Prepping for a Guards Division, Normandy 1944 - Part 2 Updated

Guards Division build part 2 is about what forces and vehicles I am going to use based on the Beyond The Beaches lists by Battle Group Kursk.
And Yay my transfers arrived!!!

My Armoured Teeth of the Division is going to consist an HQ, 1st Battalion Coldstream Guards, Elements of the 1st Motor Battalion Grenadier Guards, A/T Regiment RA, A/A Regiment RA, Field Regiments RA, Elements of an Armoured car Regiment, and Elements of the 2nd RECCE Battalion the Welsh Guards, along with Engineering, Supply, REME, and Medical Assets.

 First up is the Divisional HQ:

There is no actual Divisional HQ as such just a Forward HQ. We have the choice of multiple vehicles such as a Jeep, M5 Halftrack, White Scout Car, Dingo Scout Car, Humber Scout Car, M4 Sherman and Cromwell, with the last two having an HQ version option. I have Tentively decided to use the Humber for the Senior Officers mode of transport, I can also use one of the tanks from the HQ Squadrons of either the Coldstream Guards or Welsh Guards.


Humber Scout Car, and Forward Signals Unit

The Forward Signals unit which in reality is the Artillery rear radio link can use a Radio truck, M5 Half-track or a Dorchester ACV (Hmmmm). Their markings was the same as the HQ they were allocated to but in this case my Radio truck has the signals Tac marking with the number 40 on. The Dorchester ACV looks appealing and I have the ability to add one to the army which may give a more unique feel to the over all HQ troops.

UPDATE: The HQ gets its Armoured Command Vehicle an AEC 6x6 ACV

3D Printed ACV

Next HQ unit to add will be the Forward Air Controller who can have either a Jeep, Radio Truck, M5 Half-track, Bren Carrier, Dingo Scout car or a Humber LRC Mk1. At the moment I will be using a Jeep but toying with the idea of the Humber LRC Mk1. The markings for this vehicle are a little different in that it used the Division marking and a small RAF roundel as the Tac Markings.

The Motor Rifle elements from the Grenadier Guards will be mounted in M5 Half-tracks, with The supports being in Bren (Universal)
 and Loyd Carriers. These will all carry the Red 54 and Green Squadron Markings on the side of the Half-tracks.

Now for the Teeth of the Division the Tanks. I am going to mark mine up as the 1st Battalion Cold stream Guards, as I had in part 1 purchased a tank squadron marked up as this battalion but it was pointed out the wrong type of Sherman's. This has been rectified by raiding my Italy Sherman's and quick ebay purchases which will provide enough Sherman's for the missing Troops and HQ vehicles. These have duly arrived and have turned out to be Battlefronts new plastics which I must say do not fit together well and are not a patch on the older resin models.
In addition the HQ Squadron will have Crusader AA Tanks and a Light Recce troop of 3 "Honey" Stuart 3's which by late '44 were replaced by Stuart V's.



HQ Squadron vehicles, Sherman IV, Crusader AA, and M3 Light Tanks.

UPDATE:  The 3 M3A1 Stuarts have now been replaced by M3A3's Stuart V's which are more inkeeping with the Guards Division. The M3A1's are going to my BattleAxe Division for Tunisia.

HQ Squadron 3D printed Stuart V as to cut down on costs although detail is not as good on these, they will do.Awaiting Squadron Markings.

Instead of marking them up as one Squadron, each  troop will represent a Squadron. The HQ Squadron will consist of AA and light Recce tanks. Whilst the normal Troops will be 3 Sherman IV/A4 and 1 Sherman VC. The Squadron markings will also have black centres


Late '44 Squadron markings without the Black centre.



First of 3 Troops ready for Squadron markings

Troop markings now applied.

The other armoured option are Cromwell's, which under the lists can not be used in conjunction with the Sherman's (Oh Pooh, said Piglet), another reason for doing the Guards Division. Along comes the Recce Squadrons of the Welsh Guards. In the list each Cromwell Troop can have 2 Cromwell's and 1 Sherman VC, with one troop allowed an Challenger.
They can also supply Individual Cromwell's as RECCE Tanks. At the moment I have enough Cromwell's to make up 2 Troops.

UPDATE: The Welsh Guards did not get Firefly's so will not be used in a Teeth role but consigned to the role for which they were used for; Reconnaissance . At the moment I have 4 Cromwell's and re-enforced them with a Challenger and 3 Stuart V's. This means that if I wanted to field as Teeth Troops, one can have the Challenger, and the other Troop will get support from a firefly from one of the Cold stream Troops. Under BGK tanks can run around independently to the rest of the troop.

Again 3D printed to save costs, a Challenger and another 3 Stuart V's. Although as time goes by they may be updated with newer models.

One of my First completed units is the Anti Tank Battery, Royal Artillery, which will provide additional SP 17pdr A/T support in the form of half Troop of M10 Achilles. These can also aid the Infantry along with some 17pdr towed guns from the same regiment.

M10 Achilles

Now onto the Artillery. The Senior Regiment equipped with Sextons and an Sherman IV AOP. Support from the regiment is going to be two Troops of two Sextons. An optional AOP Tank is the Cromwell which now has been done.

First Sexton Troop



Sherman FO. All Marked up.

Taster of what else is on the bench

I modified a damaged Sherman to an ARV, a little more stowage needs adding.

Scotts Guards M4 Dozer tank  with a 3D printed Dozer blade, and an Scotts Guards Objective 

Royal Artillery, SP Artillery, SP and Towed Anti-tank, OP's and Ambulance Jeep.

HQ Units, along with some lorries for the infantry, The Stuarts are going back to Tunisia, Notice the difference in quality between the old resin Sherman and the New plastic Sherman (Left)

Well that's all for now, watch out for part 3.



WW2 Infantry Basing for multiple rules

Most of my 15mm WW2 armies are based as per FOW, but now I have moved away from FOW and onto Battlegroup Kursk and back to Rapid Fire, I realised that I could not easily convert the infantry with out debasing the already based to FOW infantry which I wanted to keep based that way in case I went back to FOW.
So an Ingenious (Well to me) Plan came about using the small FOW base and 15mm round bases.

Below is a 3 man through to 10 man units. Casualties on the larger bases can be handled either through  Splat markers, Curtain rings, Small Dice or using spare figures based on the smaller bases.

HMG, Mortars, etc.  are based as per FOW with 3 crew each, Light mortars , AT teams on Small bases as they are usually 2 men. The German 3 Man MG team for BGK are in my units based on a Medium FOW base, as well as all my AT Guns up to 76mm which need 3 man crews are all on Medium FOW bases and the 4 man crewed larger Guns on the Large FOW base