Lorraine 38L Infantry Tractor

With Tamiya’s 1:35 scale UE tractor kit attracting modellers’ attentions of late Steve Zaloga decided to build an alternative hauler – the Lorraine 38L VBCP infantry carrier of the early Second World War period

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Can anyone name the French World War II armoured tractor represented in 1:35scale by two plastic kits? Not counting the Renault UE? Does Lorraine ring a bell?

The Lorraine 37L has certainly not attracted the attention of the recent Tamiya UE even though two plastic kits and a few resin kits have been out for a decade. Having finished the Tamiya UE, I thought I’d dust off these kits and make a companion piece to my UE.

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Historical Notes

With production of the UE well underway, in 1935 the French Army began to look for a larger and more capable armoured tractor. Lorraine offered its own CRI (Chenillette derevaillement d’Infanterie) , but the army decided on a revised Renault design instead - the UE 2. The Lorraine design still had potential and was offered as a tank re-supply vehicle (TRC: tracteur de ravaillement pour chars) to supplement the Renault 36R (ACD 1) based on the UE tractor that was already on order.

An initial Chenillette Lorraine TRC was completed in April 1937 based on the short CRI design with two bogies, and a definitive three-bogie version emerged in July 1937. The Lorraine 37L TRC had a crew of two and towed a special tracked VRC fuel trailer carrying 565 litres of fuel. The standard deployment was 12 per light tank battalion, 18 per Char B1 bis battalion and three per combat squadron of the DLM (light mechanized divisions). The primary function of the TRC was to refuel the tanks in forward areas, though other supplies could be carried in the rear compartment. The design was satisfactory enough that several contracts were placed in 1938-39 for a total of 452 Lorraine 37L with plans to assemble up to 70 a month with most coming from Societé Lorraine and 20-30 from the Fouga plant. After the outbreak of the war in September 1939, the orders were increased to 560 of which about 480 Lorraine 37L TRC were delivered before the armistice in 1940.

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They were widely used in French tank units in the 1940 campaign. In 1938, plans emerged to equip the mechanized infantry (chasseurs portés) of the armoured divisions (DCR) with a fully tracked carrier instead of the trucks and half-tracks then in use, primarily in heavy weapons companies (compagnie d’accompagnement) which typically deployed 14 heavy machine guns, two mortars and two anti-tank guns. The Lorraine 37L emerged as a possible candidate, but the small rear compartment was sufficient for only four infantrymen. As a result, the Lorraine 38L VBCP infantry carrier (Voiture blindée de chasseurs portés) had a tracked trailer added which could accommodate six more men and the rear compartment was redesigned with armoured protection for the troops. A total of 240 were ordered in September 1939 and a few more than 140were delivered by the time of the armistice. They were deployed primarily with the 5e BCP (Battalion chasseurs portés) of the 1e DCR and the 17e BCP of the 2e DCR. A variety of other schemes for the Lorraine tractors were underway in 1940, including substantially redesigned infantry carrier, the Lorraine 39L, and tank destroyer armed with the 47mm anti-tank gun on the Lorraine 37L. The Lorraine is better known for its use after 1940 as the Wehrmacht captured about 360 Lorraines of both types in an undamaged state. They were used primarily as the basis for a variety of German self-propelled guns.

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Lorraine Options

My fascination with the Lorraine dates back to the mid-1960s when I first began to build tank models. Reference material was thin on the ground, and the ‘Armour in Profile’ series was my favourite. Number 10 on the Chenillette Lorraine was a bit of a puzzle, as it seemed to be a very obscure subject compared to the other titles. I scratch-built a 1:76 scale German Lorraine Schlepper with 15cm howitzer in 1968, and a decade later built the 1:35 scale version from the Commanders Models’ resin kit. In spite of stayed away from modelling the original 1940 type due to lack of information on the details of the rear compartment of either the TRC or VBCP versions.

In the late 1990s, two new kits of the Lorraine emerged in plastic, from RPM in Poland and Ironside in France. I bought both kits, but they sat gathering dust on the shelf. (Ironically, RPM released a new VBCP version of their Lorraine 37L TRC kit about a week after I started this project!) Two events prompted me to start this project. The Tamiya UE kit revived my interest in French 1940 armoured tractors. Also, a few years ago, a friend discovered a small treasure trove of photos of the Lorraine at the US National Archives. In 1939-40 the French government approached the US government about starting production of French weapons under licence in the United States. A fair number of documents were sent from France to the United States, including a full set of blueprints of the Char B1 bis tank, but most of these documents disappeared along with most information about the programme. However, a small dossier of photos of the Lorraine resurfaced in the US Army Military Intelligence Division files where they had been transferred during the War, after it became apparent that the Germans were making use of captured Lorraine tractors. With these detailed photos in hand, I wanted to build one of the Lorraine kits as a companion to my Tamiya UE. I didn’t have enough material to scratch-build the VBCP trailer, but I wanted to do this version of the Lorraine. Since I had built the Tamiya UE with a Heller 25mm gun, I thought a similar tractor/gun combination would be ideal for the Lorraine.

Having already built one of the wretched old Heller 25mm guns, I didn’t really fancy another. I had been fascinated with the French 47mm anti-tank gun (SA modéle 1937/39) since having seen one at Aberdeen Proving Grounds in the early 1970s, and I had actually measured it and drawn a scale plan almost 30 years ago. Fortunately, I’d found one of the rare Alby 1:35 scale resin kits of the 47mm gun on a trip to France many years ago, and it had been languishing in my basement stockpile. Although the Lorraine 38L VBCP had been tested to tow the 47mm gun, it was a bit underpowered and not regularly used in this role, but I decided to build mine in this configuration anyway. Given the chaotic conditions in 1940, it’s possible that on some occasion it was used in this role.

Now the question was, which of the two kits? Ironside or RPM? I compared the two and settled on the Ironside kit. The RPM kit comes with link-to-link track, which looked to be complete torture compared to the link-and-length on the Ironside kit. Also, the Ironside kit has some resin and photo-etched details that looked better than the RPM kit. With these issues settled, it was off to the modelling room.

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Building the Hull

The Ironside kit is a limited run injection moulded kit from the ADV/Azimut hobby shop in Paris and was first released in 1997; it still seems to be available, though I haven’t seen one on sale for years. Limited-run production inevitably means extra work cleaning up parts and tweaking the small details. The Ironside kit depicts the Lorraine 37L TRC rather than the Lorraine 38L VBCP, but this didn’t bother me, as I probably would have had to rebuild the rear superstructure of the VBCP anyway. I started by assembling the basic hull that comes with an interior for the driver’s compartment. This includes a very nice resin transmission, but as I had no plans to show the front door open, I skipped any major detail effort on the interior. Very little is visible through the driver’s hatch anyway, so I built the kit out of the box in this respect, and painted it before sealing up the hull. I live not far from Aberdeen Proving Ground, so one Sunday afternoon I drove over to look at the Lorraine SP howitzer they have preserved there. The chassis is pretty beat-up since its capture from Rommel’s Afrika Korps 65 years ago, but the suspension is still in good shape. Some quick photography of these details made it clear that the kit parts were a bit chunky and as a result, I thinned down the bogie arms and other small details with a file, added a bit of detail, and tried to make the detail look a bit more crisp. The Ironside tracks are not bad, but they can use a bit of extra detail. I added detail at the end of each link by punching some small discs from .010 thou plastic using a Waldron punch-and-die. With the suspension assembled, I turned to the upper hull. This needed a bit of work with sanding sticks and files to sharpen up the detail, and inevitably most of the rivets were lost in the process. I also added the extended rear superstructure from .015 thou plastic. My biggest challenge was forming the photo-etch cover over the muffler, which turned out to be a real chore due to the thickness and rigidity of the metal.

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There is a great deal of small detail on the Lorraine, mostly consisting of rivets, but also some stowage brackets and ring-shaped tie-downs. I made the tie-down rings by wrapping some Plastruct .015 thou plastic rod around a brass rod of suitable diameter, taping it in place, immersing it in boiling water over the stove, and then tempering it by a quick dunk into cold water in the kitchen sink. Styrene is a thermoplastic, and this can be used to the modeller’s advantage since it retains its new ‘memory’ after rapid heating and cooling. The many rivets came from the usual method of punching them out from .010 thou plastic using the Waldron sub-micro punch-and-die. The Lorraine 38L VBCP could be fitted with a hooped frame and tarpaulin to protect the crew and I thought this might add a bit of interest to the rear compartment. I made the hooped frame from Plastruct plastic rod, but the canvas cover was more of a challenge. I decided to make the basic shape using a 40-year old Mattel ‘Vacu-Form’ I had owned since I was a kid. These were sold as toys back in the 1960s, but it has long proved to be a useful modelling tool. I’m thankful that I had the foresight many years ago to stock up on some Mattel ‘vac form’ plastic sheet, and used a few on this project. I made the master out of a piece of blue Styrofoam home insulation and it took a couple of tries (and a few sheets of the scarce plastic!) before I got it right. To make the more delicate folded portions of the tarpaulin, I used Christmas packing tissue soaked in a solution of water and carpenter’s glue.

After all the work on the Lorraine, the Alby 47mm anti-tank gun was a delight. Alby is well known among 1:72 scale modellers for their superb small-scale resin castings. They are hard to find, and their 1:35 scale kits are even rarer. (I still have one of their 1:35 scale Char B1 bis unfinished in the basement! This is a real shame as their 47mm gun kit is superb, combining excellent detail with relatively easy assembly).

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Finishing Touches

I decided to depict my Lorraine 38L in the markings of the 17e BCP which used dice or domino symbols on the superstructure side to identify subunits. The photos here mainly show the prototypes of the Lorraine in hard-edged multi-tone camouflage, but finished in sprayed on camouflage patterns. I decided to do mine in a three-tone scheme of Tamiya XF-65 Field Grey with bands of XF79 Deck Brown and XF-71 Cockpit Green though the Minitracks article on the Lorraine in Issue No.5 (May-June 2007) suggests a more sober choice of army green and dark green without the lighter green. I painted the 47mm gun in overall French army green using Tamiya XF- 65 Field Grey. My weathering approach on this model was my usual method and I airbrushed the undersides, starting with XF-51 Khaki Drab, followed by an irregular overcoat of XF-72 JSDF Brown, and finally a sporadic overspray of XF-57 Buff. I used a ‘light’ wash on this model to replicate a coating of dry summer dust. I mixed the wash from Humbrol 26 Earth colour and a little white oil paint, plus mineral (white) spirits as the solvent and Winsor & Newton Liquin as a medium to help spread and dry the wash. I usually mix this wash in two consistencies, one with more paint and one with less. I use the weaker solution on the whole model, and then go back and add a bit of the stronger wash where I wanted more elaborate effects. Once this was dry, I did some ‘dark’ dry-brushing using Humbrol Olive Drab such as 155 mixed with a little black oil paint for improved contrast and smoother blending.

On Display

To display the model, I found a Trumpeter plastic model case at a local hobby store intended for truck models with a suitable long and narrow shape. For the terrain itself, I made a simple cobblestone street using some plastic sheet. I painted up the Wolf French tanker figure to accompany the model as it helps accent the tiny size of this vehicle. The Lorraine is certainly one of the more obscure vehicles of the Second World War, and I hardly expect we will see a new kit of this from Tamiya or Dragon. On the other hand, it is a reminder of how good things have become for modellers in 1:35 scale that we have not one, but two plastic kits to choose from, even if a bit difficult to find.

First published in Military Modelling Issue 15, January 2008