Tuesday, February 6, 2024

Vapnartak and storage

This last weekend was Vapnartak in York.As usual there were some nice games on display but mainly the York show for me is about catching up with fellow wargamers and doing a bit of shopping.

As usual the show that roughly coincides with my birthday saw me making some fairly significant purchases. This year it's a big birthday and a couple of friends and son Jamie had offered to pay for some toys. With the plan to do a four-player Siege of Puebla game I need a few more Maximilian Adventure units so a visit to the Foundry stand seemed like a good way to pick up some stuff that friends could contribute to.


Two units of "Foreign Legion or Filibusters" plus a personality pack will, added to a few similar models I already own, give me the basis of a French line infantry unit in campaign dress. They will fight alongside my existing Turcos in the streets of Puebla.

I also got a pack of Mexican infantry and a Mexican personalities pack. These will serve alongside my existing red-jacketed state militia as an opposing player force. The personalities pack contains a nice general officer figure who will play a perhaps-important role in the game.

The other purchases were:


A Venetian house kit that was only a tenner at the table-top sale. Being designed for big 32mm Carnivale-style miniatures the doors are huge but with a little converting I reckon I can adapt it for Puebla.

Irregular Miniatures supplied some more Franco-Prussian War models so I can play Bloody Big Battles in 6mm. When I've painted them, Froeschwiller should be within my grasp.

And finally I invested in some self-adhesive magnetic sheet from Magnetic Displays. These have already been added to my 6mm unit storage facility. For years I've been keeping my expanding 1/300th scale WWII and Moderns collection in two Ikea filing cabinets mounted on the workshop wall:


The shallower drawers for the armies:


And the deeper ones for terrain:


The nice thing is that the drawers come out and can be used to transport stuff to games. However, I'm running out of space so with the aid of Lego bricks as spacers and PVC board or MDF off-cuts I've made some of my drawers double decker!


A couple of loops of insulating tape let me lift the top layer out and the newly acquired magnetic sheets stop the models sliding off. My 1/300th units are based on artist's mounting board and many are backed with self-adhesive ferro sheet, also from Magnetic Displays.

As you can see below, the extra space is badly needed!

New top layer - assorted Germans

In need of a new layer -
assorted 1940 French

I also picked up some more ferro sheet so I'll be spending some time increasing the proportion of the forces that stick to the magnets!

All in all I really enjoyed Vapnartak. It was great to catch up with so many wargaming friends and acquaintances. The only downside was that I didn't manage to off-load the old SOTCW banner. I really must get it to a current committee member somehow!


4 comments:

Neil Patterson said...

I see Foundry have rebadged the Camerone figures......can't see them as Filibusters myself, definitely FFL in Mexico!

Re: the SOTCW banner.

At present, there is no Society Committee. The previous Committee called it quits and agreed to pass everything to Mark Wheeler who wished to relaunch the SOTCW.

After a brief relaunch period and publication of a few Journals, Mark has put things on hold. If you want to contact me via my blog, I can try to sort it out.

https://aufklarungsabteilung.blogspot.com/


Neil

Steve J. said...

Always nice to catch up with friends at a show and of course buy some new toys. Nice storage units there and something I need to sort out when we revamp our lounge-cum-dining room, if SWMBO permits of course!

Counterpane said...

Neil

Thanks for the info. I'll get in touch as you suggest.

Richard

Counterpane said...

Steve

The Ikea cabinets were originally free standing and we had them either side of the window in our "master bedroom' without them looking out of place.

Unfortunately I don't think that particular model is still available.