting on the mud camo, I was not sure how that would look. Then it was one of those “ohhhh yeah” moments as it started to take final shape.

4

Really well finished car. It fits right in with your description of the history.

One suggestion- those rocks don’t seem to sit in the landscape. I’d consider removing them.

Welcome back from the ether, Stik.

5

Nice vehicle.

You did such a good job on the camo it blends into the sand and I can barely see your work! [:P]

6

Looks great to me SP, love the way you duplicated the mud camo.

And super impressed on getting her done in twelve days. I’ve got a Bronco Republic of China early model Sdkfz 221 and I might get her finished in twelve months once I start…

And I have to agree with GM. You could just add more sand to the base and build it up to make the rocks look embedded in it.

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Thanks guys! It’s good to be back. The base is a bit of a work in progress. I am not happy with the rocks stance either… at least on some of them… it’s a learning process as that is just a sheet of that railroad stuff, cut to fit the stand. I have some ideas and I am working on them to get it all blended.

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Nicley done!

I built the first issue of the kit years ago and remember the mesh that you had to cut was a pain. Imagine the PE makes it a breeze.

9

Looks really good stick! And in 12 days…wow

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Thanks guys. I appreciate your taking the time to look in and your kind words.

Grey, I hear ya about the mesh screens of the original kit. I built that one about 30 years ago. On this one the PE sure sped up that part of the build. Just bend to shape and add some CA glue to keep in in shape. But then I had to be super careful around those areas in the finishing process, as I did not want to accidentally knock those things off…

Kev, yeah pretty much 12 days of bench sessions. I finished in 11 days before the deadline, then went back and did some fine tuning afterwards. My work schedule had me miss two full days so why not…

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Really nice with the yellow on gray finish,yes and if your going to imbed the rocks,do the wheels also,so not sitting up,but sinking into the sand.

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Thank you Tony.

Aside from a major surgery to the base, I really can’t sink the vehicle into the sand. But having spent months in the desert myself I can tell you that not all desert is soft sand, and there are plenty of areas where AFVs and soft skins sit on top, just like here. The top surface is hardpacked as concrete, and even tanks leave very little trace of their passage…

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Beautifully done Stik,and absolutely correct observation on a desert enviroment.

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Thank you sir!

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Sure true. Maybe the thing is that the rocks are too big, and they seem to pay attention to the perimeter in the way they are arranged.

For smaller scales I like to use aquarium rocks.

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I was aiming for this appearance

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No critiques here, because that’s a darn nice looking 222!

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Well done Stik!

To support what you said about hard ground: I spent five months in the Arizona desert in 2013 - 2014 and found vast areas of undisturbed sand to be hard as concrete. This hard soil (caliche) occurs worldwide I‘m told, generally in arid or semiarid regions.

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Thanks for the critiques and comments guys!

Based upon GM’s critique, I changed the orientation of the vehicle on the base, so that the large rocks were also under the vehicle. That helped a good bit I think. I also added a map case over the ding that I accidentally created in the top deck grill when I was opening it up. That’s the great thing about armor builds- stowage and weathering can usually cover such gaffes…

This past Friday nite at IPMS the theme was open top vehicles, so I chose this build as my contest entrant. The figure that I am working on is not ready yet, so I added another from my batch of DAK figures to fill in for now… anyways she took 1st place in the Master Category and also won the theme award of Open Top with all the work that I added to the interior… Yay!

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The final entry for this project. Yesterday I finally got around to taking a photo of this build with the awards received.