#067 wz. 34

Building the Polish Samochód pancerny wz. 34 from the 1:35 Mirage Hobby kit, with some figures from MiniArt: “The Lost Christmas”

Notes

The Samochód pancerny wz. 34 was the basic armoured car of Polish Army at the outbreak of World War II in 1939, despite it already being obsolete.

NB:

• WL: Wojska Lądowe (Polish Land Forces)
• WP: Wojsko Polskie (Polish Military)

The Kit

I picked up the Mirage Hobby No. 355020 1:35 kit in a bag for $5 at a charity sale.

Paint Scheme

In 1936-1937 there was a standard camouflage scheme introduced for Polish vehicles:

• irregular patches of greyish sand and dark brown (sepia) over base color of brown-green.
• airbrushed, with soft transitions, their shapes were mainly horizontal. No standard pattern

An older scheme was used between 1932 and 1936 aka “Japanese camouflage”:

• patches in bright yellowish sand, dark green and dark brown, separated with thin black stripes
• recent publications suggest that the colours might have been yellowish sand, olive green and light blue-gray

It was the bizarre “Japanese camouflage” scheme that initially caught my eye, so I’m going with that, using the following colours:

Build Log

It is quite a basic kit and some of the detail is a little soft, but a nice quick build.

How could I not chose the so-called “Japanese camouflage” scheme, used between 1932 and 1936. i.e. the interwar period when apparently someone lost the memo on what camouflage was for!!

I selected two figures from the MiniArt Polish Tank Crew set for a little diorama

So as I was finish this up just before Christmas, I couldn’t help myself and went with a light-hearted, festive variation…

Credits and References

• this project on scalemates
• Samochód pancerny wersja wz. 34-II Mirage Hobby No. 355020 1:35 - scalemates
• Polish Tank Crew MiniArt No. 35267 1:35 - scalemates
• Samochód pancerny wz. 34 - wikipedia
• Polish armoured car wz. 34 - derela