Napoleonic & ECW wargaming, with a load of old Hooptedoodle on this & that


Tuesday 10 May 2022

WSS: En passant par la Lorraine - and a quart of pea soup, please

 More sabots. I painted most of my stock of special one-size-fits-all WSS sabots a while ago, but the time has come to paint the rest of them. In some ways, the WSS has been an opportunity to try out some of my more peculiar OCD ideas, and the sabots are one of my better efforts. I designed my basing for this period so that it could be used with Maurice, Beneath the Lily Banners, Piquet's Field of Battle and my own WSS rules - infantry in column are 150mm long, in line they are 150mm wide, and the cavalry measurements are also standardised, so I have one size of sabot which will handle all horse and foot in either formation.

Part of my obsession with sabots, of course, is to do with the fact that I use old Les Higgins figures, which have the most ridiculously fragile bayonets ever, so wargaming here is HANDLE BY THE BASES ONLY.

I stirred up a nice big pot of the house baseboard green, and the last of the sabots have now had their first coat. These are the last MDF items I bought from the much-missed Tony Barr before he retired, so I view them with some affection.

You can never have too many sabots - it's a fact. I just need to get a bigger box to keep them in now.

 
Yes - that's right - the second coat will look after the end I left for handling, and the third (touch-up) coat will check the edges for charcoal traces showing through


8 comments:

  1. Just to show what you can stir up by accident, I received an email from Henry, an interior designer from Harrogate, complimenting me on the piece of furniture underneath the paint job, which he correctly identifies as a "mid-century Ercol studio couch". Why thank you, Henry - what else would I paint some old bits of MDF on?

    Anyway, Henry's happy, so I've pleased someone.

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  2. How very nice and green they look too!

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    1. Thank you Ray - they are, as you say, very green indeed.

      I must say that painting with a 1" Harris brush is quite therapeutic after a spell with the 000 Series 7.

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  3. You will have some more figures in the post (hopefully) tomorrow for some of those sabots! Nice shade of green, I like the way everything just hangs together in your system with not a bit of static grass in sight.

    Ercol, good spot by Henry. I like Ercol so very quick story. In the early Eighties my Father in Law was working at the University of Greenwich at a time when the Chancellors offices and the board room were being redecorated. Out in the skip went a lovely Ercol extending dining table and 8 chairs ( to be replaced by a ghastly modern set) so he 'rescued' the lot and used the University van to get the entire set home over the course of a week. In 2008 we inherited it and it served us well for many family meals until we moved to Spain and sold for a price that surprised us - you might have a little gem there Tony :) Sorry, nothing to do with soldiers I know but it hosted many a wargame in it's time.

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    1. Looking forward to greeting the new troops - I have a very fine double CD of period music written for Louis XIV, featuring military tableaux and all sorts - notably compositions of André Philidor - I'm sure it will be just the thing.

      Ercol - this particular "studio couch" was obtained from a Polish lady who restores and reupholsters mid-Century furniture, and I'm convinced that I got it at a very good price!

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  4. Oh yes, I grew up with ercol, parental pride and joy. I inherited some too. Mum would have gone mad if I'd tried painting anywhere near it !

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    1. This is where our anal tendencies come from, dear boy. "Keeping things nice" was a religion in my family.

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  5. Looks a lovely piece Tony. Good quality stuff. I like the term "mid-century". Logically it's very imprecise, but we all know what it means.

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