Miscellaneous and Future Landships

The HMLS Jocasta was a not-fully successful attempt at a light landship steam ram. David used a die-cast toy truck with a great snowplow as the basis, and built a casemate, pilothouse, coal-bunker and stacks, without ever actually managing to make the modern truck look antique or even convincing. (It's still a great plow, though.) This model also serves the Kaiser as the SMGS Bimmler.



An ideal
candidate
for a future
heavy landship.

This plastic toy tank David picked up at a second-hand shop is from the GI Joe action figure line. It is purple with an image of a cobra on the front, so presumably it belongs to Pvt. Joe's enemies. Originally it carried a missile launcher.

The top view shows the interior detail. A large stack projecting through a roof grating made from needlepoint canvas, would turn it into a very convincing boiler room. A foamcore floor would convert the front opening to a capacious machine-gun station. A few gunports in the front of the shield, a bit of paint, and a big Imperial German War Ensign fluttering from a staff would complete the project. It's a landship builder's dream.

Postscript: Since this was published, a GI Joe collector informs me that this vehicle is called the Cobra IMP. These are available on the collector's market and on E-Bay for $15 or less, complete. Perhaps half that for one without the rack and missiles (which are useless for landships anyway). Such a deal.
Armored car
made from a diecast toy.
For details, see the Armored Car page.



Early Landship Idea Sketches by David.
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Copyright©1998 David Helber. No commercial distribution of images or text from any page on this site without written permission.