1:35 Thomson M1928

Thompson M1928 submachine gun in 1:35 scale

An accessory in the form of a Thompson M1928 submachine gun for 1:35 scale. Weapons out of the box tend to be the weakest point on figures: they have coarse shapes, they lack a hollow muzzle and they are often molded onto the hand in one piece. A separately supplied weapon evens that difference out, and on a figure it shows at once.

The real subject

The Thompson was an American submachine gun of 11.43 mm caliber, that is, for the cartridge known as the .45. The M1928 version is recognizable by its finned barrel with a muzzle brake, its wooden stock and its separate forend; it could be fed from a stick magazine as well as from the conspicuous drum magazine. In the Second World War it was issued to American and Allied units, among them the British commandos, and the later simplified M1 and M1A1 versions no longer had the drum magazine or the muzzle brake. Those are exactly the features by which the M1928 differs from the later examples.

Building and painting tips

• Cut the surplus material away with a sharp blade a little from the part and sand the spot left behind.
• Choose the glue according to the material of the part and go through the procedure in the instructions beforehand.
• Wash and degrease the part before painting, as paint will crack on a greasy surface.
• Lay the wooden parts in brown and go over them with an oil glaze along the grain, and leave the metal dark with a restrained sheen.
• Pick the sharp edges of the weapon out lightly with a graphite pencil or a metal pigment, so that it looks used.

Who the accessory is for

For builders of figures and dioramas of the Second World War for whom a weapon molded together with the figure's hand is not enough. Fitting it calls for tweezers and a steady hand, because in this scale the part is about two and a half centimeters long. Figures, paints and glue are not included in the package, unless stated otherwise.