Looted Wagons 23

More work on the final Looted Wagon rear, sides and the front hull weapon...

Again I used an Assault Cannon as a Big Shoota to tie in with the first Looted Wagon and the previous Chimera based Wagon (which is in the hands of the person who commissioned these).

Next job will be to add some short track guards. Originally I wasn't going to add any but I have chosen to due to a. the crappy way the one piece of track was added by the original owner and b. the wagon looks a bit bare compared to the other two who have guards.

After that it'll be the turret which will have a Boomgun and a Rokkit Launcha. Originally I was going to do a turret built around the original Russ turret but I have been asked to do a bigger, chunky turret much like a couple of my other Looted Wagons.

I will aim to get the track guards done by end of tomorrow, the turret and any other little details on all three will then hopefully be done by the end of the week.

Defensive Walls & 3D Printing 10 and Mould Prices

I had some more plaster arrive resulting in more wall casts being done. Since the last update the tally now runs at…

64 No. Straight Walls (3.2 metres)

54 No. Corner Walls
44 No. Straight Plinths (1.1 metres)
19 No. Corner Plinths

Some close ups of the latest walls with damage carved into them:

Sometime this weekend I will (I hope) get some Realm of Battle panels out and do some set ups with some bastions etc to see how many more casts it is worth doing.

I am also thinking about static guns (ala planetstrike) and how they would set up behind the walls. I don’t like the base you get in the planetstrike sets and while I like the alternative Tarantula like base it takes up too much room with the legs spread out.

I am thinking of either a. using the base without the legs or b. doing a new one from scratch.

Here are some pics of the guns set up:

Using the 'box' base

Using the alternative base without the legs.

I prefer the legless base, but not completely sold on it yet. I'm probably going to end up doing a new one similar to it.

Moulds for Sale

As discussed in the previous post I am thinking about selling moulds of the defensive walls for people to then cast their own sets. I’ve had enough emails of interest to make it worth giving it a go. As such I have some new rubber and I’ll be doing the first mould this weekend.

I have some prices which are almost certainly going to be what I go with. I have decided to not include the mounting plate mould in the basic set as I know not everyone would want to bother adding them. So the prices are:

Mould Set 1 – single mould covering the straight wall, corner wall, straight plinth and corner plinth. £22 + postage

Mould Set 2 – Two of Set 1. £40 + postage

Mould Set 3 – As Set 1 + mounting plate mould & 4 pieces of rebar (each just shy of 100mm long). £25 + postage.

Mould Set 4 – Two of Set 3. £45 + postage.

Postage would be at cost. Keep in mind the boxes won’t be light, though a lot less than if you were buying a whole set of cast walls.

I recommend if people can to buy the two mould option as it will make casting all the pieces a lot less time consuming, it allows you to alternative doing casts so that you can do it constantly rather than having to wait for plaster to dry before doing the next set.

I will not be taking orders as such until after the first mould is done this weekend. It allows me to do a test cast to ensure that the mould size and everything else is ok. Plus it’ll give me a weight to determine postage costs so no one has a nasty surprise later.

Looted Wagons 22

The third wagon is well under way now...

Still needs work on the rear before I do the sides, front and the turret.

Defensive Walls & 3D Printing 9 + For Sale...?

So I have been rather busy casting.

To date I have cast...

42 No. Straight Walls (so 2.1 metres of straight walls)
38 No. Corner Walls
34 No. Straight Plinths (so 850mm)
15 No. Corner Plinths

All set up they look something like this:

Though in an actual game setting there will be bastions in there which would increase the area covered.

I think I have nearly enough now. I have run out of plaster but i've ordered a load more. Once it arrives I'll finish off the casting and do the sub assemblies for the plinth walls sections.

I do have the fun task of casting all the mounting plates for them. I can hardly wait.

Not much of an update I admit, however the main reason for this post is to follow.

'Defensive Wall Mould Sets'

A number of people have asked me if I would be selling casts of the walls which they can buy.

I did consider it but the amount of time this would take up would be far too much and would result in it being too expensive for people to buy.

However, what I am seriously considering is selling a set of moulds which people can then use to cast as many walls as they like. It will be far cheaper for people to cast their own walls using moulds they have bought as the plaster is very cheap.

So what I am proposing is to sell a set which will include moulds for 1 Straight Wall, 1 Corner Wall, 1 Straight Plinth, 1 Corner Plinth and a mould for four Mounting Plates. A mould for rebar will not be included as it uses a lot of rubber, I am finding I am not using much at all - just four lengths so far. As such I will include with the moulds four casts of the rebar.

All this depends on demand. I don't know how much a set will be yet, once I know this is a goer (i.e. there are people interested) I will order some more rubber, as I don't have enough left for a full set, and produce the first set. From this I will then be able to determine a price and people can then order them.

So if you are interested please drop me an email at rictusrd-blog at yahoo dot co dot uk

Looted Wagons 21

The second wagon is now almost finished. I say 'almost' as while taking the pictures I realised I hadn't added sodding handles to the hatch.

I will go back and add those at the end now, I always intended to go back to the first two wagons at the end and do any little bits and pieces anyway so i'll sort the handles at the end.

Firstly I have to say using the Demolisher cannon bit was a stupid idea. I bloody hate the GW metal hybrid bits. Sodding nightmare to use, they never fit together properly and they are a bugger to use.

So anyway, pictures of the second wagon.

I think the demolisher cannon parts are firmly attached in place now, a combination of superglue and GS was used. The first attempt I had to pull the bits off as the cannon pointed downwards slightly with the result of the bits breaking apart instead of coming free. The two arrows point to where I drilled holes through and glued some brass rod in place.

And the first two wagons together:

Next up will be Wagon No. 3.

It will have a turret mounted Boomgun and secondary weapons mounted in the hull. Work will start on it tomorrow.

Recalcitrant Daze – 11 Months, Orks, BoLS and Forge World.

Welcome to the eleventh Recalcitrant Daze Monthly Blog Post Thing (you may have guessed I still haven’t thought up a good name for it).

Wow, eleven months. It seems we are stuck with each other; I think we should all just accept it and make the best of the situation.

So, I hear you ask, what has the eleventh month brought to RD and what will the following month bring?

3D Printing, Casting & Bell of Lost Souls.

The plinths, rebar and mounting plates arrived from the printers this month. The first batch of casts is done but I need to do a lot more casting. Since the last update I have produced another set of moulds for the plinths to speed the process up. Expect another update on these this weekend after I spend some time seriously building up the numbers.

My latest article went up on Bell of Lost Souls Monday evening and for a change it wasn’t about Orks. I decided to share my experiences so far with the 3D printing to the wider hobby world as I know it is something of interest to a lot of people.

You can catch the article, which includes some pictures that haven’t been seen on RD, here. To tempt you to pay a visit here is one of the previously unseen pictures…

Looted Wagons.

Soon the first two Looted Wagons I was commissioned to build will be declared finished. The third will become the priority project then.

Due to a couple of reasons – dealing with the clean up from a leaking roof and underestimating how long it would take to strip the paint off three tanks in one go – I am behind where I expected to be with these, hence making the third one a priority for the forthcoming week or two so the project doesn’t end up being over the estimated completion date.

Forge World Open Day.

1^st April sees WHW open its doors for another FW Open Day. I have been to every one so far and they have all been excellent. I will be there with Schoolcormorant from The Spring Offensive and Maelstrom from The Rising Sign.

I do not intend to spend much. This is no guarantee of anything however.

My camera will be in my hand throughout the day so expect many pictures appearing on Recalcitrant Daze sometime in the evening along with any info I hear (and can remember).

If you are going to be there and want to say hello feel free to do so. I’ll be the one with praying skeleton tattoos on his forearms and three chaos star tattoos on the back of his right arm. That should make it easy to tell me from the crowd.

Zone Mortalis.

The following weekend in April will see me passing across our northern border into the Land of the Scots where I shall be staying with a friend for a few days of gaming.

We have two aims, the first is to try out the ‘leaked’ 6^th edition rule set with some 1000 point army lists (we normally play 2.5k games), while the second is to have a go at the Zone Mortalis rules from FW using 750 point armies on a 3’ x 3‘ gaming area.

I will be taking a thousand points of Orks and a thousand points of Militia. This means building some Orks, I’m not sure yet if I will do any blog updates on the Orks as it will be basic, out of the box builds (due to time) and nothing will get painted (obviously…this is me) so there will not be much to show.

However I will do a post or two on ZM to say what I think of it and to show the very (very) basic terrain we knock up to try it out. While I would love a space hulk style board I’m not going to embark on building one when I don’t have the time or room for the finished product (plus I don’t know if I will like the game yet).

For the walls I made a master corner/end piece with the aim of casting enough before we play in April. It was a pretty rough and quick build out of lego and styrene.

Finnboard door

Cardboard walls - the card we use for the game will be plain,
not a garish mix of colours...

We will cut card to slot in between them for the walls and some finnboard to drop into the central groove for doorways. They are nice and solid with the hope it will keep everything stable during gaming. It will all be pretty basic and plain but for now it will do the job nicely.

So yeah, in the coming month expect more casting, more looting, some orks, more terrain and a big dump of Forge World related shenanigans.

I feel you don’t hear the word shenanigans often enough.

Rictus.

A quick afterthought…

I am looking to do more articles for Bell of Lost Souls and Miniature Wargames Conversions in the future, however I’m not currently brimming over with ideas for topics.

If you have an idea for an article you would like me to do please do post it up, all ideas will be considered, though not necessarily taken up...

Looted Wagons 20

The Boomgun on the second Wagon is proving an annoyance, I do so hate the GW metal hybrid parts.

I have had to add a small spacer and some GS to modify it so the gun pointed forward rather than to the left.

So while I left the GS to cure (will not work on it again till tomorrow now) I got on with a few other things.

On the first Looted Wagon I added GS welds to the rear towing point and some plating underneath the tank. I also got round to adding the tracks - a mix of the original tracks pulled off it and new ones from my bits box added.

The second Wagon got some weld lines on the turret plus some dags.

It also got its tracks, again a mixture of old and new ones, though more new ones than the first wagon.


I admit that wasn't the most thrilling of updates - especially as I forgot to take a pic of the demolisher cannon / boomgun WIP.

Very little left to do on these two wagons now. Once the boomgun is in place and detailed up it'll just be a few little bits and pieces. Then it will be onto the third wagon (which is so obvious it didn't really need to be said to be honest).