Restoring A Britains Motorcyclist

It is a difference of opinion I have heard a few times - to re-paint old figures or to leave as is? If a figure is pristine condition and worth big bucks well, no, I tend not to paint it. But what if it has paint missing? Again, it depends how much and how much the figure is worth. I might also consider the rarity of the figure, although this is often tied up with the figure. I am also assuming the painter is not going to do a 'crap paint job' but even then if the figures aren't going to be re-sold it is a moot point.

On the other hand, when I acquire figures it is usually with an eye to including them in my wargames and I don't really like seeing toy soldiers with metal showing where there should be scarlet or khaki. For the most part I am not in any hurry to sell the figures anyway - they are there to be played with rather than left on a dusty shelf.

Admittedly, most of my Timpo and Britains swoppets do stay on shelves because they risk losing arms and legs if dropped on the floor, so brittle is the plastic becoming. But my enjoyment of them is now limited to the occasional squiz.

Other plastics are more durable and thus get played with. As for metal, try moving around a movement tray of twenty solid metal toy soldiers and multiply that for a whole army. (I'm talking 54mm of course). But hollow cast is just nice - not really light but not weighing a ton.

Which brings me to hollowcasts in my collection. As a boy in the 60s I inherited a handful of British grenadiers, infantry and a horse guard from older cousins, peter and Graeme. The figures were fascinating because everything else I had was plastic. They were, of course subject to the usual missile fire of marbles, matchsticks and elastic bands, but never crackers, I might add. They did not fit in my toy soldier Geneva Convention.

Over the last few decades I have acquired a couple hundred or so hollow cast at reasonable prices. And as I don't mind getting ones with limited remaining paint and minor structural damage they have often been as cheap as a dollar each. Now look at the prices of new metal, even unpainted which I would paint anyway so why not paint these old figures? I can paint them better than the originals or 'restore' their original primitive look. It is kind of nice to paint those dots for eyes and rosy cheeks. of course, I a assuming a good paint job, but it doesn't take a lot of skill to match the original paint work. Just one thing which repels me is when people paint the facial details like smudged makeup - big clown lips and huge black dots for eyes; a certain subtlety is still required.

Those with most of their original paint I have compromised and simply added card bases so they don't fall over.

Finally, I'll talk about my WW1 British motorcyclist. He was a little more rare than most figures but it lacked its sidecar with passenger and machinegun. It was not cheap, but probably I got it cheaper than what it would normally sell for. But it still bugged me. it couldn't stand up so I added a base. Then I used it in battle, in the forces of Borduria, no less.

Except for lacking its side car it as in reasonable shape. But it also had a small whole in the chest and some sections of paint missing. The options were the most brutal - completely strip the paint in methylated spirits (works best on Britains and other hollow cast paints or just paint the gaps. To do the former would eliminate an uneven look in the paint. But I wanted the figure for another game coming up shortly and I wanted to see the original colours to colour match. I wanted to 'restore' the original look. I filled in the hole in the chest with GW liquid Green Stuff. In the end I re-painted the whole of the khaki uniform and gave a couple of thick coats to hide the uneven nature of bare metal and remaining paint. I also repainted the white part on the bike and the equipment. I elected not to enhance detail by painting straps.

The khaki is a rich colour and I achieved it by mixing three Humbrol enamels - matt 62, matt 29 and matt 186.

The flesh lacked small spot on the chin and hands. I mixed Game Workshop flesh colours Cadian Flesh tone and Bugman's glow. Doombull Brown was for the straps on the blanket and some equipment on the bike.. The bike was largely bare metal and I left it as is. The white part on the bike was painted an off white. The Blanket was painted a dark olive green, in this case US Dark Green (Model Color acrylic) with a touch of white.

Finally, I wanted to match the shine of the original paint, which was semi-gloss (or semi mat) so I coated the dried paint with Humbrol Satin. (Alternatively you could use satin paints or mix gloss and matt but that might limit the range of colours available). Of course some would prefer completely gloss, which may be how they started off. Personally, I like the semi-gloss.

                                         
                                                          Before the paint additions.