Austro-Hungary Responds to Italian Escalation!

Not to be outdone by the Italians, the Austro-Hungarian army has equipped its forces along the Southern Front with newly acquired machine guns of their own.

Astute readers will note that these are not the standard Schwarzlose but rather are models based on the German MG 08. 

Once again, this is a model available from Irregular Miniatures in their 54mm WWI line. The gas mask head is an option. I just like the way they look (for the same reason I have always liked the 1/72 Strelets WWI figures as they all have gas masks for all sides).

My "conversion" of the uniform to Austrian, besides the colors, was to simply paint over the boot upper as if it was a puttee. 

Assembling the MG took some effort, but then, assembling anything is not my strong suit (you should see me with Ikea furniture). I snapped one of the front support legs - thankfully it was only one, and it repaired easily with super glue. Attaching them at the correct angle nearly resulted in permanently gluing myself to the model. Twice.

In the end though, slapped over with paint and gloss, it looks the part.

I plan to buy one more MG team for each force again from Irregular eventually.  They are a great deal, even including shipping to the US, and they arrived quickly. However, I have more infantry to paint up in the meantime.