M109 - Vietnam
Fire Support Base Coral May 1968

After WW2, the US Army created a succession of self-propelled guns and howitzers based upon existing tank chassis and automotives married to existing guns and howitzers. None of the resulting weapons were entirely satisfactory. So, in 195x the Army started a new clean-sheet design. This resulted in the M108 105mm self-propelled howitzer and the M109 155mm self-propelled howitzer going into production in 1962. The platform was so successful that the M109 series is still in production in 2020 and will serve for another decade or two.

This model is based upon the excellent AFV Club M109 155mm L23 kit released in 2020. This is the next logical extension of AFV Club's excellent series of kits based upon this platform. The kit consists of most of the sprues from the excellent M109A2 kit along with a couple of sprues from their new M108 kit and a new sprue of M109 parts and a multi-part metal barrel. As is typical of AFV Club, there are a lot of tiny parts to add detail. Although the vinyl tracks are detailed and well molded, I decided to use the AFV Club individual link tracks that I had in my stash. I also used portions of the Voyager PE kit for the M109A2. Voyager has since release a PE kit specific to the M109. Although the PE was a bit crisper for several of the parts, in hindsight, I am not sure that it was worth the effort. The AFV Club kit does a great job of molding the details with the hassle of PE. I scratch built the red and white aiming stakes from aluminum tubing and silver rod to replace the kit ones, part Q27, which are molded in an unrealistic case. Note that the kit painting instructions confuse the cleaning staff with aiming stakes. The cleaning staff, part AC13, should be painted black - not red and white. I also used lead from an old wine bottle and PE buckles for the tool retaining straps.

The kit is excellent with just a small amount of filling with Mr. Surfacer 1000 needed to make the seams around the sides and top of the hull disappear. I did deviate from the directions and assembled the hull top, step 7, after the lower hull, step 2. This allowed me to ensure that the multipart hull fit and was square. The AFV Club individual link tracks went together easily and fit perfectly.

I chose to use the kit decals to depict howitzer A-14 of Battery C, 2nd Battalion 35th Field Artillery at FSB Coral in May 1968. This Battery was attached to the Australian forces at FSB Coral to supplement the Aussie's 105mm towed howitzers. After priming it with flat black Krylon ColorMax rattle can primer procured from the local hardware store, I used Tamiya XF74 JDSF Olive Drab as the base color. I brush painted the rubber on the road wheels with Tamiya XF84 Rubber. Winsor & Newton oils were used for filters and a dot filter. As the M109 series is made of aluminum alloy, I did a bit of chipping along the edges, spades, and drivers hatch with Tamiya X32 Titanium Silver allied with a small bit of sponge. The model was sprayed with Future in preparation for the decals and again to seal them. I then weathered with various AK Interactive streaking products and filters. I sprayed a light dry coat of AK Red-brown filter to represent the Vietnam reddish dust. This was then followed by AK Vietnam Earth pigments and a final sealer of Testor's Dullcote.

This is a nice addition to my collection of US artillery.

Rick