A Crusader Model for "The Crusader Gal"

Custom Decals for Custom Decor

Yes. I know. No British WW2 tank ever had “The Crusader Gal” emblazoned across the sides in such a blatant manner as so many secret vehicles with names of their secret organizations plastered all over them like in the old 1960s Gerry Anderson shows like “Shado”, “Spectrum” and “Thunderbirds” did. And in this case, too, it’s more symbolic than realistic. Mostly, it was meant to be deliberately legible.

“The Crusader Gal” is the moniker used by Sarah Cain, a lovely young lady who discusses various social issues on her YouTube channel with a few props in the background as a part of her on-camera set. Like the previous Crusader jet model I built for her, this tank was built for the purpose of set decoration as well.

This is, nevertheless, an accurate model of a WW2 Crusader tank used by the British in various campaigns at the time. I deliberately personalized it for Sarah to fit her set decor. I started with a screen grab of her main page and asked her what font she used. I adapted the text to fit the sides of the tank model by scanning the skirts to make it fit. I overlayed a screen grab of her logo from her channel and re-sized it to fit the fender skirts of the scanned parts from the Tamiya/Italeri kit.

I then re-built the text in Adobe Illustrator and modified it as you can see below. To improve it somewhat I adjusted the kerning of the text so it would look a little better and added a cross and the “Deus Vult” I used on her Crusader jet to complete the look, like this:

The finished decal art as sent to the printer, complete with a new shield crest to add to the turret looked like this:

I usually print custom decals myself using a bubble jet printer if they are going over white or very light coloured surfaces, but in this case, I needed opaque ones with a white background (for the shield) so I hired V-1 decals in British Columbia, Canada to make them for me. He has the ability to print white and fully opaque decals with a special laser printer that can do what was once only available by the now defunct “ALPS” printers that were previously used for such tasks. The laser-printed decals also have the advantage of being fully waterproof without the need for spraying them with a sealing spray which is required for inkjet-printed decals.

I finished the tank in a desert tan which will show up better than the dark army green it was supposed to be painted (these Crusader tanks were indeed painted for desert operations too so the tan colour is canon) and sprayed the side fenders in white ready to receive the decals as you can see here (shows the almost-finished model with a few bits still to be mounted):

The tank was complete with some light wash weathering and the decals were finally applied to make the model you see here and in Sarah’s upcoming shows on YouTube and other various social media platforms.

Yes, the turret rotates 360 degreesand the gun can move up and down.