Final Sd.Kfz. 251/9

On saturday, I completed a Hasegawa Sd. Kfz. 251/9 that I was doing on the side:     . I know have two sections of two vehicles each, or one platoon of four vehicles. I actually only need two (a section of two vehicles) but at the time I did the first two I had a third, and did it up at the same time. I got this fourth back in January via a private sale and the price was fantastic, hence why I bought it.

(Plus, a platoon of fire support that can also transport some footsloggers…worth trying even if I sell the second section off later).

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Weather was pretty horrible for the rest of saturday and all yesterday, so I wasn’t able to Dullcote and photo some buildings I’m working on…

 

 

…and that’s the end of big-terrain-piece-making for the current Spring/Summer/Autumn!

Winter is clawing at the windows nowadays – our second morning under 5 degrees Celsius two mornings ago – and so I’ve finished with making large terrain pieces until warmer weather returns.

You’ll recall that I was working on some more  ”commercial-style” wargaming hills. Last weekend I was able to photograph them and move them inside, and clean up the table in the shed for more ‘house and garden’-type activities.

So, here are the two hills I made – one large and in two sections, the other much smaller (and it can go on the large one to make a two-level hill):     . Because these hills have flat tops, I’ll be able to put some based trees on them. It looks a little bit funny to only have beautifully sloping hills that have no trees on them…but if you want hills to be durable and easily stored with other hills in one box, then my opinion is that you can’t make hills with trees stuck on them.

I have three criticisms of my work: 1) I probably brushed off too much loose flock that was left behind after the glue dried. I could’ve left some on when I sprayed the hills with Scenic Cement to seal them. There are some patches where you can see the brown undercoat a little too easily. Oh well. 2) I touched these hills before the glue under the flock had even had a chance to harden,so one on of the two hill halves, you can just see a thumbprint. Oh well. 3) I used too much of the Heki green scatter material. Originally I said I’d use none, and really strive for a very “commercial”, modular appearance. Then as I was undercoating them I decided I’d better use some of the Heki scatter material to represent weeds, as I have done that one so many figure bases, other scenery pieces and some of the other hills. If I don’t, they’ll stand out from my other pieces too much. In practice, I applied too much. Oh well.

So, no big terrain items now for quite a while.

 

Happiness is a pair of warm guns – Caesar Miniatures 1/72 scale Kit 7202 finished

The sIG-33′s are complete:

The pair together: .

They turned out very well! Well made, Caesar!

I’ve used the SeeNiks Earth Blend flock once again, to represent the trodden-on ground/churned-up mud that would eventuate whenever a field gun is set up somewhere and fired more than once or twice. I’m not so happy with the results…the SeeNiks Earth blend flock looks great when used on a hill or as a scenery piece, but here on a base trying to represent freshly-disturbed earth, I don’t think it’s so goodl. I’ll go back to using Woodland Scenics’ Earth blend for freshly-churned-up earth/mud.

I am having trouble with doing extreme macro’s/close-ups with Mrs Eastern Funker’s camera. I’ll do some reading to see if there is some setting I haven’t utilised properly…but it might be that her camera is not cut out for detailed closeups of 1:72 scale troops’ faces.

 

 

The shed is alive with the sound of hill-making – part 2

I was a bit keen with the sand-paper, so some bubbles came free completely. Otherwise, the edges rounded nicely with the sand-papering: .

Putting two layers of paint on will help fill up the tiny holes a bit…when I cover them with Aquadhere, that will get rid of all the small holes and tiny grooves completely. Finished product this weekend, if this freaky Autumn warm spell can hold until then…

The shed is alive with the sound of hill-making…

I’ve decided that, whilst the shed table is clear, to get rid of all the polystyrene I could find in my house and make up some more hills. Instead of using a knife (my beloved yellow-handled Olfa) to cut and carve them, these hills will look a bit more “commercial” in appearance, so I’m using my hot wire cutter to make them: . I bought this from an art & craft shop in Prahran. It’s from Taiwan and when I bought it 8-10 years ago, cost $30. I then bought a transformer for it – that’s the black plug and cord coming out the top of the front. That cost another $30. I’ve had plenty of practice with it over the years and have drawn some conclusions about it: 1) It doesn’t cut all thicknesses of polystyrene…you’ll have trouble if you’re cutting more than 30mm thick blanks; 2) it is not rugged – the bottom metal electrode bends easily, causing the wire to slacken, so I wedge it across my hand to keep the wire taut, and that hurts my hand after some time; 3) The connection for the transformer is wonky – you have to keep wiggling the cord to get the electricity flowing, and I know it’s not the transformer, as I tested in with other electrical devices and it worked fine, no wiggling of cords needed; 4) the wire frequently comes loose off the electrodes, so every 5 minutes you have to stop and re-string it. To conclude, don’t buy this “Polyon Cutter” (as it is called on its packing). Make your own, or go buy a specialist hobby one. I know Woodland Scenics make one – if I have to do more hills in the near future, I’ll ditch this and get theirs.

Even with all the frustration, it does still make lovely cuts and there is no mess unlike with an packing knife: . I made one really big hill in two halves, as Peter and I know we need more of them: and with the last piece of polystyrene, made a second level for this hill: . Today or on the weekend I’ll sandpaper the sides to smooth where the cutter was a little erratic and sandpaper the angle where the top meets the side, so it is more rounded: . Then it will be time for undercoating with paint and a simple, flock finish – I’m not gioing to detail this hill as much as the others.

 

 

Time to make some better hills 3 & 4

Now it’s time to seal the hills. If these were troops or vehicles, I’d be sealing them (to protect the paintwork) with Testors Dullcote. I seal hills with Woodland Scenics spray-on/brush-on Scenic Cement as it glues the flock from the top side, meaning that at the end of the process it’s glued from below and above and will only come off under physical duress.

I prepare the spraying area. In the past, I put newspaper on the floor and walls of a corner of a room and sprayed. Now I’m doing it in the garden shed. I get my cardboard box shield and it’s removable cardboard floor: and place newspaper on the removable floor to absorb any overspray or runoff: then put the fllor into place and place the hills in position: . I use a cheap garden sprayer/mister with 500ml reservoir as they are available in hardware shops and supermarkets – either I pour the Scenic Cement into the reservoir (usually when the Scenic Cement bottle level is low) or put the sprayer mechanism directly onto the Scenic Cement bottle (when the level is high, as is here -a brand-new, unopened bottle).Spray from the front, the sides and very lightly from the top: then take out the cardboard floor, rotate it 180 degrees, put it in place and spray from the front. Then leave the hills to dry (I always wait 24 hours). Be sure to carefully wash out your sprayer/mister, otherwise the glue will harden and interfere with the mechanism. I rinse it out and spray clean water through it twice. Even so, glue will still ruin it in time (over a few years of annual use, so hence the need to buy cheap sprayers/misters.

Next day, have a look at your finished products! . I’m very happy with how the SeeNiks Earth Blend flock turned out – it looks like this: . I think it looks fantastic, far better than the Woodland Scenics Earth Blend which contrasts too much with green flock. This SeeNiks flock also is a bit grittier…there are cut fibres and large flakes of sawdust in there, that make it look more like broken ground that’s dry than the “polished mud” appearance of Woodland Scenics’ product.

Your hills are now complete. Remove all the posterboard pins from underneath and store your hills or get a game on with them. Here are some photos of the hills with my Tiger Is:    . Just a quick check that the hills are taller than the tanks, thus completely blocking LOS when everyone’s at ground level : – they sure are.

 

Post #334: Time to make some better hills 2

I’ve already done 333 posts…one third of a thousand. I didn’t think back at the start that I would need so much time to complete enough German forces to have a good slog against Peter – well, I was wrong. At the rate I’m going, I’ll need another 300 posts at least…

Anyway, let’s keep making better hills!

Assemble all terrain ingredients you think will be useful: . I’ve got my Woodland Scenics Green Blend flock, my SeeNiks Earth Blend flock, some Woodland Scenics fine Talus, some Heki coarse flock and Selleys Aquadhere glue. No, none of these companies are sponsoring me.

Apply the glue completely and thickly: . A thick application of glue will fill up any small holes and crevices, leaving a smoother appearance.

If you’re going to apply talus, now’s the time, before applying any flock: . Remember, grass grows up,  around and sometimes nearly covers rocks…not the other way around (unless a volcano just went off).

If you need to apply any sort of coarse turf or small clumpy foliage, you are now at the appropriate stage to do so: – I use this strongly-coloured green coarse turf stuff from Heki to represent big-leafed weeds. Green Blend flock is fine, but it’s still a fairly uniform product. Break it up with some of this kind of stuff.

Thickly apply your flock: – you too can let a chance ray of sunlight into your garden shed if you want…this was by and large a grey morning, so all my other photos don’t feature it. Once applied, I manually pat the stuff down hard so I know that it’s gone into the glue. I pat the whole hill over and I pat it with some strength to the action. Then I apply more flock over the top of what’s there because inveitably you’ll see some glue visible somewhere after patting.

Now you can leave it for 24 hours(or longer if the humidity’s high) to dry.

Want to do hills where some bare soil is showing? OK, apply glue and then your Earth Blend flock: – I placed some Talus around its edge to show the effects of erosion. Remember, erosion usually only affects one side of a hill, so don’t go silly with your Earth Blend flock. I decided with this project to leave the Woodland Scenics Earth Blend out – I wanted to try the less uniform and slightly more gritty SeeNiks Earth Blend. It goes on OK and looks good at this stage.

I like to put some lush vgetation (thick weeds) on the opposite side of the hill, to show that the other side to the Earth Blend is sheltered from the wind: .

Then on goes the Green Blend flock, thickly applied, patted down and then reapplied where necessary: – you’ll see that I’ve even applied it almost covering the Earth Blend flock too. I don’t want the erosion to be too bare.

Now wait for it to dry.

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Back inside the house, the next project is waiting to be started. It’s a pair of infantry guns: . I bought them over a year ago – it’s time to get these Caesar Miniatures sIG 33 guns built, painted, based and gaming.

Time to make some better hills 1

I decided during last year that the hills I made back in 2009 don’t really cut the mustard when used in a game. I had collected some polystyrene foam used for house insulation a few years ago…it’s about 3 inches thick, allowing for quite tall hills – my other polstyrene is less than an inch thick which doesn’t allow for hills that completely block LOS. I had done the initial shaping of the foam some time ago. I refined the two hills I’m going to make this summer during last week, by doing finer cuts and thin shaves of the foam until I had realistic hill shapes.

I’m doing it all in the shed, not the Hobby Room. First thing to do is put down some cardboard to stop any drips/mess going onto the table underneath:  and then some newspaper on top of it:  . Here are the hills as plain foam shapes: – one has a flat summit, the other a natural/curved summit. I wanted a flat summit for one so I could put at least one of my based trees on it (to further block LOS, but also because hills often do have trees growing on them!).

Open and stir the paint, making sure you’ve got some water to rinse out the brush with:  . Begin painting with your base/earth colour:  – I’m using Haymes’ ‘Kayak Brown’ as my earth colour. Cover until you only have the bit left where you are holding it: – as my polystyrene foam was rescued from a rubbish skip, I’m turning them over and putting a light coat on the bottom to cover some of the dirt they got on them when shoved into the skip: . When you’ve done all the hills you have, then stop and let them dry: . I’ll do the remaining white when they are dry (probably early tomorrow morning, we’ve been having hot days and warm nights lately).

Begin to think about what flock, talus, underbrush etc. you are going to glue on when all this painting is finished. I like to do two coats on the exposed surface of the hill, so these won’t be ready for any glue tomorrow or the day after…

 

 

 

 

 

Best link for 2011

I haven’t linked to as much this year as I did last year, but then I also didn’t post as much this year as I did last year.

These are the links, in date descending order (librarian tech speak) that I feel are worth nominating as candidates for best link for 2011:

“10 minutes spent on terrain each day keeps the guilt doctor away” – after Paul, from his ‘Plastic Warriors’ blog – November 21

The 7.92 mm Pz B39 – what is it? – July 4

What does it look like inside a company that makes plastic model kits? – May 20

It’s a tree-basing bonanza… – May 6

Camouflage – how good is yours? – April 21

If you are good enough, you could make your own toy soldiers… – April 4

and lastly:

How we modellers can help Japan – March 15

Paul from “Plastic Warriors” has two great posts in here, and Bunkermeister’s one about helping Japan in the wake of the Fukushima disaster is very good too. To be able to find a good review about historical weapons was very helpful and something I didn’t think I’d find so readily. The camouflage on the Maus from the “Modelling Madness” is lots of fun, and seeing inside Italeri was unprecedented.

All the links above are well worth a visit. If you haven’t seen these while reading my blog throughout the year (or if you are a recent newcomer to my blog), hop to it. You’ll enjoy them.

The winner, though, are the photos from inside Italeri that a member of the Modellismo Piu model-making forum shared.

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I didn’t get any model kits for Christmas, if you’re wondering.

 

 

 

 

 

A second attempt at resin haystacks – this time, they are BIG haystacks

Back in September I showed you some small resin haystacks I’d bought and painted up. I discussed how I had painted them and what I was trying to achieve with colour and effects when I painted them. I also asked about what it means when a resin item is still ‘sticky’ to the touch, as one of them was still ‘sticky’ even after being painted and varnished.

Talking to a valued acquaintance on Friday night at Nunawading Wargames Association provided the best answer – the resin used for that particular item was at or past it’s effective ‘use-by’ date, and so had not hardened or cured properly – the chemicals in it when mixed with the hardener won’t react completely – so they will never stop being ‘sticky’ – just chuck the item out. He spoke with plenty of authority as he has cast in resin for well over 25 years. He’d cast me some wonderful large haystacks, taller than tanks, which I’d painted up – and I’d found the bottom of one was a tad sticky. It was a good opportunity to speak directly to a manufacturer whom couldn’t be evasive – so I provide the answer here for all of you to utilise as well. Photos? Here they are for you to see (with the camera flash on): .

I’d spent some weeks trying to decide how to do the final, light drybrushed layer, to get the lightest, outermost strands of hay that should be sun-bleached to look exactly as all the balesof straw I could see in my mind’s eye. At first I thought I’d just drybrush with Bleached Bone, but when I tried it, it looked a bit odd – a bit too much greenish-grey. So I tried a mix of Desert Yellow and Skull White…and it was perfect. It was exact. Not too white, still with a touch of yellowy-brown. Golden. It’s what you can see, on layers of Desert Yellow. In order for you to see what they look like without the camera flash, here are two more photographs – the colours are less distinct: . As far as I’m concerned, these haystacks are perfect. I’m very proud of them.

I have a photo somewhere of haystacks in the Ukraine just before the war…they were two storeys tall, huge things, so I’m ruling that these haystacks do block LOS for ‘Panzerfaust: Armoured Fist’.