Review of 2022 - part 1 progress against plan

I am posting this entry slightly earlier than planned as I caught Covid and had to skip some of my family visits to return home. Overall a bit of a mixed year with less progress than hoped

Looking at my progress against the detailed plan:-

First and foremost my plan is to meet with as many friends as possible, assuming that retrictions come to an end, other than that I'll be working on three themes. - - Beacon Wargames club is well established, we've had a good year and additionally been running Saturday games every 6 weeks or so. There have been less shows than pre-Covid and family comitments and changes to them have prevented me from attanding some others I had hoped to attend.

Game specific projects

• Pegasus bridge and Horsa glider for a D-Day game - Both the glider and bridge are fully assembled and painted, but I still need to create a sufficient large river for the bridge to cross. I have failed to find the same clear flexible plastic that I used for a coastline some years ago.
• Continuing to build my War of Spanish Succession forces, as quickly as Strelets release them - Up until December I had finished everything in the stash, but with the new releases of cuirassiers I still have more to do.
• Rebase/upgrade the whole of my Anglo-Zulu War armies including the Boers - not started - I just couldn't settle on a basing approach - carried foward to 2023.
• Attempt to rationalise my terrain - not started - due to family taking over the garage I missed the opportunity to have a sort out this summer - carried forward to 2023.

Reducing the existing stash, I'd like to make at least a 10% reduction - Completed - I had a purge in Q1 and sold some surplus on ebay and have sold some more in Q4. The stash has declined from 6,630 to 5,820 so a 12% reduction.

• Paint the already printed WW2 French vehicles - Completed, and then painted the extras I subsequently printed. Then I painted all the replacements for those that subsequently "exploded"
• Extra Afrika Corps and Italian figures to convert my Rapid Fire troops to use Batttlegroup. - Completed
• French Goumier Platoon - Completed
• An Australian Platoon plus supports for the desert/Crete, etc - Completed.
• WW2 German Gebirgsjaeger and remaining two platoons of winter infantry - I completed one Gebirgsjager Plationn and another that I had missed in Zeltbahns. But I still have to do the two winter platoons - carried forward to 2023.
• Cavalry for the Seven Years War/Jacobite Rebellion - Completed
• Napoleonic Spanish artillery and more cavalry - Completed
• 1800 French in Egypt - double up the unit size from 12 to 24 - Completed although they were painted as new units instead
• French Revolution - Cisapline legion troops - Completed
• More Crusader baggage and Saracen cavalry - Completed
• Imperial Croat cavalry and Polish pancerni - not started - carried forward to 2023.
• WW1 odd bits and pieces - not started- carried forward to 2023.

Exploiting the 3D resin printer - I've learnt about post production problems, I have lost numerous vehicles due to the models "exploding". So far so good with all my later batches with far larger vent/drain holes. I have also learnt how to slice and merge models using 4D builder, although I don't have a powerful enough graphic card to do complex manipulations.

• Completing my Japanese forces for Pacific/Burma, by printing a selection of suitable vehicles to hopefully cover various 1941-1945 campaigns. - completed - a whole range of tanks, vehicles and guns have been printed and painted.
• Gradually replacing poorly cast or moulded models with new resin prints - underway - in an eaarlier print run I printed replacements for my existing Somua S35's, and then I had to reprint them once they "exploded" A later print run included M10s and Sextons to replace my exisitng Armourfast and PSC versions - this will probably become an ongoing action when I plan the next print runs.
• LVTs and any other extra vehicles so I can carry out Pacific beach landing games - Completed - LVT's printed and painted - although I am tempted to create some waterline versions of the LVTs
• Test printing of 20mm figures - Discovered the best approach was to print with a base, so I've learnt how to add those, but the bases do seem to be subject to warping. I also need to try printing then with a more flexible resin, do reduce the risk of damage to fine parts, although this may not the be water-washable resin I have used up till now
• Components for buildings, doors, windows, shutters etc. - not started - carried forward to 2023.
• Try some 1/100 moderns for NorthAG - Completed - printed a sufficient selection of West German vehicles for a Battlegroup Northag game, but I still need to paint them and source the infantry - carried forward to 2023.
• More vehicles for "Setting the East Ablaze" - underway - Lanchester armoured cars completed. , The Austin armoured cars that "exploded" have now been reprinted, and I still not found any suitable trucks