What, no stowage for the British?

Most of the kit (Brit word for gear) on a Chally is stored in bins on the turret rear and sides.  The Brits don't like to store their kit on the outsides of the tank.   

Thanks so much for your time HA, seems like the forum was down yesterday for some time. I stopped by the LHS and snatched the Tamiya set anyways. I'll have it pending for an upcoming Bradley build. Once the Chally 2 is finished, next in line is Academy's Merkava then comes the Bradley

Have a nice weekend!

No stowage?  You got to be kidding me... they has to store tea bags and cups somewhere!?!?  

Check this Desert Storm-era shot:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Challenger_Desert_Storm_1.jpg

There's some folding cots stowed on the turret, but that's about it, as far as I can see.. Plus the gear inside the rolled tarp...  I'd always noticed that about the Brits..

Guess they can't get their gear replaced as easily as we could after it got holed by one determined machine-gunner and  shrapnel from a couple mines... 

I dumped copper jackets, various blobs of lead, and pieces of steel outta my shredded ruck for a week...  Got a new set of DBDU's,a parka, and blanket... My field stove, coffee pot, and three jars of instant coffee were goners though, along with most of my canned pogey-bait... Oh gawd... Gawd... I rememeber now...The cheese... The Cheese!! The atrocity-committin' SKUNKS!! They.. Them.. The sumb**ches killed my CHEESE!!!

The only stowage on my Mk 2 is the tarp I got from Real Model that was commonly seen on the Chally during Operation Telic  some rolled tarps at the back and the food ration cartons that came withe the Real Models box.

One thing I that I noticed during my service time was that most foreign armies individual soldiers are not so lavishly equipped as US soldiers. We tend to issue more gear, comfort items, and uniforms to our soldiers. Not to mention what soldiers buy, trade, or otherwise acquire for themselves along the way. And comparing stowage on an IFV like the Bradley to an MBT like the Abrams of Challenger is not a valid comparison. The Bradley carries an 8 man rifle squad in a smaller vehicle vs. a 4 man tank crew. The rifle squad has twice the amount of water and ration requirements, NBC protective gear,  plus their associated specialty gear such as individual Night Vision Gear and optics for themselves and weapons, Man Pack radios and sapre batteries, ATGM such as Javelin, shoulder fired AT weapons, ammo for weapons like grenade launchers, belt fed small arms automatic weapons, etc. More stuff, to again put in a smaller space.... IFVs and APCs get crowded real quick.

I agree with Stikpusher. I'm a big fan of british armor and vehicles and I hardly see any photo of them loaded as the americans have. Even in the desert during WWII,their armoe and vehicle are almost clean of any loadexcept perhaps some tarps.

HVH, thanks so much for the picture of the Chally in action. It gave some inspiration to weather the v2 which was just started.

Thanks for the link constructor, I never heard from Real Models. I did a search and found their sets, ouchh!!! I think I'm going to try to scratch build those tarps. I will flatten Sculpey with a round glass, roll and bake them. All I have to loose is $1.99

Carlos, thanks so much for your insight. I believe it makes a lot of sense.

Here are a few pixes of my humble Chally 1 Mk.3 I need to paint the hatch but not very sure which is the right color.

Very nicely built El Taino For the inner surface of the hatch I will suggest Bronze Green, Tamiya Khaki Drab. The British Challengers that were deployed to Saudi were taken from Europe in their Green and Black camo schemes. The hatches would have been closed and periscopes/vision blocks masked off when repainted into desert camo. To my eye, Tamiya Khaki Drab is a good match for the green color once it is weathered and faded, at least compared to the stuff I have seen in real life. Bronze Green I believe is the color when new.

No, we don't like to store stuff on the outside, its rather frowned upon. When i was driving a Warrior, the only things on the outside were the crew tent, cam net, and maybe the day sacks and a few bit and pieces that wouldn't go inside in the turret bin. Plus roll mats bungeed to the back of the bin.

 The only things i have noticed on the back of Challys is a few roll mates attached to the rear or the turret.

And haveing stuff stored inside doesn't stop the stuff getting damaged. During live firing, when every one was closed down, we used to take great joy in 'accidentally' hoseing down the back of our challys with our 7.62 chain guns. Just where the bin were that stored there sleeping bags and other items.

There is the odd exception. We did spend a couple of weeks driving round the Canadian prairie with ration boxes strapped to the front because we had so many rations. But that was about it.

But there doesn't seem to be much British kit on the market

I think Accurate Armor are the only folks I have seen offer modern British kit in 1/35. Bish, when you say roll mates, are those the foam sleeping matts?

One thing I that I noticed during my service time was that most foreign armies individual soldiers are not so lavishly equipped as US soldiers. We tend to issue more gear, comfort items, and uniforms to our soldiers. Not to mention what soldiers buy, trade, or otherwise acquire for themselves along the way.

Boy, you ain't kiddin'...

I had my stuff spread between the howitzer and the FAASV...

I built a couple "sit-downs" for my section as well..  Took a pair of folding lawn-chairs, cut the webbing off the seat and screwed down a piece of plywood... Then cut a hole in the middle of it, and we kept it bungied on the bustle-rack..  No squatters on the "Base Piece", lol..   Just remember to take an e-tool with ya to "flush"...

Looks great El Taino. Nice subdued finish.

stikpusher

I think Accurate Armor are the only folks I have seen offer modern British kit in 1/35. Bish, when you say roll mates, are those the foam sleeping matts?

 

Ye, thats them. And i believe your right about Accurate Armour.

I can't speak for the tankies, but we used to be very limited in the stuff we took on excersise, theres not a lot of room inside those Warriors.

Thanks so much guys for all your comments. I've been learning things from them I did not know.

Tigerman, thanks for the compliment. To be honest, I'm not totally satisfied with the base color. I used Acryl British Gulf Armor 4813. The color might be right, but looking around for reference pictures, most Challengers in service have a more ''bleached'' sand tone. I don't know, maybe my eyes are failing

I gave the Challenger 2 (still WIP) a coat fo Acryl Sand 4720 to the lower hull. It is too light, I decided to mix a 50/50 of Sand 4720 and 4813, it does looks better. I will post some pictures.

i know this thread is a few weeks old and i'm not gonna dispute you guys that know more about the British tankers' habits than i do, i'm England born, but i did my time in the US Army. 

but, back on topic, i ordered/received the stowage kit for HBs Defender Wolf today from Legend and it does contain some really good, well molded British kit. it's got enough bergens, kit bags, open and wrapped, including some bedmats separate as well for the 3 crew members of this vehicle. 

with limited modern British kit available, most of the pieces in this set can be used for any model.

ctfw529

i know this thread is a few weeks old and i'm not gonna dispute you guys that know more about the British tankers' habits than i do, i'm England born, but i did my time in the US Army. 

but, back on topic, i ordered/received the stowage kit for HBs Defender Wolf today from Legend and it does contain some really good, well molded British kit. it's got enough bergens, kit bags, open and wrapped, including some bedmats separate as well for the 3 crew members of this vehicle. 

with limited modern British kit available, most of the pieces in this set can be used for any model.

Thanks for the info amigo, could you place a link to the Legend kit you're talking about. I'm still interested.

Cheers!

sure, sorry, should of done that last night in my reply.

link to the product page at Legend - http://www-legend.co.kr/01_afv01.html?table=product&st=view&page=1&id=487&limit=&keykind=&keyword=&bo_class=1&fpage=&spage=

link to sprue brothers page with product, this was where i got mine, they're one of the only online retailers that have any right now, that i could find - http://store.spruebrothers.com/135-legend-wolf-wmik-storage-set-hbs-kit-1226-p27180.aspx