Wrecked Car for my African Shanty

I thought my African Shanty town needed a few beat-up old cars hanging around to 'modern' it up a bit. I looked around for a source of suitable models, and came up with a surprising find.

Modern 28mm civilian vehicles are a bit of a rarity. You can find Hummers and Toyota pick ups in some ranges, but they are expensive. for this project I wanted something a bit different. I have had plenty of experience converting die-cast cars into wargaming pieces, having done it for my VBCW and Battle Cars collections in the past. The trouble is that most die-casts are not in '28mm scale', which is about 1:56. It was by chance I stumbled on the fact that Disney's Cars die casts are something close to 1:56 scale, although there is some variation across the range with some of the small cars being undersized for comic effect.










I thought I would start with Tow Mater, the tow truck. I bought him on eBay for about £5. I drilled out the bolts underneath so I could take it apart. I took the mouth piece off the front, and removed the tow hook thing on the back. I used a bit of card to build up a new front, and built a scenic base to fit in with the rest of the shanty town scenery. I also cut down one of the tires to make a flat tire out of green stuff.

A quick bit of paint, a bit of rust effect stippled over the top and plenty if GW washed to add a lot of weathering, and hey-presto! A suitably wrecked piece of war gaming scenery.

Here's a shot with a 28mm Russian (I haven't got any Africans yet) for comparison. Bear in mind, this isn't a Toyota type pick up typically used as 'Technicals', but rather an older 1950's Chevy type, which was a bigger beast. Scale wise, I think it's about right. I have also got a nice small salon car (I think it might be an old Skoda) and a VW camper to do next.