Modelling For Hppos Ishoo Firty: Orkified Sherman Gunwagon.

No doubt some of you recall Waaagh! Orkzenhower, part of Mad Juzzy the Flutist's Bounty, and my third Ork Army alongside Waaagh Snaggatoof and Waaagh Gruntblasta. It's the Maxmini Green Alliance WW2 US Army Orks one. In the current hobby climate I decided it was probably time to star doing something with them, so I crunched the numbers and realised that I really did not have enough of them. No problem, all they really need is a Battlewagon I thought, I'll just ork-up a Sherman. So one Tamiya M4 Early Production sherman order from Metro Hobbies later (which arrived at 0800 on Sunday - bless AusPost!) I had all I needed. Since Tamiya kits basically fall together and the modifications were not extensive, the project went very quickly and easily. How quickly and easily? Let us consult with certain experts...

You can just about see the texture of the clapboard siding in the top-left corner of the radiator...

This is how far I had gotten by the end of Sunday. You could actually fit the tracks and call it done at this point, but I wanted an open engine compartment, so onwards I plunged.

And there you have it Hippo Fans! This took three days - Sunday, and then a bit of Monday and Tuesday evenings. It's a quick and easy little project and quite effective. The key to making a 1/35 real world tank like this look right for 40K is to replace anything which is not exagerated - the gun was far too small, you'll notice I have not used any of the hand-grips from the kit as they are also too small and spindly. Ultimately, I would like the tank to be a little taller to look a bit more orky - I'm not sure if it's the Tamiya kit's fault, but it does not look as tall as I thought Shermans were... Might just be to do with viewing angles.

Anyway, I should paint up some figs to go with this beast. Until next time!

Pudding Wrestler's Perfidious Projects: Grot Tanks for the memories.

Having built new Grot Tanks, and mostly painted new Grot Tanks, I decided that my old ones looked all wrong. They were the first ork vehicles painted for Waaagh! Snaggatoof, and I have changed my painting style, so they don't fit in. I have stared to remedy this, and I'm also going to build a few more. I'm low on Plasticard (just ordered more) so I'm going to try to make them with as little structural plasticard as I can. As a result, the next two will be based on PVC pipe. I still have tons of .5mm plasticard to add details and plates, but it's a bit thin for structural work.
Anyway, time for pictures!

This is the second Grot Tank - this time armed with a skorcha. I was channeling Italian tankettes of ww1 and the ww1 Ford 3-Ton tank on this one. It's the first Grot Tank with exposed road wheels.

It has ended up longer than the others, mostly because I didn't think it was selling the whole 'flame' part of the design without the big fuel tanks.

Here it is with the Rokkit version from MFH Twenty-Nin.

And here is is mostly painted with a second rokkit version I built later.

Meanwhile, Scale Reference Cat is being stalked by the Morkanaut (actually, this photo is the result of me looking at Scale Reference Cat from behind and thinking that from certain angles he bears a strong resemblance to the Morkanaut from certain angles...

I've started to repaint my old Grot Tanks to match the new stuff - I was never happy with the weathering on them before, and everything else in Waaagh! Snaggatoof is pretty clean as Bad Moons are the only orks with enough teef to afford to run their vehicles through the car wash - since Scunthork is by the sea and has a salt-water car wash it's pretty hard on the exposed metal parts, hence all the rust to go with the clean paint.

Scale Reference Cat, meanwhile, is ignoring me and sleeping in a box full of miniatures - moslty Mad Juzzy the Flutist's Bounty.

Well, that about wraps it up for this update. I'm going to start working on some PVC pipe based Grot Tanks, and I'm also planning on building a Gun Wagon and Grot Mega Tank soon. Plus, I just ordered a 1/35 Tamiya Sherman online for a mysterious orky project of mystery!

Modelling For Hippos Ishoo Twenty-Nin: Grot Tank with Rokkits

I've been busily painting the Kill Tank and Stompa for the last few weeks, and tackling such huge projects led to a bit of burnout. With things so huge, it takes so long to achieve anything visible that you can tend to feel like you're standing still (just applying a coat of yellow to the Stompa body took almost an hour - and it took three coats!). So I decided I needed to tackle a smaller project with more immediate results. And it turn out that despite my promises, I never did do an MFH on making Grot Tanks. So to kill two birds with one stone, here's Grot to build a Grot Tank!
NOTE: Lies! All Lies! I did Grot Tanks in MFH17, ut forgot to tag it so when I went back I didn't find it! Oh well, now we have a second Grot Tank ishoo about a different weapon fit...

And there you have it hippo fans! This is a pretty quick little project - I started this Friday afternoon and it was finished before lunch on Saturday. In the past, I have built one of these from raw materials to completed starting around 1300 and ending about 2200 during the Descent of the Hobbyists on the Hoodling's Hole. Obviously there were food breaks in there, and the odd bit of chat, but it's not hard to build one of these in a day, and it does not require very much material - you can probably get three of these from a single sheet of 1mm plasticard, plus a it more .5mm card, rods, rubes etc.
Anyway, I'll leave Grot Grot and Mek Grot to sort out their differences and get back to the modelling table - I've got an idea for a Skorcha armed Grot Tank banging away at the sides of my head trying to get out...