1:35 U.S. konzervy

The cans that fed the American army

American field rations stood on the can. Between 1942 and 1945 the daily C ration consisted of six cylindrical cans, three with a meat dish and three with biscuits, coffee and sugar. Alongside them, large kitchen cans of the B ration went to the units, and a whole company was cooked for out of those. Cans lay about everywhere a squad stopped: on a fender, in a ditch by the road, in a crate beside a jerrycan.

Why the printing decides

The set is built on a photo-etched fret and on decals. Without a printed body a can is just a smooth cylinder that nobody on a diorama will recognize. A label, on the other hand, gives away both the year and the supply line, because American cans carried large lettering with the contents and the batch. The decals are therefore applied to a glossy base and a softener is recommended, so that the film settles into the rounded shape.

Setting it into a scene

A field kitchen store, a supply point by the road or a pile of refuse behind a firing position are among the scenes that can be built out of little space and tell a lot. Kitchen cans carried an olive finish, small cans stayed bare and turned brown as soon as dew fell on them.

Everything is prepared for figures and vehicles in the 1:35 ratio, where the shape of the lid and the rim already show up well on small goods.

A small thing that gives the period away

A can is a datable object. From the shape of the lid and from whether it has a key for winding off the strip, a knowing viewer can tell a wartime delivery from a postwar one. Anyone building a scene from the end of the fighting mixes American supplies with captured ones, adds trampled cardboard and open cans turned upside down.