FoW: Slovak Armoured Cars (Oa vz.30's)

So, as it stands my life is upside down at the moment as I attempt to complete a relocation to the other side of the country, complete an internal transfer on the railways (and fight every inch of the way with a grossly incompetent/unproductive HR department!) and finish off buying a house...

All of this I must confess has sapped my will to live much less my will to write so I have found it remarkably hard to sit down and apply myself to the string of blog posts that I still have to do for my Flames of War Slovak army.... BUT having just sat down to watch 'How to Train your Dragon: The Hidden World' with my besties plus family I finally felt an urge to put down some words.... 

... and so here I am!

I thought I would ease myself back into things with a relatively quick and simple post covering one of my favourite Slovak vehicles; the Tatra OA vz.30 armoured car! No conversion here just good old simple painting... and a little bit of history! 

Easy right? Well, lets see!

Lets start at the beginning, when Czechoslovakia was still 'a thing' and the landscape of Europe was creaking under the weight of ideological ego!

The OA vz.30 (full title being Obrneny Automobil vzor 30 - Armoured Car model 30) was a homegrown Czechoslovakian armoured car designed by the Tatra company which through the course of its active service saw use with the Czechoslovakian and Slovak armed forces and was either appropriated or exported to other countries such as Germany, Romania and Hungary during the Second World War.

A total of fifty one of these vehicles were manufactured by Tatra before production ceased, of which the Germans seized twenty four when they occupied Bohemia-Moravia in March 1939, whilst the Slovaks retained eighteen when they declared independence from Czechoslovakia at the same time. Romania was able to bag nine when Czech troops sought refuge across the border following the Hungarian invasion of the Carpatho-Ukraine in the same month.

Here we will deal principally with the Czechoslovakian and Slovakian vehicles though, and they saw combat deployments in Poland '39, the Slovak-Hungarian War and throughout the Slovak experience on the Eastern Front when in January 1944 they were finally phased out of service as the Slovaks received PzKpfw II's to replace them although they were kept on the Army's equipment rolls... and yet their journey was not over because in late '44 when the Slovaks rose up against their former German allies the OA vz.30's were once again thrust into the combat zone in the Slovak National Uprising!

The OA vz.30's armoured body used the chassis of the Tatra 6x4 T-72 truck as its foundation. The central tube design of the chassis itself was unusual as it had independently sprung rear half axles which rendered superb cross country performance. 

The driver of the vehicle was positioned on the right side of the body and used an observation port which was protected by an armoured visor with an integral vision slit. The assistant driver sat on the left hand side with a smaller vision port through which his ZB vz.26 light machine gun protruded. This one was mounted to fire directly to the front of the vehicle. There were similar vision slits on both sides of the vehicle as well to enable all round visibility. The crew accessed the vehicle through a door on the rear wall of the vehicle.

The vehicle commander (and primary gunner) sat in a small cylindrical turret mounted on the top of the vehicle capable of a full 360 deg traverse. It included an observation port in the front alongside the turret weapon and was complemented with more vision slits on the turret sides and rear. The turrets main armament was another ZB vz.26 light machine gun mounted in a ball mount. 

It was standard practise to carry another spare light machine gun inside the vehicle as well. Over 3000 rounds of ammunition were stored in the vehicle for all of the weapons and the armour was typically between 3-6mm thick. Whilst nothing to write home about by any means, it must be stated that when this vehicle was designed in 1933 this was considered more than suitable to deflect any small arms fire from 100m or more. 

It had a 4 cylinder, 32 horsepower, air cooled Tatra 71 engine, mounted on the front of the vehicle and enabling a top speed of 37 mph, and being able to negotiate ditches up to 0.5m wide and ford water obstacles up to 0.3m deep.

The Czechoslovakian army had been evaluating a series of different Tatra truck chassis for application as armoured cars since 1926 with a number of prototypes built over the years with both wooden and metal bodies to trial a variety of different layouts. The Czechoslovakian military finally placed an order on 6th March 1933 for fifty one OA vz.30's for a projected delivery in December of that same year.

Tatra was late on the delivery and was only able to deliver the first six on 29th January 1934 followed by sixteen more in February and the final batch delivered in July on account of their destination workshops and garages in Milovice were not yet complete.

The pre-war Czechoslovakian armed forces had all of their armour concentrated into 'Mobile' Divisions of which there were supposed to be four and which had a formal organisation set down on 1st October 1937. These were based on the French Division Legere along with things gleaned from German experience. The fine details are not relevant here suffice it to say that the only part of these Mobile Divisions that had armoured cars in their TO&E's was as a part of the Reconnaissance Battalion which was directly subordinated to the Divisional Headquarters.

These Mobile Divisions never achieved full establishment strength before the demobilisation in 1938 and of the four only one, the 3rd Mobile Division was stationed in Slovakia, which was so positioned to serve as the Operational Reserve for the Czechoslovakian 3rd Army. Its 3rd Armoured Regiment was stationed in Turciansky sv.Martin where the barracks and garages, warehouses and work-shops for its vehicles were based after being built between 1935-37. By the end of 1936 the regiment had a total complement of eighteen OA vz.30 armoured cars, three OA vz.27's, thirty Vz.33 tankettes and fifteen LT vz.34 light tanks.

Despite an expansion in the Regiments tank strength, the numbers of armoured cars remained the same and other than the 3rd Replacement Battalion, all other armoured cars were allocated to the companies of the 1st Battalion along with the vz.33 tankettes.

The regiment retained its three OA vz.27's, but of its eighteen OA vz.30's it transferred eight vehicles to the Czech Gendarmerie, later acquiring another eight vehicles from the 2nd Armoured Regiment along with some tanks. These particular vehicles ended up fighting against the Hungarian invasion of Transcarpathian Ruthenia, later retreating into Slovakia where they were confiscated by the Slovak authorities before its Czech crews could sabotage them.

During the conflict with the Hungarians between 23-26th March 1939 one of the armoured cars (No. 13401) was destroyed and had to be abandoned before Hungary occupied the former Slovak territory.

After the departure of all of the Czech serving men the Regiment was left with all of its equipment but hardly any men to crew them. The most senior remaining officer was Staff Captain Cani who was placed in command and given the remit to create a full Armoured Battalion. On 28th April he proposed a battalion structure composed of a headquarters, one armoured car company, two tank companies and one anti-tank company. He was compelled to ask for a further 288 men to fully outfit the battalion. 

By 6th July 1939 the battalion had achieved its manpower targets and was renamed Armoured Battalion 'Martin' and training with its vehicles and assets was began. In the autumn of 1939 the organisation of the Battalion changed again with the reconnaissance assets being amalgamated into a 'group' with a single platoon of three armoured cars only.

Following a limited deployment of the OA vz.30's into Poland in September 1939 (the vz.27's being considered too old and obsolete for front-line service) the Battalion was reinforced again with the anti-tank battalion from Hlohovec and renamed as a Regiment. 

By January 1940 the Armoured Regiment had a structure in line with that proposed by the now Major Cani. It had the 1st of four companies in the First Battalion of armoured cars. Initially this caused some organisational complications as initially the Armoured Regiment was subordinated to the infantry, whilst some of its armoured car companies were subordinated to the heavy squadrons of the Cavalry Reconnaissance Groups No's I & II. This situation ended in May 1940 when all of the armoured cars officially became a constituent part of the Regiment, although on occasion the platoons may have been subordinated to other services temporarily to complete certain functions.

As new assets were made available and manpower shortages were overcome a reorganisation occurred once again, and from January 1941 with the following organisation:

Headquarters

Staff Company

Motorised Company (Armoured Cars)

1st Battalion (3 Tank Companies)

2nd Battalion (3 Anti-Tank Companies)

Reserve Battalion

On June 1941 the Armoured Regiment sent a combined group of 47 tanks and included a company of three armoured cars with the Mobile Group when it entered the Soviet Union. In this campaign both tanks and armoured cars repeatedly proved their quality.

Despite many serving officers in the Slovakian ranks having extreme anti-fascist leanings, and a resultant endemic sabotage of their own armoured vehicles in order to have them sent home for future use, the Slovaks were still able to maintain and armoured force in the field on the front line.

Following a further reorganisation of the Mobile Brigade on 8th July 1941, they were still able to field a Motorised Reconnaissance Group which fielded five OA vz.30's.

Slovakia's first major combat engagement against units of the Red Army was around the town of Lipovec (Lypovets in the Vinnytsia Oblast of the Ukraine). Things did not go as well as expected! The fight began at 05:00, instigated by three of the Reconnaissance Groups five armoured cars accompanied by a company of cyclists who made contact with a company of Soviet infantry dug into foxholes about three kilometres west of the town itself. By 16:00 the repeated combined arms assaults of the Mobile Brigade had managed to penetrate the defensive cordon of the Soviet 44th Siberian Infantry Division and had entered the suburbs of Lipovec itself, capturing the railway station.

It was then that disaster struck. 

Colonel Pilfousek, the commanding officer of the Mobile Brigade ordered them to advance on Lipovec because he was convinced that the town had already been taken. Advancing down a single road into Lipovec the entire Brigade was caught on the right flank by an aggressive counterattack launched by two Soviet infantry battalions supported by very accurate supporting artillery fire. 

The Soviets split the Mobile Brigade in half, isolating the front half within Lipovec itself whilst the main force on the road began to retreat in a panic only managing to bring the Soviet counterattack to a halt about 2km in front of Shchaslyva to the west of Lipovec.

Tanks from the 1st and 2nd Companies were sent forwards to assist the troops trapped in Lipovec, joining a single tank from 3rd Company. A desperate struggle broke out as the tanks broke through Soviet anti-tank defences joining the armoured cars trapped in the town. One of the OA vz.30's (13403) was hit and burned out completely. One was hit and abandoned by its crew and the final one suffered light damage. The fighting continued until 22:00 when the withdrawal from the town was complete and the Slovaks were able to pull back to the safety of their own lines, pursued by Soviet anti-tank guns knocking out further Slovak tanks. 

They were able to occupy the town the next day bloodlessly as the Soviets had withdrawn. The captured OA vz.30 had already had red stars painted over its Slovak crosses!

The battle of Lipovec revealed that the Mobile Brigade was simply not strong enough to take on divisional level forces on its own and steps were taken to strengthen the Brigade further although the road ahead was a long one and further attrition was the inevitable result.

By 1st January 1942 the regiment was still able to field many of its armoured vehicles despite having many of them shipped back to Slovakia. Out of sixteen OA vz.30's only seven were left fully repaired and operational.

In August 1942 the Ministry of Defence finally got around to bolstering the Security Division with some armoured assets included in which was assigned six OA vz.30's. They were widely used in patrolling and anti partisan actions. Two of them (13399 and 13411) were lost in action at Lojev and the rest of the company was sent back to Slovakia on 12th January 1943 at which time only one of the four remaining armoured cars was in running condition.

As a replacement for the aged and worn out OA vz.30's the Ministry of Defence placed an order for twenty PzKpfw II's to be used as reconnaissance vehicles. They managed to obtain sixteen of them in January 1944. At this time the OA vz.27's were phased out and the remaining OA vz.30's were placed into storage as no longer usable although they were still kept on the rolls.

The OA vz.30 armoured cars performed their duties magnificently, considering that they were over ten years old, lightly armoured, armed with only two light machine guns incapable of sustained fire and using an engine that was considered under-powered. These cars moved over terrain they were not designed for and were able to fight in place of heavy armoured cars and even in the place of tanks in some places.

So there we have it; an summarised combat history of these little darlings.

Now we come to the modelling and as you have already read so many times I wont bore you with the basing as its the same for absolutely everything that I do so we will just get straight into the painting.

The first thing that I do on any of my vehicles is always the green base colour.

The main paint scheme of the armoured cars is done by airbrush using my MIG Aircobra for the Priming and Basecoating and my Harder & Steenbeck for all of the shading and highlighting as my H&S has a 0.15 needle and provides a hell of a lot more control... but the MIG is SOOOOO easy to clean it just makes sense to use it where I can...

The Airbrushing steps are as follows:

i) The model is primed with a Matt Black Etch Primer

ii) The basecoat is Tamiya's XF-58's Olive Green

iii) The first highlight is LifeColors UA221 Khaki Olive Drab applied in a panel highlight fashion

iv) The second highlight is LifeColors UA224 Olive Drab Faded Type 2 applied as above but a bit lighter and gathered in along the edges and prominent areas

v) The third highlight is a 50/50 mix of LifeColors UA224 Olive Drab Faded Type 2 with LifeColor 01 White. This is applied sparingly just along the edges and prominent areas.

So that's the airbrushing complete and don't be overly concerned if your third highlight was too heavy as the next two steps will, if done correctly, tone the whole contrasted effect down.

vi) The next step is to apply the colour swatches over the body of the vehicle that will provide the camouflage pattern. With the green camouflage base now finished off I add swatches of Vallejo's 914 Green Ochre and Vallejo's 826 German Camo Med. Brown to leave an equal balance of all three colours in an intentionally smoothed edge blotted pattern.

vii) Now we apply the Filter over the whole thing to unify the colour aesthetic and clip the contrast a little. I apply MIG's Filter 1506 Brown for Dark Green.

viii) Once dry wipe of any serious excess from where it may have pooled but otherwise leave it untouched.

ix) At this point I apply the first layer of Varnish. It doesn't matter which varnish you choose so long as it fixes the Filter layer to the miniature as its an oil based layer.

Once the varnish is dry its time for the next layer which is where the real depth starts to come out.

x) Over every detail laden part of the model apply a Wash. I use AK Interactives Wash 075 Wash for NATO Camouflage Vehicles. Don't be shy with this step. Slap it on aplenty! Then leave to dry for a while.

xi) Once its dry (or dry-ish) use cotton buds (cue tips for you Yankees out there...) and use a gentle white spirit to wipe away the excess leaving great detail and shadowing around all of your detail areas and a general lowering of the overall luminosity. Personally I use Winsor & Newtons Artists White Spirit as I had a bad experience with normal white spirit stripping away four layers of paint and primer and have no wish to repeat the disaster!

xii) Once the whole piece is dry to the touch apply another layer of varnish to fix everything in place.

xiii) The last thing to do with paint is to lightly airbrush a layer of Vallejo's 826 German Camo Medium Brown across the wheels and the lower third of the vehicle. This layer has a highlight of Vallejo's 914 Green Ochre mixed in whatever ratio you want with the German Camo Medium Brown already in the airbrush and is then applied in splotches to provide some variance in the muddy weathering.

xiv) A final varnishing is applied to the vehicle which are then finally fixed to their bases.

xv) ...and so we come to the very last thing that I needed to do for these Slovak additions... the decals.

Now, I am capable of making my own decals BUT the experience that I have had so far has led to decals that are uncomfortably thick and ones that cannot include white unless as an overall substrate to the total image and so one of my Polish friends suggested I approach a gentleman in Poland that both he and his father had used to produce specialist decals.

I thus contracted one Bogdan Zolnierowicz through Facebook to produce for me a decal sheet with enough Slovak aircraft and tank markings to polish off everything that I thought I would need. Along with a couple of sheets of numbers and letters I had enough to produce the exact representation that I wanted and Bogdan's decals were exactly what the doctor ordered.

Incidentally if you want to approach Bogdan for help with decals he says you are all welcome to do so. He may not respond quickly but he will eventually and he is the only one on Facebook with the name.

He knocked out a sheet with a stack of tiny Slovak crosses for me which duly made it to the turrets of these armoured cars.

So there we have it ladies and gents. Another mini project finished and one (read six) more items to place onto the table alongside the rest of my Slovak Mobile forces

Onwards and Upwards Ladies!

Fix bayonets!