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Hi there!

These tutorials have been up at the Bolter&Chainsword for quite a while now, and I wanted to share them with you.

First off is an easy, selfmade version of a MkVI frontplate!


I am not the cleanest converter, and I don't claim to be. My tools are:

- Kitchen Knife i obtained a couple of years ago (by nicking it from my mother's kitchen drawers)
- A nail file, also obtained at about the same time (by nicking it from my mother's beauty case)
- And the pair of clippers that came with the last version of the Hobby Starter Kit by GW (not from my mother)

Good thing I moved out after stealing so much stuff from my mum, come to think of it.


Now let's get started:

I. The Mk IV Front Plate

1. You start with the normal Black-Reach Dread front:



2. And a Terminator Torso Front and some random bit from your box. I used half of a Landspeeder Searchlight, obtained from the Ravenwing Sprue, that will neatly fit UNDER the termi-torso:



3. Next, use your file to smoothen the surface of the Sarcophagus Front Plate. I didn't do this very properly, just to have a smooth enough surface to attach the other bits. If you do it better, it will surely look better, too.

4. Also smooth the back of the terminator torso-front to make it even. The pieces should now look something like this:



5. Next step is pretty obvious. Glue the torso front and the random bit on the smoothened sarcophagus plate:





6. Now you just have to search your box for a fitting head. Be sure to use a smaller, but helmeted one. Bare heads on Dreads look stupid, and too big ones also don't look that good. My best guess would be the Warhammer Fantasy Chaos helmets, sans horns and chaosy stuff.

DONE!

Next up will be the 'humanized hand'...


Automatically Appended Next Post:
The idea behind this was to have a hand for my Ironclad conversion, in which he could rest his Seismic Hammer. I don't have any WiP pictures of this, but I hope it is self-explaining.


II. The Humanized Hand

1. First, take the normal Close-Combat Arm that comes with the Black Reach dread. Don't assemble it, the whole process is easier if you don't!



2. Now, you carefully cut of all the fingers of the dread right where I marked it. Be very careful here, the fingers should stay mostly intact!



3. Smoothen the surface of the remaining stump and re-arrange the fingers in any way you like. This is how I did it:





4. This will probably look a lot better if you do it with a standard dread arm, since the fingers are a lot more accessible.

[HINT] On my humanized hand, the thumb is actually a piece of plastic sprue cut to fit, since I lost the fourth finger somewhere. Those basterds are tiny!

And last but not least, my version of the Seismic Hammer...


Automatically Appended Next Post:
This conversion came to be rather randomly. The biggest part of it was already in use for a number of stuff I broke down again, like a Blastmaster for Chaos or a machine gun, also for chaos. I don't have any WiP pictures of it either, but I will just use two pictures to visually break it down for you. It should just be an idea for you to make your own.

III. The Seismic Hammer





Red - Part of a gun (I don't recall the english name, is it machine- or auto-gun) that comes with the Imperial Guard Heavy Weapon Team

Green - A trimmed down Las-Cannon from the plastic Devastator-Sprue. This sprue is absolutely awesome, by the way.

Blue - The rest of a Space Marine Flamer with both fuel canister and grip clipped off.

White - Piece of a Chaos Space Marine Backpack I found lying around. Very random, just to fill the empty space.

Yellow - Piece of a Las-Can from some Space Marine Vehicle, I think. This bit has been around my table for some time...


Two more pictures without scribble:






[NOTE: This is not how you HAVE to do it. I just wanted to show how you can assemble very different things with more or less random bitz]

Conclusion

Well, now we have to think about how we can put this hammer on our dread? And how will the front plate look with a helmet in it? And what the fudge is this guy talking about?

This is my Ironclad so far.

Not bad. The hand's nice and easy, as is the torso/sarcophagus change, although I think it sticks out a little far... would work better I think if you trimmed away the front of the sarcophagus first, so the torso was recessed in and more upright.

I don't get the hammer...


Nice, easy to follow tute, though

I don't get the hammer either. Which bit is the handle? What is the ammo canister for? Which bit do you hit the tanks with?

Really nice and useful tut though. Thanks Cathar!

P.s. It's autocannon.

P.p.s. really like the humanised hand!

Love the hand
Not so sure about the hammer though... I always imagined it to be more 'built in'

http://tortureentertainment.blogsport.de/images/Ironclad02.jpg

What did you use for the head ?

I see the hammer, looks good have to do this on my next dread

Thats not a hammer .... its a walking stick!! you got a disabled dread there

good tut btw

Yeah well the hammer takes a while to understand XD

I'm not really happy with it either, I wanted to go for a steampunk feel and failed a bit.

The second hammer for my second Ironclad though, is rather obvious:



I used the same MkIV thing on that one, too.

@adamsouza: I'm not so sure anymore, to be honest. Either a trimmed down head from the Chaos Terminator Lord sprue or from the Chaos Marine Command sprue, I think. Could also be from WHFB Chaos Warriors...

Thanks for the comments, I just hope I can be of help to someone

I really like the second dread. The hammer is inspired, and the fists are great in their level of detail. I'd like to see more on that right handed DCCW of the second dread.

Ask and I shall deliver ^^

I just love scratchbuilding...

Cathar the Great wrote:6. Now you just have to search your box for a fitting head. Be sure to use a smaller, but helmeted one. Bare heads on Dreads look stupid, and too big ones also don't look that good. My best guess would be the Warhammer Fantasy Chaos helmets, sans horns and chaosy stuff.

I don't see how a bare head is stupid-looking!

@irishthump: I just don think it would fit. A Dreadnought is mainly a kind of robot/mech and what is left of the driver is mostly nothing but brain and a piece of spinal cord. So any "head" placed on the outside of the armor would only be some sort of visual sensor equipment. So why build visual sensors made of flesh on an armored robot? Doesn't make any sense to me.

Of course I only wrote "bare heads on a DREAD look stupid", I do like using them for power-armored Marines and Terminators.

You're entitled to your opinion, though. If you can show me a painted Dread conversion with a helmetless head sticking out the front that looks convincing and cool, you might change mine. ^^

I've seen plenty of people put sm bits on csm, but never the other way round, and I must say you've pulled it off very well. Not bad. Not bad at all.

freaky angel wrote:I've seen plenty of people put sm bits on csm, but never the other way round, and I must say you've pulled it off very well. Not bad. Not bad at all.

People put CSM bits on SM models all the time. For pete's sake, all the CSM vehicles are SM vehicles with different add ons.

To his credit, Cathar did a great job on his CSM Dread

adamsouza wrote:

freaky angel wrote:I've seen plenty of people put sm bits on csm, but never the other way round, and I must say you've pulled it off very well. Not bad. Not bad at all.

People put CSM bits on SM models all the time. For pete's sake, all the CSM vehicles are SM vehicles with different add ons.

To his credit, Cathar did a great job on his CSM Dread

I just said that I'VE never seen it that way round, not that they don't exist.

And yes, the dread is very nice. How did you do the right hand?

Hmm, very nice! I'll quite probably be using the tip for the torso!

Very nice... *Idea's flash through brain*---Iron Warriors dredd's here I come, yee haw! Probablyy Berossus also but the warrior head works really well and i'll probably use it for an IW helmet.

*eyes light up* Youve inspired me to make a deff dred with a giant hammer!

o and great tut by the way (i got the first seismec hammer[i like the second one better though])

Those are cool, "Eat Hammer"

This seems like it will be helpful for converting my SM dreadnought into a CSM dreadnought, mainly the head.

It looks kind of like a grey knight or sisters of battle dreadnought good work though!

great scratch building on the chaos dred, especially the hands!!

all i can do is agree with the others. your doing a fine job. Keep up the practice and try new things

BoW- John

It is pretty good
Why don't you just buy the new iron clad dred?

The lascannon is the handle of the first. The other guns or the hammer part

The Hand is awesome!! I've been hating the dread arm for ever but the humanized hand is killer. Thanks!

that could also be a venerable dreadnought. dont you see?
venerable dreads got their heads outside too and you can make some more stuff with it to look more, well, "venerable".

btw, good conversion.

I like the way it looks, I think all dreads should look like this.

I like this for Venerables, definately...

If i did stick a bare face on this - it would be more as a Death Mask however, and would be painted in gold or something.
Along with the majority of the Terminator torso.


That second seismic hammer looks like it would wreck hobbies!

That is a really nice piece and a great tutorial to boot! I was thinking an ironclad with thunder hammer and storm shield would be really sweet, and this is a great start to the plan, thanks!