What's (Back) on the Table - Team Yankee Volksarmee Build Log Part 1

Guardian Games in Portland is running a Fulda Gap campaign this summer, and I'm still hoping to get in a few games in some of the later turns. Unfortunately my Team Yankee armies are no where near done because of my recent work schedule, but I'm madly trying to get a few points on the table as quickly as possible.

My first purchases were way back when TY first came out, but other projects took priority over them. I still plan to go back and do an American force with some fun markings appropriate to the mid-1980's period (when this particular author was in high school), but when the Volks Armee release came out with the miniatures in the (admittedly) late 1980's NVA paint scheme, I'd "found my army" so to speak.

Battlefront's teaser for the T-55AM tank - though they really should have done it in plastic

At this point I'm still playing around with a few different lists - I wanted to have some of the T55AM tanks in the force because they're fairly iconic for the East German armed forces in the mid-1980's, but they're hopeless when faced with a third generation main battle tank from the front, so I decided to base the force around the more capable T-72 while maintaining a unit of T-55AM tanks as a flanking unit.

At this point I'm sort of working with this 100 point list:

• T-72M Panzer Bataillon
• HQ: 1X T-72M (3)
• Required 1: 7X T-72M (23)
• Required 2: 7X T-72M (23)
• Support 1: 10X T-55AM2 (16)
• Support 2: Full BMP-1 Mot-Schützen Kompanie + AGS-17 + SA-14 (21)
• Support 3: 4x ZSU-23-4 Shilka (4)
• Support 4: 3x BM-21 Hail (5)
• Support 5: 3X Spandrel (3)
• Support 6: Recon TBD (2)

So that ends up being a lot of vehicles - some of which I had picked up from the outset and started on (i.e. the boatload of T-72's that came in the initial release). I've been supplementing these with additional purchases as time went by until now I think I have all of the "stuff" I need to actually get this force together.

Some of the vehicles on the painting table ready for primer

So far construction of the Team Yankee vehicles has been a bit of a mixed bag. The plastic T-72 kit (TSBX01) goes together pretty well without a lot of fuss. I'm not crazy about the join line in the external fuel tanks, so I'm doing a little work with a styrene punch and disc to replace some of the detail. I also managed to lose one in the move, so my commander may have dropped his rear fuel drums.

Overall the plastic BMP (TSBX02) goes together well too, but the front lacks detail and has too many join lines on what should be a flat plate. Right now I've got several puttied and will be adding other detail later. The Shilka (TSBX05) kits aren't bad as resin and metal kits go, and assemble quickly. Though I'm not using them at this point, there are a couple of Gopher (TSBX06) SAM launchers above. I found the turret assembly to be fairly ticky on these.

T-55AM tank in progress

The T-55AM (TEBX01) tanks are turning out well, but they're taking a fair amount of extra work. I'm not entirely convinced the commander's hatches provided separately with the kit are exactly right based on 1/35th scale versions - so I'm kit bashing a better looking version with the parts included. Took me a couple to get it "right," but they seem to be coming out okay now.

The rest of the in progress T-72 tanks (I still have more to start) and the Hail launchers

The Hail Battery (TSBX08) is one unit where I've had some major issues. The resin casting on the truck bodies is really not up to normal Battlefront standards, but they're salvageable with a little work. However two of the three launchers have severe distortion and mold shifts resulting in "curved" tubes. I've sent a note to customer service asking for replacements after trying and failing to fix them

That being said, the Spandrel platoon (TSBX11) meets or exceeds the best that Battlefront has had to offer for several years. The resin is well cast. The design of the wheels is good, and the casting is top notch. I had been thinking about using the BMP as recon, but I like these miniatures so much I may end up going with BRDM-2 (TSBX10) platoon... because... well... cool minis!

So as I said, I have a lot of building to do at this point. I've also got one more business trip and then a trip back to Tennessee to see family coming up as well that are going to take some time out of my schedule. I really want to get this done before too late in the year because I will have another big build project to tackle later in the year - so keep watching this space...