Rubicon Models OQF 6-pdr

Over the course of this summer, I have determined to start the process of clearing my “Pile of Shame” [see also, “Pile of Potential”]. This list includes such items as “Convert and paint the USMC DUKW” [done], “Sort out a carrying case for Barons’ War retinue” [done], and “Finish painting Barons’ War retinue” [done].

[done, done, done!]

But there’s plenty of Shame left on the list to convert into Potential, and so I’ve launched into something really juicy:

Crafting an ad-hoc anti-tank platoon for my 8th Army in the desert. 

This, therefore, is the first of two blog posts about its construction, with a specific focus on two Rubicon kits; the Ordnance QF 6-pounder 7cwt, and the Ordnance QF25/QF17-pdr Gun; both in 1/56 hard plastic.

First things first: the Rubicon 6-pdr.

This is a lovely kit, and was bound to be an essential part of my nascent AT platoon for two reasons: (1) it’s pretty bloomin’ iconic in the later desert war, and (2) I already had an unbuilt desert 6-pdr from Warlord Games in metal!

This meant that I had to dress to match. The Warlord model is the variant with the long, smooth barrel and no muzzle brake, so in order to match both it and the carriage, I opted for the British Mk 4 with L/50 on the Mk 1A carriage and simply removed the single baffle muzzle brake. Happily, once you’ve worked out just which variant you want to build, the full-colour assembly instructions are colour-coded to help, so I doubled-down on the tiny colour-swatch with my trusty highlighter and set to work.

Like almost all Rubicon kits, some aspects of the 6-pdr kit are comically complicated and some aspects are comically tiny. I have been building fiddly kits for thirty-five years now, and I know what I’m doing, but still, if I couldn’t laugh at the tiny bits pinging away over my desk, I suspect I might find it a wee bit frustrating.

Rubicon mitigate this by such clever expedients as attaching tabs to tiny components that you can hold until they’re glued in place (bravo, Ruby!), and by using colour-coded diagrams to show which component goes where… but I do wish they’d make the diagrams a little bigger: it’d be far more useful, I’m sure, than the page-and-a-half of adverts - and I’m not even that long-sighted yet!

The components are brilliantly designed and tooled, and fit together beautifully (no surprises there) - by preference, I build all my kits with superglue rather than ABS, and it works fine. Pleasingly, the trails pivot on their axis, so if you’re canny whilst building and basing it (not the US 57mm version), you can retain enough flexibility for the gun to switch between ‘deployed’ mode (tails split) and ‘towed’ mode. Those so inclined could then use magnets for the gun-laying crewman etc.

I was not - in this case - so inclined, so although my trails still swing, they will be glued into a firing position. That said, because I have an unhelpful fixation on uniformity of basing, I have left the fun itself unglued from the carriage, so that it can be more easily transported to games (and so it can still traverse and elevate in games before - inevitably - whiffing its shot!). Whenever possible, all of my support teams are based on the excellent Warlord Games 60mm round, lipped bases. 

The Ruby 6pdr comes with three British desert gunners, after the fashion of all Rubicon humans - that is, they are properly proportioned and a relatively blank canvas: their faces are pretty much identical and they require much better painting than I can manage to bring them to life! Although they are multi-part, they are relatively ‘monopose’ (which is fine for gunners with particular roles), but at least these crew don’t require their forearms to be attached to their upper arms, like some of Rubicon’s Vietnam-era vehicle crews! Kudos to Ruby for including in the instructions a brief guide to ‘Crew Placement’ too. Brilliant. 

The crew and accompanying ammo, empty cases etc. are not yet glued in place, as that tends to make painting them even trickier(!), but as I’ll have the wheels on the level of the base and the trail spades hanging over the back of the rim, it should work out perfectly - the gun being detachable for transport as noted above. Were the locating pin from the trunnions into the barrel assembly less robust than it is, I would consider substituting a pair of magnets, but thanks to Rubicon’s great design, it should be fine. 

All-in-all, this 6-pdr is a fabulous kit, and it’ll look great on the tabletop. Please join me for my next blog, when I’ll review its stablemate and classic ‘Franken-gun’, the 17/25-pdr.

- Chris