Updating Your Spandrels!

One of the original releases for Team Yankee was the Soviet "Spandrel" or 9P148 Konkurs. It serves as a light anti-tank asset for your Warsaw Pact forces, and is typically fielded in groups of two or three - you get three in the AT Platoon box set (TSBX11). Because of its light armor and inability to fire on the move, the Spandrel is generally best used in ambush or from prepared positions with some cover. As a part of my overall East German force, I decided I needed a unit of these cute little armored cars.

Looking at the original miniature, it is clear that Battlefront tool the easy way out and created one master body for all BRDM-2 variants (Boyevaya Razvedyvatelnaya Dozornaya Mashina 2, or Combat Reconnaissance Patrol Vehicle 2). This means that the Spandrel and related Gaskin (be on the look out for a future blog on that vehicle) share the same hull as the vanilla reconnaissance variant. That means the view ports on the sides of the Reconnaissance vehicle carry over, and generally these were not present on the Spandrel. So I decided to fix mine.

The right hand side was as simple as just deleting the vision port. I did most of the surgery with a Dremel motor tool, and then sanded it smooth with medium and fine grit sandpaper.

The other side was a bit trickier as I had to mold a shovel to put on the left side. Okay "had" may be a bit of a strong word, but I chose to add the detail. To make this happen I used a mold putty to create an RTV mold of the shovel from the Battlefront Shilka.

I then cast up a few copies and super glued them to the hull. Now I have three Spandrels ready for paint (which again will be detailed in a future blog entry!).