Dragoons released

(Updated 01/06/19)

In case you are not on PA's mailing list - they have just announced that the dragoon moulds are (finally) been released - see their newsletter:                 

Hi Steve, The June Bank Holiday weekend is upon us, combined with Fathers Day on the 16th and the new release of our super Dragoons Mould set inspired us to offer some discounts that will determine how your hobby develops this summer. First and foremost, we have a brand new set of FOUR moulds that offers you the biggest opportunity yet to customise your castings for the armies in the Seven Years War. Dragoons were fielded by most countries and our mould have interchangeable heads to reflect that versatility. Painting /Assembly guides are still in development. There is an early discount of 10% off this new set that expires at noon on Tuesday. The other discounts are part of the June Weekend Sale and include the following: ·     SYW Artillery crew moulds PA3118 and PA3119. ·     SYW Russian Bundle further discounted. ·     PA1240 Napoleonic Starter Kit (54mm). ·     PSK-L Advanced Paint Pack. ·     Solder Melting Pot. ·     Flexi-neck Magnifying Glass. ·     AC-PA2073 Tool Set (Brass Brush, Files and Super Snipper). Sale expires at noon on Tuesday June 4th 2019 GMT+1. No coupons are required. Sale prices are on product pages (strikethrough of older prices can be seen). No minimum order requirements. Go to Prince August's Website ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌

I received a set of 4 moulds today (so no sneak peak this time), which comprises:

1. Officer with Austrian head (as shown)
2. Drummer with Austrian head (as shown)
3. Trooper with Austrian head (not shown - see below)
4. A set of 8 different heads to make other nations & horse grenadiers,  plus an arm for a standard bearer.

The horse/torso are one piece castings, with separate arms, heads and carbine.

The picture is confusing (in fact wrong), the rear figure is the previously released cuirassier, the dragoon is on a similar horse, however the sword is pointing rather than on the shoulder.

As the weather has been fine I have done some casting over the last couple of days, and have cast up enough figure for about 5 units (so that is 30 of the trooper). Initially using my 'scrap metal' I struggled casting the heads, swords and carbine (which are near the top of the mould). However after some venting, and playing around with the elastic bands and clamps I ended up with something like a 90% success rate. (They cast much easier with the Model Metal).

The heads Austrian heads in with the tops of the moulds with the horses and riders, and although they cast pretty much every time, the detail was a little smooth. For the Austrians I have decided to use the officer head from the Russians, which I think is one of the nicest in the range, and is the one I have used on the Karoliner conversions, so there will be some continuity between the two sets of cavalry.

I have a couple of units cleaned up and undercoated and will try and get one painted in the next week or so - the dragoon officer is also going to act as 'brigadiers' until some general staff are available.

Freikorps von Kleist

Prussian Light Troops

I decided to make some light troops for a project I am planning. Hopefully PA will bring out some dedicated moulds in the near future, however in the meantime I had a play with what I currently have available.

The bodies for the troops are the Hungarian infantry, with a few changes:

• Mirliton heads have been used on the NCO and rank and file. These were kindly donated by Aly Morrison (see post 20 March 2017), hopefully something similar will be made available by PA in the not too distant future? (Kronoskaf states that a tricorns was also worn.)
• The tricorns for the officers and drummer are from the Prussian guard infantry (rank ans file), I chose this as it has the scalloped edge - I cut the mustache off using a sharp knife.
• The NCO has a musket from the Russian officer.

I appreciate the lace is all wrong, however they do what I always wanted from this range - look the part even if not 100% correct.

The figures are singly based as I am planning to use thenm with the recently published 'A Gentleman's War' rules.

Next up some Austrian Light troops. I fancy painting up 'Grun Loudon'............what figures to use???

Prussian Infantry & Dragoon Update

Prussian Infantry

I have finally made a start to painting some more Prussian infantry - this time IR No7 - Braunschweig-Bevern.

These are pretty much the standard Prussian castings, with the exception of the officer who is a Russian with a Prussian head. He needs a little conversion - just remove the belly pouch and shave off the buttons from the front of the coat.

I really do not enjoy painting Prussians - I find working with the dark blue difficult.

The flag is from Maverick Models - 80p well spent!

Dragoons - Update

Work on the dragoons is moving on slowly, the current plan is to revert back to figures with the horse and torso together, as it proved difficult to produce an accurate fit on the torso to horse connection (hands-up that was my idea) . It is still proposed to keep separate arms and heads to allow more variety.

Both the horses and riders will be about 7% smaller than the cuirassiers to rescale the horse to 15 hands compared with the 16 hands for the cuirassiers.

There will be 3 figure moulds, an officer (pictured below), a drummer and a trooper, along with an extra arm to convert either the officer or trooper into a standard bearer, these will have 'Austrian' heads, which are also suitable for French, Russians and quite a few others.

In order to allow these to be used for other nations there will be an additional mould containing cavalry heads including:

• Prussian tricorn with steep front
• Austrian horse grenadier bearskin
• Russian horse grenadier 'mitre'
• Horse grenadier mitre
• French dragoon fatigue cap
• British light dragoon

Below is the work in progress for the heads - these need a bit more work but give an idea of what is proposed.

As always feedback would be appreciated.

Prussian Cuirassiers by Steve Marthinsen

A little more eye candy for you - Steve has been busy converting the Austrian cuirassiers to make the Prussian version.

The conversion was quite involved and required shortening the coat tails and adding the sabretache.

If you have any comments or questions on how he did this please post them here and I am sure Steve will pass me the responses.

More head swapping

I've been playing again................

Following on from the previous post. The charging French dragoons were originally painted as a large 'old school' unit - so there are quite a lot of them. (Enough for 3 of my smaller 8 man units if I paint up two more standard bearers and musicians)

Having done the first unit with a straight swap of heads with tricorn I decided to be a bit more adventurous. and make a unit in forage cap.  I used the 'bonnet de police' from the SYW French infantry - again it fits quite well and looks fine size wise.

I have to admit that this combination of the Karoliner charging cavalry and the new SYW heads is really growing in me, and I might cast up some more?

Interestingly, when I started this project all I asked PA to produce were some more heads!

What a difference a head makes?

I had a game using the 'King of the Battlefield' rules last week - well worth a try if you have not used them.

During the game I thought how well the Russian cavalry, which are Karoliners, converted during casting/assembly with the new SYW heads fitted in with the new range. Rather than sidelining the old figures, I decided to try and 'upgrade' some of my painted units - something I was nervous about, as potentially it could ruin them - however I think I got away with it.

I am not suggesting there is anything wrong with the older figures, however all of the new range have larger hats and more facial detail - so the older ones look a little out of place - the photo below shows the difference.

One of the units in action before change.

And the same unit after the head swap.

The process I adopted was much easier than I had expected - the important thing is to keep things as clean as possible (it was done with the figures on the bases), as follows:

• Cut off the head with a pair of snips (this leaves an uneven surface)
• Square off the join with a sharp craft knife (avoid a file as it makes a mess)
• Drill a small diameter pilot hole (I used an electric mini drill)
• Drill out the full size hole for the head to be fitted - use a pin vice for this to avoid generating heat which would damage the paint
• Undercoat the heads before fitting
• Fit the heads (I find the Russian officer ideal)
• Paint to match existing.

I have done 2 units so far, I think they took about 3 hours each.

Austrian "3pdr" - and best wishes for the New Year.

Nothing much has been happening on the 40mm SYW front over the last few months. I am told the plan is to release the dragoons early next year - fingers crossed.

I have however, as suggested in my post back in March (was it really that long ago) had a play at making an Austrian 3pdr battalion gun using the following components:

• Wheels from new SYW range
• Barrel from the Karoliner 6pdr
• Carriage from the Rossbach 12pdr

I then made the following minor modifications:

• Added a cross piece in the trail - not quite correct but looks better.
• Drilled out the holes at the rear of the carriage, which made it look much neater,
• I originally assembled the wheels on the carriage as cast - but they looked too wide. To correct this I narrowed the solid/rectangular axle by about 2mm and then attached the wheels by drilling out 1.5mm holes, and inserting new axles made from the pegs of spare heads.
• Drilled out the end of the barrel.

As discussed in the earlier post, the dimensions are not quite right - however I am happy with the result and will be rearming my Austrians with them (when I start working on them again).

Best wishes to you all for the New Year.

Steve