Gaslands: Ork Evil Sunz (AKA Idris) Team

First off, some house-keeping. I'm holding off on starting another long term project for now. I have ideas, but I don't want to rush headlong into something half-baked. If/when I do start, I'm going to be posting updates of a Wednesday, so as to better manage my time. As As I am still running far ahead on Sunday articles, Wednesday will feature overspill and such in the meantime. Or things I'd rather speak about sooner, like today's article.

This latest Gaslands exercise arose out of a realisation that my vehicle pool wasn't very varied, and it might be more fun for new players if I offered more choice. So I rummaged through my bits, worked out an Idris team roster, and decided to paint them Evil Sunz red. As this almost entirely came from pre-existing gubbins, the materials and techniques in use here get a bit varied, but nothing radically new. As a side effect, I don't think anything here is in exactly the same scale as anything else, or sometimes with itself, but hopefully nobody will notice.

The first car "Not-so-Mini" was a Matchbox toy I picked up at TFN, and the most conventional of the three. This build relied on the Instruments of Carnage sprue for its engine and one gun, while the turret is a resin orc piece by Ramshackle Games. It is also covered with a variety of scratchbuild materials; wire mesh, scrap plastic, EVA foam, and foil. I visualise this car as one sticking to the middle of the pack, shooting at people, before suddenly hitting the nitro on the final lap.

"The Buggle" is a scratchbuild buggy of the same basic design as this one from a month or so back. This one features a more elaborate rollcage and a frontend off one of a bunch of really cheap toy cars I found in a charity shop. I felt they were going to be great for buggies, but these were made of translucent plastic that was very brittle. I salvaged a useful bit, before reverting to my original design. The weapon is off the Carnage sprue, with the crew and exhausts being Ramshackle Games resin again.

Finally, "Git Rida" is mainly the plastic bike from the Carnage sprue, but made orky. The head is off a Ramshackle Games bit, with the body built up with greenstuff in an attempt to improve the proportions. I then went a bit old school, adding warbike-style twin shootas out back. It worked out fairly well, as long as you don't stare at it too closely.

This was a fairly relaxing little project, which achieved it's aims. Job's a good 'un.

Scratchbuild: Ork Gobsmasha

I started this one when I was kinda in a bad mood. Work had been stressful, I was processing a few things emotionally, I was going off Project Sulaco, and finding myself at loose end creatively. So I ended up opting to do another orky scratchbuild. I've done a great many of these, and truthfully I fear falling into a rut without realising. I've got a method for these locked in, and while the results speak for themselves, it gets samey to write about. That said, I find these fun and therapeutic in way that Project Sulaco wasn't really. So, with that in mind, the Gobsmasha.

In order to put the Gobsmasha onto context, we have to go back the earliest days of the 40k setting. You know, the 1st edition, early Epic, mostly metal rather than plastic, pre-me, sort of time period. As I've mentioned before, actual 28mm scale vehicle kits were not something GW could easily do, which is why things like jet/motorbikes and dreadnoughts were so common unit types at the time. And in many ways still are, but I digress. This isn't to say there wasn't a demand for heavy vehicles at the time, the 6mm scale Epic system was all about that, and 40k had vehicle rules from day one, but GW was a much smaller company back then, and such things were a major investment for them. It's not like you can 3D print stuff in the early 90's is it? As such both the 1st edition rulebook and subsequent White Dwarf articles featured a variety of scratchbuilds and kitbashes, even to the point of featuring plans for complete vehicles. Games Workshop absolutely would not do that today. The Gobsmasha, as featured in this link, is one such vehicle. It's one of the numerous and oft odd battlewagon-adjacent vehicles that turned up in Epic, had an obscure resin model in 28mm, but otherwise has been forgotten. it's overall vibe is typical of the super early Ork vehicle pool, sitting somewhere between a self-propelled gun and an olde timey traction engine.

 

Now, I could have gone and attempted the plans as is, but I didn't for three reasons. 1) Size creep is a thing, and I'd probably end up with something more akin to a Grot Tank or buggy than a modern Battlewagon. 2) I'm not a fan of papercraft stuff, being too clack-handed and impatient. 3) In my hubris, I felt that in between my bitzbox, my experience, and a hot glue gun, that I could free-form something better. Arrogant, I know, but those plans are 30 odd years old, I've got things they didn't, and this ain't my first barbecue. I use the word "hubris" as I ended up crafting the front wheels from 60mm bases, and the result isn't perfectly circular, something that sets off my perfectionism something fierce. It doesn't matter in the wider context, although it's a shame I wasn't able source some suitable lids for use in this project, that would have sidestepped some faff. The main body was built up from three tubes hot-glued together in a H shape, which was then layered with old toy truck panels and such. My stockpile of resin pieces from Ramshackle Games came good with a boiler and chimney piece suitable for a traction engine, while the weapons are GW plastics. Now, as a first edition thing, the Gobsmasha predates the modern orky armoury, but there's some fairly obvious equivalents to go for, i. E. heavy bolter = big shoota, a convention I've used on this and many other projects. As the Gobsmasha had a big cannon on it and two machine gun type things, this led to me me treating as a Big Trakk, like my recent Basilisk. That's not actually ideal given the size this ended up, plus it doesn't actually have trakks, but I didn't feel adding all the ancillary stuff that comes as standard on a modern Battlewagon. That would spoil the effect I was going for. Innumerable rivets later, I got to drybrushing.

Its good to be back :)

Gaslands: Scratchbuilt Buggy

I've actually had the opportunity to finally play Gaslands a bit of late. Been teaching a few people, and I received a generous gift of scenery at one point. Folks seem to like my models, and it's nice to actually experience the game. As a modelling project though, Gaslands has however been on the back burner. I don't really need to make more cars, at least until/if/maybe a racing circuit forms at my local gaming centre, and I've made so many that it's not hugely engaging. Then an idea hit while I was at work: I realised how I could make buggies while changing price labels. Buggies are amongst the cheapest rides in Gaslands, but also something tricky to source. Your average charity shop or toy aisle is pretty certain of having mundane cars and sports cars. But a dune buggy? Not so much. These are smaller, open plan and tend to trade roofs for a roll-bar. Think Beachcomber, but more so. An engine, a lightweight chassis made from scaffolding, and wheels. They are usually less solid as a design than the famously robust diecast car is, which is possibly why you don't see them about much. My realisation was that if I got some dirt cheap cars, specifically a twin pack of plastic ones with cartoony proportions, I could make those into buggies. Just rip the shell off, build a new chassis atop the wheels, put an engine looking bit out back, roll-bar, and then add some resin ork crew. Job's a good 'un?

Well, as it turned out, yeah. My brain worms had me working on this idea of a Saturday evening, and while there was a certain amount of hot glue and bodging, things came together quickly. My bitz box presented some toy car innards for seats, and a resin bit that made for a good engine block. That cut out some faff, although getting the crew to fit was a matter of trial and error. Making the roll-bar was also unexpectedly swift; I threaded little segments of q-tip onto some scrap wire, which allowed me to reinforce it and test fit it without going mad. By the time I called it for the evening, all the key elements were in place, ready for the finishing touches, and then paint. I went for Evil Sunz, aka Idris, with the tires putting up a fight. I probably should have sanded them a bit. That said, it all worked out.

Generally, I'm quite happy with this. It doesn't quite have the fine detail of an actual toy car, but I'm sure that would come with practice. At present, this is more an exaggerated "heroic scale", the sort of detail easily understood in play. I probably made things difficult in jumping straight to exposed crew too. I could have probably have got away with a little mesh box or similar for the crew compartment, which I'm inclined to try for the next one. 

 

 

Jobs a good 'un. 

 

 

Scratchbuild: Killa Kans Redux

Here we go, the first major article written in 2024. If you don’t count Project Tankbustas. Got a new document open and everything. Of course, the subject of this article was started in 2023, and I have a SUBSTANTIAL number of posts awaiting publication, one of which got bumped for this one, but here we are.

So with, January coming up, and in desperate need of something to do to balance out Chrimbo, I felt it was time to revisit the idea of a Killa Kans scratchbuild. Yes, it's both predictable and pretentious to consider making scrap robots for fun. Especially in the often stressful and hazy festive period. But it is fun. Also, I've built up my skills since. I'm very proud of my original scratchbuilds, don't get me wrong, but I will admit that those are a touch oversized. So these were intended to be refinements and closer to the official kits. This resulted in me having a tape measure and a reference model to hand. I drifted a little on that, but as with Project Tonks I seem to have found methods that work for me, arising as much from the resources available as any thing. First, I'd intended to make more extensive use of water pistol innards, but these seem to be out of season, so I ended up using beads more and more as I went on. As it turned out, I did have some left, but I wouldn’t find them until base-coating the things because I don’t organise my bitz. Unconsciously, I ended up making Beadbots, the legs of the third being entirely beads and wire. The arms were based off plastic rod, with a metal sewing bar, (I never did find out the proper name for these,) with a flexible material in the middle to suggest cabling. Wire and small beads were used to create pistons, giving the arms an industrial robotics look. At least until I put the klaw or whatever on the end. I did not try to add pistons to the legs as I felt it would not be visually pleasing. While each was based off lids and such, the main bodies of the first two shared a common hip piece, based off toy cars I was no longer able to source. All this leads to three Kans with enough common design elements to suggest a shared origin, although the last I made was the most divergent from the template as I'd ran out of some bits. So, let's briefly look at each in turn.

The first "Bugeye McPinchy" is the one most reminiscent of my earlier work and the GW house style for Orks. It's legs are water pistol triggers, with the generator and exhausts coming from the same place. The initial melee arm I built for this one proved far too fragile, promoting the style of arm described above. It's Grotzooka was the same style that I'd made for the Grot Mega-Tank. Once the limbs were on, and I was confident it would stand without issue, I then dressed the model with bits, going down the ork face route. Much later on, when I viewed the trio as a group, I'd realised the size of each had subtly increased with successive kan. Nothing major, all were close enough to my reference model, but I felt Bug needed a little something to compensate, hence his bosspole made from gears.

The second, "Screwfix" was arguably better received when shared on social media. This name, and presumably it's popularity, came from the big screw fitting I'd added as a melee weapon. Too big? Maybe. Appropriate? Definitely. I mirrored it's weapons versus the first and gave it a monoeye. Due to space limitations this ended up with fewer teeth, with legs being a combination of water pistol bits, beads, toy car wheels, and cable ties. The generator also ended up sitting higher, but that proved to be a good place for a glyph and other greebling.

The third, “Wideboy” was where I went full bead mode, and radically changed the body shape. Here the legs and claw were wooden beads, and its main body was a small jar of a kind previously used as a Tonk turret. This would lead me to omit the bulky generator of the previous two, because it was bulky enough already. He's biggish for a Kan, but not to the extent of the ones I made before. The klaw also required a rethink. I'D initially went for a jcb/digger look, but it wasn't working, so I sliced if off and tried again. I also opted for the Grotzooka to be more of a gun arm rather than mounting it directly to the shoulder. Aware of how much this one was deviating from the other two, I also gave this a monoeye and teeth.

This was fun. I might not need to actually buy models any more at this rate.

Project Tonks: Part 7

Lucky number seven?

 

Mindful of becoming somewhat "tonked-out", I tapped my breaks a bit. I'd laid the foundations for today's Tonk in the week 6 segment, and then promised myself I'd try to do something else for 24 hours. At that point, the Tonk was looking to combine elements from each of the previous weeks'. The track base was similar to last week's, but triangular, with the hull being half a Jenga tile. The turret was looking like the one from week 5, but more towards the front. I soon realised this was gonna be too small, so I revisited the gimmick straws I'd used for week 4's oversized Tonk. Through good luck one of the pieces matched the width of this Tonk all-but-perfectly, with a bit spare for a gun barrel. However, things didn't seem to be sticking well, and I took that as my cue to take a break. 

 

When I came back to it, I found myself making an inverse of a Tonk somewhat, with most of the mass towards the front. The hull was dressed with a keyboard key and a lot of rivets, while I added additional roadwheels in the form of beads atop nanoblocks. While the turret was another small jar, I tried to detail it differently from the week 5 model. I also applied a panel from an old toy car to the top of the hull, as it had duel extractor fans. Painting then continued with my now standard "make-up brush dry brushed rust bucket method". I'm quite happy with how it turned out, although I didn't notice a wonky wheel until it was too late. 

 

Once that was done, I anxiously turned to the next, as I had plans that week and wouldn't be able to model as much. Yep, rushing again. I do learn, I swear, it's just I get very focused on things. Here I used smaller wheels and more beads, before trying a new turret style based on a construction toy. It's obviously not done, so we'll come back to that one again next week. 

 

 

All being well, I should have something to say about stage 4 soonish.

Project Tonks: Part 6

Six weeks now? I suppose that counts as a routine.

 

As you may recall from last week, I was feeling quite pleased, but had received a delivery of models that were gonna be a distraction. Bloody hell Richard, what were you thinking? You start a long term project involving 1:72 tanks, and as change of pace you order some 28mm mini-tanks for when you are on holiday. That's a really diverse set of projects you got going there. So, of course I put those together alongside today's Tonk work, although the write-up will come in future weeks. On the plus side, it does not appear to have slowed me down by much.

 

Today's Tonk followed on the innovations of last week's where I'd chanced upon a method to easily make road wheels. Here I cut down some 6 by 1 thin not-lego pieces, attached wheels to them, and wrapped the bricks with a strip of EVA foam to provide a foundation. The wheels here were salvaged from toy cars, specifically pull-motors, which also provide good gears. As this was a first attempt, I went for a simple line of road wheels, which ended up needing an additional small wheel as I’d misjudged the distance between them. Not quite what I wanted, but good enough. Attaching these to the hull of the Tonk was a bit of trail & error, as was applying the tracks. I had to faff about a bit so everything sat flat. Otherwise, I went for a slightly more angular look with a smaller turret than the last one. Said turret was achieved by wrapping the business end of a spraypump with EVA foam and bits until I got the shape I wanted. I used a lot of cheapo gap-filler on that turret too, to smooth it out. Painting then continued in the usual manner, making use of a make-up brush to speed things up. A couple rivets didn't want to take paint for some reason, but i think I got it in the end. Sorry about the photos, the light wasn't great.

 

 

 

All in all, I'm quite happy with how it turned out. The tracks aren't quite there, but are certainly good enough. I’ve also found my pace of building and painting has increased. Part of that’s being on holiday, but I seem to approaching Gaslands levels of efficiency where the only thing that’s slowing me is literally the paint drying, or waiting for the putty to set. I’ve made A LOT of track links in the past week, so the remaining two Tonks should go faster. Actually I’ve started on the third, but decided slow down, lest I burn out.

Up next: Another Tonk.

Project Tonks: Part 5

Part 5 then... Here we go.

 

 

While I was being too much of a perfectionist with last week's effort, I wanted to avoid the same imperfections for the next one. I.e. keep the size under control, and do actual track links this time. I started with the track links as I knew this was going to be the most involved and lengthy part of the build, but once I got it right, future builds would be easier. This was because I was going to make some crude, two-part, push moulds which would enable me to mass produce the links with minimal effort. I'm not great at precision cutting, but I don't mind filing a part after the fact to it fits. If you're unfamiliar with such things, I will say it requires a certain amount of preparation and good old trial & error. It's only worth doing if the part you're making is A) rare/annoying to source or B) you're making so many of the things it works out to a time saving. Obviously doing a bunch of track links is a massive B, and if you want to know more about the process, I'm going to include a link here to a video. It probably explains things better than I can. My initial design was to base these around zip ties and paper clips, but these proved to be too slight for this style of mould. Instead, I went for something based on cut down nanoblocks, tubing and scrap plastic. These are perhaps a bit chunky, and aren't interlocking, but I have to work with what I have.

So while I was prepping that and creating a lot of miscasts, I went to work on the actual tonk. This proved to be a series of happy accidents. I'd decided to use a small spraybottle from an airline travel kit for the turret joint. During installation, the top, which I had intended to build up into the turret, pinged off into a corner and presumably Narnia as I have yet to find it. However, a small make-up tub from the same set would work just as well. Actually, better, as it had an indentation on one side the same diameter as the spray mechanism, so it flows better. The track wheels meanwhile were left overs from an old Frame Arms kit, these having been selected as convenient short-cut while I worked out the track links. These are single mould piece with four wheels and a rectangular behind. These looked the part, but there was a lot of empty space that would make adding tracks impractical. So, I wrapped the piece with EVA foam to fill those gaps and make for better connections. Then it hit me, I can do the same thing with lego and disks. That will make the next one so much easier to do! The track links meanwhile, while requiring significant clean-up and gap-filling, went on with almost no issue, when I'd been suspecting a need to mod something to make 'em fit. Word to the wise: if you're trying something like this, do the visible areas first, that way, if you have to bodge something, it's on the underside. I only really needed to add a strip of EVA to bridge a gap. And finally, once I' d added some panels to the side, the tonk proved to be very close to the 7 by 5cm target. I was quite pleased. Painting then continued in my usual way, this time featuring lime green, and some homebrew mud paint to obscure some imperfections.

Generally, I'm a lot happier with how this turned out versus week 4's creation. That was OK, well-liked even, but this is more scale appropriate, and looks a bit better. I'm inclined to do three more like this, and redesignate the bigger green one as a prototype. That puts me a little behind schedule, but I do have some time off this week. I’ll have plenty of time to catch up, assuming nothing happens to distract me…

Uh-oh.

Project Tonks: Part 4

Ah right, part 4. Let's do this. 

 

As you may recall from part 1, the plan was now to do scratching and heavy kitbashes, and on a very rainy day, I started on the first of four new Tonks. This was going to be a mix of techniques my research had previously turned up, although I hadn’t given much prior thought as to how it would all go together, it was very free-form. The hull was a cut down jenga tile, with cut-up pens for the wheelbase. Its tracks were then created with strips of EVA foam, layered with cable tie segments. I will admit to this being simpler than some of my previous works, but sometimes you skip the dull stuff. The main hull was built up around this, going for a still ramshackle look but less orky than my usual. I had various modern tanks in mind, mainly NATO ones, although that may not be apparent. I had aimed for a 7 by 5cm hull, but as so often happens, the model grew during assembly so it's more like 9 by 6. The turret was made from a hand-soap pump and a bottlecap, salvaging part of the mechanism for turret rotation. The turret and main body were painted separately, and not attached until painting was almost complete, something I should have been a touch more careful about, but rust covers my mistakes. Speaking of painting, I experimented with a Halfords grey primer and some watered-down Vallejo 70.873 US Field Drab as a base coat. I'd ran out of both my preferred and backup spraypaints, but I'd heard good things about Halfords rattle-cans, so I gave one a go here. Initial results seem satisfactory. 

 

While it generally came out well enough, I’m not entirely satisfied, like I’ve not quite got it down. It looks like a scrap tank, the EVA foam tracks work OK as a technique, but its not quite me. This prompted me to mull over how best to approach the next one. I gave some thought to casting a smaller style of track links. Then I thought about cut-up cable ties on double-sided tape. And then about the assorted kitbash ready tracks I already had. Then about cutting up shower gel bottles for their shape.I went back to my (unfeasibly large) bitzbox, and had a rummage too. I decided to sleep on it, before picking up fresh modelling supplies the next day.

Of course, this was just me suffering being a perfectionist, when I started sharing these images with people, the Tonk was well-received. So, I’ll accept this how it is. The next one will  hopefully feature milliput tracks though...

 

The Orktober Stompa

 

Yes, it's that time of year again. But what to do? As mentioned in a previous article, I've done a lot of Ork stuff lately, so I needed to do something special, without flooding the blog. I also wanted it to be fun, and, if possible, not hugely expensive. After mulling it over for a bit, I decided to go back to my roots and make a Stompa. For the unfamiliar, Stompas are a centrepiece model for an Ork, something roughly on the same scale as an Imperial Knight but much chunkier. There bigger things in the lore and older rulesets, the fabled Gargants, but a Stompa is about as big Ork units can get in regular 40k. They are also amongst the orkiest things imaginable, being a roughly humanoid waddling idol to Gork and/or Mork, with enough firepower to make your average gunclub member drop his pipe and exclaim "Steady on, chap!". Less romantically, Stompas are ambulatory collections of scrap metal with proportions somewhere between an upturned plant pot and a wind-up robot toy circa 1953. They aren't hugely well-regarded in competitive play either for a variety of reasons, but usually for it's low cost-efficiency. GW has historically priced it high, which isn't great as a Stompa is a bit of an enthusiastic generalist, although we're not gonna get into that today. Now, I've built Stompas before. Specifically the GW kit, it's a bit annoying as I recall, and scratch-built another. But I’d like to think I’m better at this now than I was then. It was time to try again.

So, aside from an unreasonable amount of hot glue, how did this go together?

Hull

The majority of the stompa is a Mr Potato head body atop the lid from a coffee jar. It's still in there somewhere. Such things are not unheard of in stompa builds, because they offer such a nice body shape, versus the aforementioned "plant pot" stereotype that is common. I still took the easy route though in that I didn't build distinct legs, just feet with an implied skirt. Hey if the official model does it that way, I can too. Once the mounting points for weapons and limbs were worked out, I layered panels of numerous different materials over it. It's an effect I'd used on my recent Battlewagon, as such a thing like this absolutely should not have clean lines. EVA foam was a big help here, as was my hoarder-level bitzbox. The feet are off a combining robot toy that went an odd colour, and we're basically fine as-is. I did attempt keep this sensibly sized too, I had a tape measure and everything, but it kinda got away from me.

Mega-Choppa Arm

This was off a construction toy I'd been keeping for such a use for absolutely ages. It didn't need much work but the melee weapon presented a bit of a challenge. Eventually, I hit on the idea of using triangular beads for teeth, in a fitting made from a bit of a tank. This was fiddly work, but it looks great. 

 

 

DethKannon Arm

This was built up from a series of cylindrical bits I'd collected, the largest of which was a Junkbot toy. There's no real trick to this, you just need a lot of tubing, although the Supa-Gatler benefits from some beads. This was affixed to the main body via some some heavy duty wire and some T'au bits, because it's not Deathskulls without looted bits. 

 

 

Head

The head was built from a pod from a gatchapon toy, onto which panels were layered, and the measuring spoon from a tub of stain remover. The spoon looked so much like a baseball cap this prompted me to go in a different direction for the paint scheme, more on that shortly. 

 

 

Secondary weapons

These were of a mix of felt-tip pens, beads, and actual pre-existing weapons. The Supa-Rokkits were possibly a bit too simple looking back, as these are merely tubes with spikes from the bead shop, but it works. The secondary turret was mainly the cab off a truck toy, and while inspired by the one on the regular Stompa kit, I felt it needed a bit more punch. Thus it got the twin big shoota and two supa-rokkits. 

 

 

Painting

I broke out the art/craft paint for this one, as while you can absolutely use miniature paints on a project like this, you are talking about a model a foot tall. Things easily run out, so I used craft supplies for all the major colours, via drybrushing, stippling and sponging. I got a make-up brush for that. The head however was closer to my usual style, if with a quirk. As it had a baseball cap, it obviously followed that I paint it up like crude representation of an ork's face. I used AK Lime Green, as I didn't want to perfectly match the skintones of my Boyz, I needed a sharper contrast. This also led to be doing the hat in my usual blue, and the feet in black, suggesting a kinship with the lads. The head, turret, and main body were painted separately, only to be attached at the final stage. Touch-up followed, and while I'm generally pleased, some of the glyph plates could be better.

Job's a good 'un. And following a discussion with my RPG group, I named it "Mr Giblets".

Scratchbuild: Another Ork Battlewagon

 Yes, I sometimes repeat myself.

With the new edition, I inevitably began thinking about modernising my forces. And how certain units seem to have been reshuffled Given my specific cocktail of neurodivergence and neurosis it's very hard to put things like that aside, so once I did those Grot Tanks, I decided to take a swing at doing another battlewagon.

The weird/annoying thing about battlewagons just now is how they interact with the "exactly what's in the box" design philosophy found in the index lists. This is because the kit spent two editions representing 3 distinct variations, one doing the classical 'wagon, one being about the deathrolla, and an unpopular cannon one. (There's also Forgeworld units, but honestly I don't care.) Putting guns on one wasn’t usually viewed as an especially practical option given A) ork marksmanship, and B) how these act as an ork party bus. With this in mind, creating and pricing the unit on the assumption that people would build one with all possible options is daft. Experienced players wouldn't have done that under the previous points systems, as the options are contradictory in purpose to an extent, while beginners would have to look up the difference, and thus likely came across the opinions of the former. So, for this new project I took a "can't beat 'em, join' em" approach. I'd build a wagon with all the guns, and most of the melee options. The Wrecking Ball option is not actually in the kit, I assume that was a concession to kitbashers, so I skipped it. The choice between Firing Ports and Ard Case meanwhile is still largely a matter of side grades and what dakka if any the passengers have. I went for Ard Case as it simplified the build. As to how practical such a battlewagon is, I'm unsure. Putting a lobba, kannon, and 4 big shootas on a single platform means it can unleash 40 odd shots in a single volley. I dunno if that's good on something that carries troops and likes to pancake people. You'd be looking at 14ish S5 hits, which isn't bad, but it's the sorta thing you can get elsewhere. I see this as a tactical battering ram and distraction.

 

 

Having done… frankly too many such modelling projects, this thing went together with relative speed and a lot of hot glue. I decided on a wheeled design fairly early on, first going for eight wheels, and then realising that was far too big even by my loose standards. In terms of techniques and materials used, I’d call this a “pragmatic” scratchbuild. The wheels, weapons, and details like exhausts were pre-existing bits, either plastic or resin. That’s the sort of thing I could try doing myself, and have done, but I have the bits, so why not? The majority of the hull however was more mixed material; bits of toy, flatpackers, chipboard, scrap plastic, and EVA foam. The curved shape comes from what remains of a fork-lift toy. It was then painted in my obsessively rusty style.

I’m very pleased with one. I’ve been grinding away at lot of rusty projects over the last year or so, and it seems to be paying off. I should probably stop putting off the infantry though.

 

 

 

Scatchbuild Experiment: Robotrike

Some projects don't really turn out as you wanted. It happens. You try something and it doesn't click, as evidenced by a long-stalled Morkanaut project and my recent 30MM experience. That said, sometimes it's possible to change direction and still get something pleasing out of what did actually work. Like today's subject.

 

Having spent a lot of time on Orks, I had decided to start moving into something less in my comfort zone, and more free-form. My initial idea was to create the archetypal chicken-walker robot, but then it grew into something closer to Dreampod 9's Gear Krieg setting. For the unfamiliar, that's a super science take on World War 2, which featured diesel punk mecha, the eponymous "Gears". These were an interesting non-humanoid take on the whole robot thing, sitting somewhere between an armoured car, and a tank that stood up to cross broken terrain. Between gunpla bits and fidget toys, I was pretty sure I could create something along those lines. Something that couldn't transform, due to me gluing the joints for stability, but looked like it could. Unfortunately it became evident early in the build that the legs weren't working out, so I decided for a hybrid trike instead. I imagine this being a Drone with a lot of off-road performance, steering and adjusting it's height with its two front legs. The larger back wheel provides the forwards motion, so it's not a 3 by 3, but it does dirt bike stuff as well as crawl. Imagine such a thing left out in the field, or on patrol for months on end, only for it to suddenly chase some luckless chap. 

 

Now, the build was broadly similar to my previous ones, more a convergence of trends than anything radical. The legs & pelvis are mainly gunpla, their wheels being older GW plastics, with the main body being a lid. It's weapons are a mix of spray bottle parts and gubbins I'd been collecting for a while. While cable ties and little tokens make another appearance, something that was new was the use of toy car motors. These have interesting shapes, making for good weapon mounts and such. I also tried to evoke certain makes of scooter by having the rear wheel attached by a single fork. At least I think that's the term. The generator also invokes another DP9 setting, looking like a very crude V Engine.

Painting was my usual mix of dry rushing, stippling, and washing, but I did try a few new things. The first thing I did, and regret, was attempt to basecoat the model before final assembly. I forgot to mask the connection points with blu tack, which caused a few unforced errors. Hopefully, nothing too noticeable. I used Citadel Waaagh Flesh for the green, to see if my style would suit more conventional military aesthetics as well as my usual Deathskull blues. It worked pretty well, even before I went to town on weathering. There, I did all my usual, but also tried out AK Dark Rust Deposits, an enamel paint. I don't have much prior experience with enamels, so I don't know if I can recommend it, but it worked well enough here.

All in all, this was a pleasing distraction to have around Christmas, although given some of the basic mistakes made, I should have paced myself better. I think I'll take another swing at this chicken walker thing at a later date.

 

Work in Progress Pics