Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Excellent looking. Almost looks like he's having fun!

OneManNoodles wrote:very nice, thats a pretty epic contemptor you've built
I take it you have had problems with striking scorpions in your gaming group
and I quite like your painting style too

Cheers, mate!
Hehe, striking scorpions are actually one of my favourite eldar units of all time. I love their menacing look. A long-, long-, longterm idea is to resurrect my old Eldar army, as I'm doing with these Blood Angels, but considering my tempo...

Gitsplitta wrote:"Mmmmph... mmmph... ... Mmmmph!!"
*squish*

ROFL!

Snrub wrote:Excellent looking. Almost looks like he's having fun!

Yellowbeard wrote:Nice. Love the Scorpion in the claw.

Thanks guys, I'm happy you're liking it.

Progress!

the pipeline for the following months, quick photos. The first ones up will be the Contemptor and Spartan I think.



I decided to ditch the stock Spartan tracks as have no love whatsoever for those 'old' style Land Raider tracks, they never made sense to me. So after searching around on the net a bit I decided to go for 1/35 scale tracks from a Merkava II, which had the right width. I decided to with tracks from the modeling company fruilmodel, which seem to be very good as they can easily be found in many model webshops, and ebay .

For those of you who might be interested in something like this; older tanks like a T-55, and the larger WW2 tanks would suit a Rhino nicely, as the more modern MBT's like Merkava 2 and above, Abrams, T-90, Leopard 2 suit the width of a Land Raider.

A T-55's tracks in 1/35 are 15mm wide, which was too small for the Spartan. And I found that modern MBT's tracks are 61-65 cm, so I guestimated that they would be around the desired 20mm for the Land Raider/Spartan. Luckily, that was the case.

So I ordered two sets, 800 grams of Merkava II tracks, from Djermany. Arrived in two days. Together with the huge weight of the resin brick which is the Spartan, this is going to be a mighty model indeed, capable of crushing any styrofam hill on the table. But luckily it turns out I actually need just one set. Guess I have spares for another tank. ^^



One track completed, 42 centimeters worth of little links put together one by one. It took me 3-4 hours I think. I made them over a few sessions and kinda zoned out each time as those links and holes are rather tiny. :S But after a while I got the hand of it; clip off 5-10 pieces of wire with a few mm to spare, chain up tracks using flat nosed pliers because sometimes you need to apply gentle pressure to pierce through a little membrane of metal in the 'hinges', and repeat until you run out of wire. Then cut some more wire.

But the result is sure worth it, looks a million times better than the stock tracks. Even though they do have a lot of leeway between the running wheels, they do stay on track quite nicely when going round. Depending on how it goes during the painting progress, I might even leave them loose. The little kid in me grins at the sight of moving tank tracks.
But with weathering powders 'n all... ah well, we'll see.



Now the second one...

Ooh, do you have a link for the tracks? I've been thinking about getting an old school style superheavy SM tank, but also dislike the tracks.

You should try to make one of the lil termis a representation of the large scale one.

Sure mate, here's the link to the brand: http://www.friulmodel.hu/en/metal-tracks-m5/metal-tracks-1-35-p5.6/

I bought mine here, a German shop, but I'm guessing you should be able to find them, or similar in the US. :
http://www.dersockelshop.de/military-modeling/military-scale-1-35/1-35-conversion-kits/1-35-tracks/

Hehe, yeah, good idea on the termy. I still have the little besagews from the 28mm terminator sergeant.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
For a superheavy, you might even have to go for WW2 German Elephant tracks.
The Merkava II ones I used are 19mm. How wide are those Super Heavy tracks?

Depends which ones. Two of them are based on the same chassis as the spartan. I think the big ones may have the same size tracks as well, I'll have to email FW.

Ah well, the Spartan's tracks are 19mm. And I happen to know that the Sicaran is 17 mm.
Other superheavies I don't know, sadly.

Wehey, progress!

Base coat
Wash
4 Drybrush highlights
Varnish
Glaze
Highlight touch-up
Varnish
Removed masking tape.

Now they're ready to have the metalics and details blacked out.








That spartan does look better with realistic tracks, doesn't it?

Excellent job on the edge highlighting. Very sharp!

Looks like your black symbol on the LR could use a bit of touching up around the edges.

Cheers, mate! Yeah, I'm a big fan of drybrushing as it can add some subtle variations to flat surfaces and I love the fuzziness of the hard edges.

I really dread the next part though, blocking out with black can be really tedious... but that drop will receive some love for sure!

Oh, and I forgot to mention I attacked the model with a Dremel before underoating, which was black.

Excellent as always.. Looks like you're back into the painting swing.. Loads to do !

Ow, sorry for the 'late' reply, mate. Cheers, Ivanhog.

Time sure flies too damned fast. Snap, snap, snap, and gone are a few months...

I managed to get some painting done here and there so here's the current progress. The Spartan and Contemptor are ready for weathering, the most fun and casual part of the painting process.
Personally I can't wait to see the tracks weathered up evenifIdosaysomyself.

Holy Awesome! Nice. The Spartan seriously looks massive! The treads give the body a nice counterbalance. It looks 'Heavy'

Good show!

Cheers, mate!

Yeah I think it's especially the scale of the tracks that add to the size perception.

Good to see you back painting up some good ol fashioned marines! Also, you are suddenly in the UK?

Ah, no, ermm... I'm still in Belgium but the proxy server of the company I work in is in London. *innocent whistling*

Cheers, mate!

I get where you're coming from.

Jawohl!

Looking good any chance of a photo of the spartan from directly above, you don't quite get the blood drop look from the front due to the way that it lines up

Young Logan

awesome conversions and the painting is off to a great start, and by the way, you don't by any chance happen to be the same Meph who created the Masterwork DF mod? just wondering.

Cheers, guys!

Young_Logan wrote:Looking good any chance of a photo of the spartan from directly above, you don't quite get the blood drop look from the front due to the way that it lines up

Young Logan

Yeah, sure. I'll take some tomorrow.

OnlyWar wrote: awesome conversions and the painting is off to a great start, and by the way, you don't by any chance happen to be the same Meph who created the Masterwork DF mod? just wondering.

Hmmm, nope as Masterwork doesn't ring a bell. What game, now I'm curious.

Tadaaa

God that is glorious!

Question, the vents at the rear (not the circular ones) the look to be WIP, however in case they aren't, could you care to comment on the thought process behind their paint style/scheme?

Cheers, knightley.

Well, indeed they're WIP, and they will become a lot darker and dirtier. But they're red because it made more sense. The 'instinct' is to paint most vents on vehicles and building black or metalic in their entirety, but I feel it feels more natural to paint them in the hull colour and then weather them down, even to the point where there might be little of the hull colour visible.

When you look at current day military vehicles, all the little doodads such as vents, hatches, latches, and whatnots are simply painted over in one go with the main colour scheme, so I went the same way.

Paint will be chipped and dirtied with dry-sponging and the future washes will outline the vents itself. So as a whole those vents will appear a lot darker than they are now.

First few layers of weathering. So far just some dry-sponging and drybrushing of some dark greys and metalics.

 Meph wrote:
Tadaaa

Thank you and that looks totally wonderful from that angle

Young Logan

Gaaaah!!! Frosting!! brand new can of Purity Seal...
The spartan is after the frosting and attempt to smooth it out after a coat of Klear. Which improved it slightly.
The Contempor is àfter the attempt to further rectify the fix. I mean, WTF??!!! I'v had some run-ins with frosting before, but never, ever something like this.



Currently I will attempt a polish with some pure alcohol or turpentine, see how that goes...

Man thats not good at all, I hope you can save them.

I always hand paint on my varnish, although something the size of a spartan would be an issue.

Phew... worst case scenario averted...
First attempt was moistening with airbrush cleaner and then gently applying the Dremel with a felt polishing head. Not a good idea as you can see from the removed paint. So I moved onto manual polishing using some turpentine and some old stockings.
That worked somewhat but was too slow, considering the amount of surface on all models. Next up, same fluid, but with an old toothbrush. Still not getting what I wanted I took my electric toothbrush with an old-, all-brush, head.
I managed to get everything up to an acceptable level. Most parts are fully clean again, some parts need just some re-deepening of the colours using some inks and perhaps a touch-up highlight& weathering.

The main body of the Contemptor is as clean as I can get it I'm afraid. Still, it's salvageable but I'm reasonably confident I can restore it without having to resort to stripping the model and staring over.
The white crap, even when removed, left some texture in the paint here and there and I think I might even be able to incorporate that into the weathering.



And yeah, from now on, those models will only receive airbrushed varnish. As there are no propellants involved, this should do nicely.

I really love the fact that you use the metal tracks they use on model tanks. I have used that on some of my 1/35 scale tanks. Such a great way to go by using those. Great Work. I might suggest you can get Magic Tracks from Dragon they are the plastic versions of the metal ones and much easier to assemble. IMHO

http://www.scalemodelguide.com/construction/materials/types-tank-tracks/