The Chariot Wars Refurb project commences

Regular readers will recall that I acquired  a substantial portion of the collection of Bill McHugh back in the Spring of 2019. Bill and I met at Historicon starting in the Fredericksburg years, and he was a regular player in my games. Sadly, just a few months after playing in most of my games at Histioricon 2018, Bill passed away quite suddenly. Jeff Grein was handling the sale of his collection for his widow, with the proceeds to benefit the choir in California  that Bill sang in. The bulk of the figures that I got were those pictured above, various non Egyptian troops of the Chariot Wars era, with the largest group being Hittites. There is another smaller lot of figures that are seemingly high medievals, mostly knights on cloth barded horses, with a smattering of spearmen, crossbowmen, and the like. . I haven't shown them as yet, as frankly they will need a lot of work to be usable. The past few weeks I have finally started the process of preparing the Chariot era figures for uptake into my own collection. 

Seen above: 2 units of Old Glory Peleset (presumed to be the "Philistines" of the Bible), a small unit of Hittite skirmishers, 2 units of Hittite Guardsmen,  ad a couple of Peleset "Heroes".  I believe the Hittites are from the venerable Foundry Ancients range. 

    Most but not all of these troops were singly based, I suspect for Warhammer Ancients or similar. Ever since I started collecting Ancient troops, circa 1976, I have used 60 mm frontage "WRG" element basing. This collection has to conform to that scheme. 

Above: 3 units of Old Glory Sherdans  plus a Hero or General ( I had to add and paint  few [4] extra figures to make the numbers right - fortunately I had a few left over figures from making my own Sherdans), and 2 units each of Hittite Axemen and Spearmen.

    Bill's troops were all based on a sort of rigid sheet steel compound, and then the space bewteen the bases was filled with what in most cases looks like Durham's Water Putty. Rock Hard" the product label says... pretty much true. Between the steel and the filler, this stuff was damned hard to cut - only cutting pliers would work, and that with much effort. The bases were *just* a bit wider than 20mm. The surface of the bases were finished in three or four completely different styles. Most were a white granular material, probably white sand and PVA glue, with areas stained in light green in places. Overall, I like the look of this basing. Others were just brown sand of 2 different styles, and others (Assyrian Cavalry) had what looks to me like aquarium gravel on the top layer. 

Ultimately the best solution, when removing the troops from their bases was the only option, proved to be soaking them ankle deep in water with some dish-washing detergent added, for 36 - 48 hrs, and then flexing the steel bases to loosen the figures enough to pry them off with a hobby knife. This created an abundant supply of somewhat obnoxious grit, but no fingers were lost!

 Pride of place goes to the Hittite Chariots - 18 in all! I believe these are all Foundry figures. Every last one needed repairs - re-attaching crew, wheels, and/or poles, and re-attachment to their bases. The chariots are all based on 40 x 60 mm stands, which agreeably matches my own scheme. The level of detailing on the cabs and teams was very uneven, so the majority needed additional painting, which is partially underway in the photo above. 

The remainder of the Hittite Chariots, plus some Hittite command bases and heroes; Assyrian Cavalry (partially updated with additional details - there will be a 6 figure Heavy Cavalry spear unit and a 4 figure Light Cavalry spear unit). I believe these are all Foundry. 

    The next thing I have to figure out is how to approximate Bill's original white grit basing style (I will be adding tufts to the bases as well). That may take some trial and error! 

Finally there is a mass of nondescript skirmishers - Bowmen, Slingers, and Javelinmen. I suspect these are supposed to be Canaanites, and are probably Foundry again. I don't particularly care for the rather featureless brown sand  with the occasional patch of light green flock used for their bases.

On the other hand, their bases are the right size, and so is the number of figures per base, so I think it won't be too hard to just add the new basing material over the top of this. 

    Work on this project will likely continue throughout the month of September, with the Chariots looking to be the first to be completed. They will then join my existing Hittites, which were also acquired second hand as a gift from my Band of Brothers 2 co-author, Ken Baggaley.