Fresh From The Painting Desk

 So yes, I alluded to something other than the subject of this post appearing next, and to be fair, something quite different was ahead in the painting queue, but WWII stuff is so quick and easy to do, this one surged ahead and beat the opposition to the finish line!

The 85 mm air defense gun M1939 (52-K) (Russian: 85-мм зенитная пушка обр. 1939 г. (52-К)) was an 85 mm (3.3 in) Soviet anti-aircraft gun, developed under guidance of leading Soviet designers M. N. Loginov and G. D. Dorokhin. This gun was successfully used throughout the Second World War against high level bombers and other high- and medium-altitude targets. In emergencies they were also utilized as powerful anti-tank weapons. The barrel of the 52-K was the basis for the family of 85-mm Soviet tank guns. After the war some 52-Ks were refitted for peaceful purposes as anti-avalanche guns in mountainous terrain.

Adopted in 1939, the 85-mm M1939, like its German counterpart the 88-mm Flak 18/36/37, was meant for air defense. Like many anti-aircraft (AA) guns of the era it was also provided with anti-tank ammunition in the event a tank should appear.

I am not sure why the model came with the barrel resting on the support mounting - I would assume that was normally lowered before the gun was fired and the image on the web site has it modelled in the lowered position, but as it came this way, I just left it as is - if I attempted to alter it, I am sure I would just break the model!

I notice the two standing crew members need the soles of their boots tidying up, as they were attached to a base with PVA for painting, and some of the PVA has remained in place.

A close up of each of the crew members

A few images/videos of what we got up to over the weekend

On Saturday, we went to see our son Michael playing rugby for the first time since he was about 15 (us watching, not him playing!). That is him at the back, in the half back position:

The key player at the scrum is the scrum-half or half-back. This player throws the ball into the scrum, moves to the hindmost foot of the scrum, and is usually the player who picks the ball up and passes out to the fly-half who then distributes the ball to the backline.

A try being scored by Michael's team in (Patumahoe)

Thats Michael getting the ball then being tackled - he managed to hold onto the ball and feed it back though! His team won by something like 56 - 27

On Sunday, we took a short walk in a local reserve, and heard some magical birdsong...

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