Kinder American Civil War General

 While looking for ACW figures, I came across a small lot of Kinder ACW figures, which included a general wearing a chapeau bras bicorne dress hat. The lot was bought, so now the Kinder troops have a well dressed general.

New Kinder Figures

Kinder American Civil War Toy Soldiers

40mm Kinder ACW toy soldiers. I bought them with the idea of possible conversions.

 

Comparison of Kinder, Prince August, Zinn Brigade, and Britain's 40mm figures.

The Kinder recruits from the rear.

Original 40mm Sculpture

I wanted to do a practice figure to try to match my Britains 40mm figures. The 40mm Britains don't have combat poses, so I wanted to try to create my own.

Originally I had planned to cut a head off one of the Britains which was wearing a home service helmet. At this point in making the figure, I decided I wanted to make a completely original figure of my own, so a head was added.

Sideview of the figure. The exceptionally long right arm was so I could use it to create the rifle. The head has a skull shape. That wasn't a bit of clever planning on my part; I didn't even notice it until looking at the photograph!

Right arm added. with the rifle and left hand positioned.

I was going to make the figure with an ACW kepi; however I went with a shako. I am thinking of using this figure for a  master.  The shako is larger than used at the beginning of the war. I figure I could file down the shako into different styles of hats, including kepis. As can be seen in this shot, I need to master the green stuff  and learn how to smooth it better.

The figure with ammo box, haversack, canteen and belts added.

Back of the completed figure. The cross belt looks more like a blanket roll!

The completed figure next to one of the Britains 40mm. He needs only to be based.

New Cavalry Figures for Homecasting

A lot of Johillco cavalry recently purchased for use with my newest homecasts .

I think they are a good match. My first plan was to use Zinnbrigade cavalry, which I still might do.                           However, these figures just seem to fit better as far as looks go.

I am planning to eventually make a mold. I am thinking of cutting one of the figures in                                                        half  and making two molds.   By doing this, it would make for a lighter figure and save on metal.
I have a French dragoon head that I think would work well with the figure.   

Conversion of a New Casting

Several years ago I bought an odd lot of toy soldier figures and parts. When I got them, there were several heads with different head dresses. While most are 54mm, there were several that seems in the 40mm range. Included is a head wearing a bearskin helmet. I tried this head on some Zinnbride figures, which I thought were a good match. It dawned on me last week that this head might work well with my newest  marching figure. And so a quick decapitation and drilling a hole for the neck, I tried the new head. I think it's a good match and might be making a mold of this figure in the future.

These are some of the converted Zinnbrigade figures.

A closeup of a Zinnbrigade conversion.

Another Zinnbrigade conversion figures.

A new unit of home casts.

The new conversion.

New Home Casting

British Infantry

22nd New York State Militia

U.S. Army

Another British regiment

Painted Homecast Crimean Grenadiers

I found myself wide awake at 3:30 this morning. With 3 hours before I had to go to work, there was time for some painting. So I decided to do a quick paint job on the newest home casts.

Homecast Crimean War Guardsman

In my last post, I showed a conversion figure using a Zinnbrigade and a Guardsman head. Under the comments, Ross MacFarlane mentioned about wanting to make a Crimean period British Guardsman with a coatee. The idea was too much to resist! I took a Zinnbrigade French infantry figure that I had casted for another project and put the grenadier head onto the body. The mold almost wasn't made; the rubber is on it's last legs and I barely got enough usable rubber.

The figure. There were more air bubbles in this mold; I'm wondering if it has to do with the fact the rubber  is at the end of it's shelf life. Luckily most are small and not too noticeable.

The conversion from an earlier post painted, except the rifle.

These are painted with Krylon enamel hobby paints. Now I have to find a source for more of the colors.

New Home Made Mold & Casting

Several years ago I found a nice set of molds by a company caller Creartec on the website of Berliner Zinnfiguren. The molds were a series of Frederick the Great's grenadiers, generals, and cavalry. They are great figures, however, there is no musketeer figures. I did a head swap and finally made a mold of the figure. It might not be a perfect figure but definitely as useable figure.

The female turkey hanging around our house has found a new perch on our roof. 

Another 40mm Zinnbrigade Conversion

While casting some new figures I came across the mold I made from some old heads I found in an odd-lot of toys soldiers. This head looked like a British colonial in a sun helmet. 

A previous conversion loses his head. His new head is at his feet.

The neck hole is drilled out and head fitted.

A quick coat of  paint for a rough idea of how it would look.

From another angle. The head looks a little large for the body.  Maybe a 45mm head on a 40mm body?

I like the way this figure looks. It definitely has an old toy soldier look about him. I could see him in a "Little Wars" battle.

40mm Zinnbrigade conversions

  Over the holidays I came across a blog that mentioned converting Zinnbrigade figures using Little Britons heads.  Zinnbrigade figures are 40mm homecast figures and Little Britons are a line of unassembled figures from the Shiny Toy Soldier line found at the Spencer Smith miniature page.

    I have many of the Zinnbrigade molds, and last year I came across in a job lot of old toy soldiers a bunch of heads with plug bases. What's more several of them seemed to be 40mm. At the time I was experimenting with mold making, and so made a mold using a couple of the heads.  After molding a few of the heads and attaching them to some of my Zinnbrigade figures to see how they worked, I put the figures aside and went back to casting 15mm figures.

       The story on the other blog peaked my interest and I dug out the figures I casted. One reason I started out with Zinnbrigade figures was the possibility of using them for Little Wars. After looking at the conversion figures, and the fact that the "Little Britons" line has a 4.7 cannon, it might be time to revisit these figures.

3 converted Zinnbrigade figures with  original

close up of an original and converted figure