@Hruotland - and not to hijack the thread: the commander figure sticking out of the cupola isn't driving. the driver in modern tanks (and, one would guess, in tanks of the far future, as well) sits in the front part of the lower hull, and has either a direct window, a periscope apparatus, and/or a video screen to look out of for driving.

Historically, while its less survivable for the guy who stick his head out of the tank, it's found to make the tank more survivable. It is because a tank so drastically limits its crews situational awareness that it's dangerous. Tank crews will generally only drive with hatches shut when fighting other tanks or they're concerned about artillery. The exposed crewman with a machinegun or in this case a storm bolter would be the main defense from infantry climbing on the tank.

@Hruotland: Thanks for stopping by! Glad you like what you see! Yeah, I always get enjoyment out of flipping through my copy of Rogue Trader, so many funny little tidbits! Well, I think Mythos has it right, it can be hard to protect from infantry with all hatches closed, and for older tanks, it was needed to see where one was driving sometimes given the weather or terrain. I personally like the idea of my tanks fighting other tanks more than infantry. I also prefer the closed look for aesthetic reasons, in that it looks kind of silly to me to see this big old Space Marine sticking out of a Cupola that in no way he could get in and out of. I've heard that GW/FW tanks are at a smaller scale than their figures. I'm more inclined to believe that a SM tank commander would probably be wearing scout armor over power armor, but whatever, rule of cool tends to win the day in 40k. Yeah, Cronus was cool in 5th, and he is still around in 6th/7th, although I think he is Ultramarines only. That's a great idea, using pennants like that, and it is nice and old school! Definitely a simpler solution than mine, although I appreciate that you like what I did with just a bottle cap and plasticard!
That's a good question. My immediate answer would be that I don't have a clue. Looking at pics of some real world tank interiors it honestly looks as if the commander stands on his chair and braces himself against the sides of his designated space, since even modern day tanks are pretty cramped. There is probably more to it than that, but it's beyond my knowledge!

Thanks Warboss_Waaazag, it was a fun process getting everything together!

Thanks GawdamSumbish and Mythos for chiming in! I should probably ask Aramus all this, seeing as he was a real-like tanker!

Yep, commander pants feet on chair, braces with hands/arms. The Historical images of the Panzer Commanders with their hands on the hatch pieces their feet are on the chair.

This is an awesome blog - you have some amazing stuff. Pretty sure this was probably asked elsewhere, but am too lazy to do more than look at pics - but do you have any painted/in action pictures?

Cool, good to know shasolenzabi, thanks for the verification!

Thanks kestral, glad you like everything! Hehe, that is the big question! Many of those who have been following my thread for awhile now know that I'm more of a builder than a painter. I do plan on painting everything at some point, but I really love just coming up with a concept or project and executing it. And after I finish one build there has always been another build I want to jump right into! I'm happy to say I've finally reached a good stopping point in terms of build. I have my metal T-hawk I want to put together and I will slowly complete my SM Landing Craft, and other than the occasional FW model, I'm out of possible projects that get me excited. Not saying I don't have any long term project ideas, I do, but I feel I can truly start reading up on and learning how to decently paint all of my vehicles now! Cross your fingers!

thanksalot for the enlightenment concerning tank crew, guys! - well Heliodore, I am indeed regularly reading your blog, just a silent lurker normally. There is only so much ways you can vary the theme of "great work man!",so I stay silent most of the time, but I am definitely an admirer of your stuff! Thumbs up, keep on rockin' cause I dig what ya do!

Thanks again Hruotland, glad you like keeping up with my updates! I totally understand what you mean about lurking and posting. I'm a rather shy guy in real life, so I tend to lurk more on Dakka than contribute, and even for general praise, I tend to restrain myself because just as you said, you can only say "awesome job" in so many ways that hasn't already been said by other posters or whatnot. I love a lot of the P&M blogs on Dakka, but only post on them occasionally, but I'm definitely lurking like there's no tomorrow! Hehe, thanks, I'll certainly keep on chugging along!

Ok! Got my heavy bolters in the mail today. These have been around the world for no good reason at this point, hehe, glad I have them again. They were the quad heavy bolters that came with the Storm Raptor, now they (or at least part of them) are on my Stormblade. The side sponsons and mini-turrets are both Machinator's of course. I think it looks quite nice all put together!

Really running out of superlatives for this tank! Really Really cool job! And those sponsons are awesome. Really love the semi circular look.

Just adds another extra visual difference / detail!

I can honestly say that that's one of the most amazing tank builds I've ever seen. Been a real privilege having a ring-side seat to its creation.

Those heavy bolters I sent you look good on there.

Thanks MagosBiff90 and Gitsplitta! You guys keep saying such nice things I'm kind of afraid to start painting anything! I'd hate to break the illusion that I know what I'm doing in this hobby of mine!

Thanks too Mythos, they came real fast! I thought they might be a bit small at first, but they came out just fine!

Hmmm, paint it, then make it all in mechanicus colors and repaint the cog-boy symbols in golds and such.

Hehe, I'll figure out something when the time comes. I'm currently in the middle of taking things in and out of storage, so painting is not in the cards for the time being (will it ever?).

However, I have finally convinced myself that it is time to build my metal Thunderhawk Gunship that I bought a couple of years back. I allowed myself to get intimidated by it, but I think I'm good and ready to get her off the ground!

Yup, for those of you familiar with this kit, GW originally made it to show off at Games Day 1995. At this point they were only made for staff members, and one or more were given out as prizes. I think three or so years later GW released it as a kit that was open to the public. I remember the adverts from those days, I knew I wanted one, but it was only a wish-listing at the time. Luckily, after saving some dough, I won one off of ebay, and now I'm finally fitting it all together!

As you can guess, it's going to need pinning and a lot of super-glue, maybe even epoxy or liquid nails on the inside. It's definitely not as large as the FW T-hawk or even close to the size of my two scratch builds. At this stage, it looks as if it will only be as big as a Fire Raptor, just heavier, hehe. After just one sit down this is where I'm at:

I've been waiting for this!

Please post lots of pics of the build. Such a rare thing. I was in the market years ago, then the price blew up crazy. I would love to see all the details that I will probably otherwise not.

Glad you're looking forward to it Mythos!

No prob jabbakahut, I'm pretty much posting my daily progression. If there is anything you want to specifically see feel free to ask! Yeah, I noticed that! 6 or so years ago you could probably still get it off Ebay for around its original price. Around the time I got mine it was just starting to go up. Today the price is staggering, but there also seems to be less on the market as well.

Well, up to today, I've pretty much completed steps 1-5 of the instruction manual.





The next step has a lot going on, but I've decided to only follow the instructions so far. Having looked at other builds online it seems like a good idea to leave the top portion of the main hull off till almost the end in order to maintain the visibility of certain parts that need to carefully line up. So far so good, but the pinning is pretty tedious!

You still planning to reinforce the landing gear, to avoid that problem with the weight these things have?

I think you should give your audience some pictures of the kits contents, the instructions, and maybe something to give the idea of weight and size. Jabbakahut is right, these are so rare at this point, its a matter of recording it all for posterity.

@Mythos: I'm considering it, although I'm not sure what I can do. As we know, due to the heavy weight of this guy gravity can easily take its toll on both the landing gears and wings. I am planning to reinforce the wings and engines with a couple of thick brass rods. For the landing gear I could possibly drill a hole straight through the main strut and place a thick brass rod there, which can then be used to pin it to both the feet and main hull.

Hmmm, ok, I can probably do that, there are a ton of pieces though, hehe. I'll definitely take some pics of it next to various vehicles, after its done, to show off the scale.

Yeah, I should mention that when these kits were "mass" released (limited to 500?) GW pulled out all the stops. It came in a nice lockable wooden case decorated around the edges with metal aquilas. The top was branded with an aquila and the production number. Also with the kit came an instruction manual, decals, a certificate of ownership, and a key for the case. You can see these items here:
http://www.coolminiornot.com/forums/showthread.php?48650

The reason I can't show you these things is that the one I bought off Ebay didn't come with any of it, only the metal parts and a poor xerox of the instructions. In fact, the instructions I'm using I got off of Dakka's gallery. So a shout out to Hell_Jumper_056 for uploading high quality scans of the instructions!

My T-hawk seems to have a little story, since the guy who sold it to me passed along everything he had related to it. Sadly, there is no mention of what happened to all of its extra content, only that it has been passed from owner to owner a couple or more times. The cardboard box that held the pieces of my kit is an old GW mail order box, originally shipped from Nottingham to Chicago. It would be cool to think that this may have been one of the original twelve or so. Most likely, whoever originally bought it just lost, broke, and/ or threw away all the extras.

There were a handful of these beyond the 500 that were sent to stores and employees... those didn't get the fancy box.

Ah, that would make sense!


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Some more progress:

Ah I forgot about this! Looks like it gonna quite heavy...

Hehe, you better believe it Commander Cain! I only have the main hull complete and this thing is already a potential murder weapon. I went ahead and glued the top sections of the hull on as per the instructions. I really hope the secondary hull/ engines actually fit on as the instructions suggest.



I've left off the riveted strips that line the roof and cover the gaps on purpose. I really need to wait till I get the secondary hull attached, because the instructions and all the pictures from White Dwarf seem to contradict each other, so I'll have to play it by ear.

From what I remember it comes in around 20 pounds when built.

Once built I wanna see how big it is next to a Storm Raven.

Metal T-hawk,,,,,,oh the memories!

@Mythos: I don't think its that heavy, I'll weight it when I all done, and I'll take a pic of it next to a Stormraven!
@shasolenzabi: Hehe, I certainly do recall the fun times had flipping through WD during the hay-day of 40k 2nd edition!

So, more progress after 4 tubes of super glue and three broken drill bits!



As you can see I ran out of super glue here:

Ugh, for something that beefy I'd almost consider using 2 part epoxy adhesive to cobble together the load bearing parts. I'm pretty curious how much it will weigh when done.

I considered using 2 part epoxy, for now I'm using a construction adhesive that's a little easier to spot glue, alongside the pinning and super glue. I'll be using thicker brass rods for the wings, I hope it holds together in the end, hehe. I know a fellow on Dakka who solved this problem by filling every nook and cranny of his T-hawk with resin, it was a lot of resin!

Good deal adding the rods for strength

I've worked on two of those blasted metal thunder hawks and I want to warn you that if your engine support struts are straight and even then the engines will not fit in them. Don't glue all of the engine mounts until you've test-fitted the engines in the curved parts.

Thanks elsuive! I have indeed tested them, and so far so good!


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And thanks shasolenzabi, fingers crossed it will all be enough!

Hello! I've been slowly grinding through this project this last week! Lots of tedious work this time around, but I also got a lot done in terms of build. As stated before, one of the major structural problems inherent to the metal T-hawk are its landing gears. Of course, this is easily dealt with by just placing it on a heavy-duty flight stand. I'm not really one for flight stands for my big flyers, so I wanted to be able to have my T-hawk in the landing position without fear of having its landing gears bend under its own weight, especially the front one. The solution I used was to drill straight through each landing gear and run a thick brass rod through it.



For added support for the front landing gear the brass rod I used was kept extra long so it would join to the roof of the main hull, not that you can tell from my pic!



After dry fitting the two halves of the hull I stumbled upon a real dilemma. The back landing gears are too short! My first thought was that I put the front landing gear on incorrectly, but from what I could tell I did do it right. Looking at other people's builds from online I saw that this issue was common and that some people just fit the front landing gear deeper into the T-hawks hull than what the instructions say. My join was pretty darn sturdy, so I didn't want to rip it out and redo it. Instead I opted to lengthen the back landing gears using thick plasticard. I think it turned out well enough, and I'm sure no one will notice, hehe!



Here are the two hulls dry fitted together!



At this point I want to glue in place the two outer engines, but the instructions are all over the place as to how they are positioned. As such, I'm going to build the battle cannon assembly and compartment next, because I foresee the positioning of the engines having an effect on the placement of the mini-wings that fit over it, if that makes any sense.

That is too ridiculous. Keep it up!

Thanks Mythos, it is pretty ridiculous, the things we do!

DUDE!

This is freakin epic! I love the daily updates...good luck and I look forward to more.

Great work! It's very impressive.

Lovely looking model there mate! Really nice to see it coming together!

Thanks Zeke 169, Stormwall, and MagosBiff90, I appreciate y'all coming down and checking out my updates! Today I got the primary wings done, which was pretty straightforward for this model! The kit came with two pairs of the old metal "crayon" Whirlwind launchers. I don't know if this was an original part of the kit or if someone added it later. Regardless, they make for nice missile pods, which I've magnetized in case I change my mind about them!



Next, I'll be working on the top compartment of the secondary hull where the main battle cannon is located. I tried getting it together thinking super glue was all I needed, but since I'm unable to sprout a second pair of arms, I'm going to go ahead and pin it together. Here are all the main pieces laid out:



Fun times!

This is great, I remember when it was first released, I just drooled

The way this thing goes together is crazy.

Not to be overly silly but, imagine playing with this when it is done like the airplanes from when we were kids, you know... Running down the hall holding it above your head while going "vrrooooom."

I think you'd kill someone! I mean, I've already seen what a metal dreadnought can do in a car crash! (We have a guy with a plus shaped scar from a pewter dreadnought at our FLGS. He wrecked, it flew from the back of his car, grabbed a chunk of his head, and kept going. Hit the pavement. Worst that happened was a scratched primer coat and the base losing attachment on of the legs. He however was bleeding like mad. (Can't make this stuff up. The dude really has a scar with four finger grooves and a crater in between them.) Anyways, I wonder just how heavy are these when they are done?

Sorry for gushing OT. This is still going to be amazing. Surprised you got the wicked cool crayon launchers with it, amd the wings turned out swell.

@Calibanite Lion: Hehe, yup, that was my reaction as well way back when!

I agree Mythos, this kit is not for the lighthearted!

@Stormwall: Hehe, I'd have to do it with both hands and cradle it like a football!

Yeah, I believe it! Wow, that's pretty insane! I remember an old joke at my FLGS about how you could make the metal dreadnought into a weapon by putting it in a sock. It seems it wasn't far off from the truth! If I'm ever driving with my T-hawk in the back I'll be sure to have it kept in a securely fastened down case! No worries, I'm quite the fan of off topic discussion, and your story certainly pertained to the weight issues experienced with this model! Thanks, everything is slowly coming together! Here's what I've done today, all put together from the last pic:



Now that I've built this section I have a good idea of how the secondary wings fit over the engine. Also, now that I've looked into this matter more closely, I see I was working off of the wrong assumption. I assumed that the tubing that run down the engines are meant to be positioned along the top, but this seems to be wrong. I've realized that even looking at GW's original WD pics only goes so far, seeing as there are build inconsistencies between the three they built for Games Day. So, looking at the MkIII Epic model, you can clearly see that the tubing is positioned right above where it connects with the wing, here is a pic from the web:

http://www.elisanet.fi/henrikki.almusa/gw/epic/ultramarines/thunderhawk_1_2.jpg

That is a cool gun top. It'd work on it's own for terrain.

Will you be magnetizing the gun so you have the option to swap it out for the laser?

Yeah, it is pretty cool by itself Stormwall, the old T-hawk hawks really had that Gothic flying fortress look down!

@Zuul: Hehe, too late for that, the cannon is pinned down and glued pretty securely at this point. I might have considered it if this kit had come with optional weapons. The easier thing, at this point, would be to just make a turbo-laser destroyer out of tubing that will be big enough to place over the metal cannon.

Well, it took some doing, but i got the two outer engines in place! I drilled a hole straight through the secondary hull and middle engine for the brass rod to go in. I then drilled matching holes into the two outer engines, so in the end, it is the brass rod that is taking most of the weight of the two engines instead of the thin and easily bendable braces. You can't really see in the pic I took, but that's sort of the point, this fact is pretty well hidden from view thanks to the way the hull and wings are constructed.



Also, after a dry run, I found that the position of the tubing running along the top of the engines doesn't get in the way of the mini-wings if positioned on top. This is one instance where I opted to just follow the pics in the instruction manual. I had already glued the front part of the engine in place so as to have the three nubs around it positioned in a "Y" shape. By having the tubing run right up against the wing the nubs become misaligned. Looking at GW's pics and other builds there doesn't seem to be a single way to do this, even the pics in the instructions are inconsistent, and knowing what I know now only came about because I worked this far into the model. Furthermore, the mkIII Epic model only has two nubs, so looking at it's engine construction may not have been the best bet either, oh well, what's done is done!

I'm glad the structural reinforcing is going well.

Amazing, not often you see these being built nowadays - thank you for documenting in such great detail dude

Thanks Mythos, this kit really needs it! In fact, I'd say the most challenging aspect of this model is the structural reinforcing! I can only imagine the horros that await anyone who manages to put this model together with super glue alone!

Much appreciated Ruglud! These kits are certainly getting harder to find, although, I just saw a reasonably priced one on ebay just now. Yeah, looking at other people's build online, no one has really documented their build process very closely.

So yes, hope everyone had a relaxing Easter. Now that the holidays are over I got back to my T-hawk. Hit a couple of minor setbacks having to do with the undercarriage and one of the engines, but fixed that up and moved on to getting the wings on!



Tomorrow will be a big day as I will finally be connect ing the front and back hulls together. For this job I'll be busting out the two-part epoxy!

I always was a little horrified by the little guys in the wing heavy bolter turrets. Talk about drawing the short straw on the crew assignments.

Hehe, I always thought it was interesting that a lot of GWs fluff describes such weapons as being "slaved" (as opposed to manned). Makes some sense now!

This is getting exciting!

 Heliodore wrote:
Thanks Zeke 169, Stormwall, and MagosBiff90, I appreciate y'all coming down and checking out my updates! Today I got the primary wings done, which was pretty straightforward for this model! The kit came with two pairs of the old metal "crayon" Whirlwind launchers. I don't know if this was an original part of the kit or if someone added it later. Regardless, they make for nice missile pods, which I've magnetized in case I change my mind about them!

For some reason I think I remember them being on a metal Thunderhawk, but it may have been Fred Reed's conversion. This is what the original box shows;





Yup, Fred Reed's conversion

You are making excellent progress on a model that looks completely insane to build.

From what I remember the missile launchers came with it. The rules had them as an upgrade.

That is one beast of a flier. Nice update.

Hehe, I'm getting pretty excited as well!

@Dreadclaw69: Yup, I've got the WD that features Fred Reed's Chaos T-hawk right in front of me! It's pretty much what convinced me to go ahead and use the Whirlwind launchers on mine. Reed got his T-hawk for being named Manager of Year in 96, and according to his interview, he was just handed a big bag of metal parts! So it's hard to say if the launchers were included or if Reed got the bits on his own volition.

@Mythos: What I read was that GW never released rules to go with their metal T-hawk, and I've certainly never found any. They were selling it as a collectible/ centerpiece and not as a gaming piece, much like how they told Armorcast to stop including rules for their resin kits back in the day. The closest thing to official rules at this time would have come from Citadel Journal #10, which was from 1995, and this indeed had upgrades for various kinds of missiles. I have no idea how widespread Ctadel Journal would have been at that time.

And thanks Warboss_Waaazag, I feel pretty good about how it has been progressing. Not perfect, but good enough!

So yes! Today I glued the two hulls together, and that's pretty much it, I want to let the glue dry as well as possible!






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Thanks Stormwall, should be done by the end of the week!!

That is seriously impressive Heliodore. Wow.

There were GW events where these were used as part of the scenario is what I recall.

What I find amazing, truly, is the windshield wipers.

Thanks for the waltz down memory lane!

Man that thing is ridiculous

Good fortunes and for the love of feth dont drop it. you might crack the foundation

Have you thrown that thing on a scale yet to see how much it weighs? Also, good jerb!

I can only imagine how much that thing weighs. I remember when GW first starting selling those things. They were billed as strictly collector's pieces and implied heavily that they weren't meant to be used in games.

As far as Citadel Journal was concerned, here in the States at least, it wasn't pushed. It was barely available in official GW retail outlets, and never really explained. Only crazy diehards like myself ever even bought the thing. It was mostly obscure rules for out of print GW games back then.

Looking more at the rockets it looks like they are a piece specifically for the Thunderhawk. The Whirlwind launcher is obviously the basis, but the ones for the Thunderhawk are twice as long.

 Briancj wrote:
What I find amazing, truly, is the windshield wipers.

How else do you get 'Nid bug splatters off the windows?

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:

 Briancj wrote:
What I find amazing, truly, is the windshield wipers.

How else do you get 'Nid bug splatters off the windows?

I like to imagine somewhere in the Imperium is a minor Forgeworld devoted to the veneration of the STC template and the manufacturing of all the Imperium's windshield wipers. They are given the highest level of strategic solely because of the sheer volume of war machines that use this necessary and most important component. The Omnissiah be praised for the gift of clear sight!

 aka_mythos wrote:

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:

 Briancj wrote:
What I find amazing, truly, is the windshield wipers.

How else do you get 'Nid bug splatters off the windows?

I like to imagine somewhere in the Imperium is a minor Forgeworld devoted to the veneration of the STC template and the manufacturing of all the Imperium's windshield wipers. They are given the highest level of strategic solely because of the sheer volume of war machines that use this necessary and most important component. The Omnissiah be praised for the gift of clear sight!

I'd bet it's near the one that makes the turn signals.

 Zuul wrote:

 aka_mythos wrote:

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:

 Briancj wrote:
What I find amazing, truly, is the windshield wipers.

How else do you get 'Nid bug splatters off the windows?

I like to imagine somewhere in the Imperium is a minor Forgeworld devoted to the veneration of the STC template and the manufacturing of all the Imperium's windshield wipers. They are given the highest level of strategic solely because of the sheer volume of war machines that use this necessary and most important component. The Omnissiah be praised for the gift of clear sight!

I'd bet it's near the one that makes the turn signals.

They're still looking for the STC for the hydraulics bounce systems

Thanks Gitsplitta, almost there!

That must have been the case then Mythos, which means if there were any updated rules they would have been only for that special event/ scenario.

Hehe, thanks Briancj, what great wonders humanity developed before the onset of Old Night!

Hehe, very true Desubot, I'd be afraid to drop it on my foot or something!

@Razor_Wølf: I'll definitely do that once it is all done! There was another fellow's blog who did just that, but I can't seem to find it right now! I'll keep looking! Thanks!

@Warboss_Waaazag: Yup, and I scoured for awhile looking for any possible rules, but it's quite clear that GW had no intention of making the T-hawk an everyday vehicle at that time. My FLGS did carry Citadel Journal, but I don't recall seeing it all that often at other such stores.

@Dreadclaw69: Hehe, that's because it's actually two of them glued together, it came with four of them so I assumed that was the original intention of the person who had it before me and it's what Fred Reed did!



Hehe, glad everyone's having fun discussing the necessity of windshield wipers in the grim-dark war zones of the 41st millennium!

So, even closer to being done! In fact I could probably finish it tonight, but I want to relish the final moments and not rush it! For today, I pinned and glued the cannon assembly in place, and with that was able to position the six top hull rivet strips. As I noticed on the Games Day models, the two that are placed along the edge of the T-hawk's canopy are bent at the top so as to connect with the strips placed on the top hull!





As you can see, I actually drilled out the cannon's barrel, it was a real pain, but I'd go crazy if it weren't! I also went ahead and glued on the landing vent things. This kit has the option to keep them open so you can see the wires and crap. I opted to just glue them shut. In my mind, that kind of "detail" is just a liability.



So, all that's left is the tail and the secondary wings, and yes, I added lascannons, but that is another story...

Drilling out the gun barrels is a sign of a true hobbyist.

My my this thing is coming along nicely. I have really been enjoying watching all this progress! Any plans for adding a few more details to the kit or are you leaving it as is?

Hehe, thanks Gitsplitta, I can certainly agree with that sentiment! I didn't always drill out my barrels, but one day I saw the light and had a large back-log of barrels to drill, but not today!

And thanks for following along all this time Commander Cain! I'll say one thing for this kit, it does not skimp on the detail for a metal model made in the mid-90s. I'm not sure what else I could add other than the lascannons and missile launchers. Possibly some Iron Hands icons, but I'm happy using decals on this guy. Due to the historical nature of this model I'm happy to maintain it's original look an appeal.

Well, it is done! Nothing left to do except paint it, and everyone knows my track record for that. Overall, I'm quite proud of the fact that it doesn't look as if it will be falling apart under its own weight anytime soon! I'm bit saddened it's done. For all the hard work, it was pretty fun (more fun than building a Storm Eagle for sure) and I always considered it the last present from my father before he passed away. So, here are some final pics!

A wonderful tribute to his memory. A great accomplishment for you as well. Beautifully done. You need to make the effort and paint it.

Such a great project. I am loyal follower of your PM blog and this is definitely accomplishment which stands above everything else you did so far especially that it holds emotional bond.
You can be proud of yourself this model seems very hard to build (probably still easier then new FW stuff ) and I was wondering since first time I saw it in White Dwarf how much does it weight (in kilos if you could please not those confusing imperial units ).

Thanks Gitsplitta! Hehe,my Dad was more into real-world aircraft, but I think he would have appreciated the work that went into puttng the T-hawk together! Yeah, at the moment it's not completely for lack of effort, just space. I'm a pretty messy painter, so I need a wide space lest I accidently ruin my surroundings!

Great, thanks dubovac for being a loyal follower and for so long, hehe! Yes, I'll definately weight it once I have it in the vacinity of a scale. Right now it's in my office, so I have to figure out how I'll transport it to my flat!

Brilliant piece & a worthy piece for the memory of your dad! the model itself is epic! what a wonderful piece! Cant wait to see what you do with the paintjob..... but first... am looking forward to hearing hoe you get it home!

I see the metal Mayhem continues! Good work so far on a antique miniature

Can you get an actual WEIGHT of that beast?

I raise a glass to your departed Father.

Well done on the completion of assembly, it's looking very fuzzy and nostalgic now, it would almost ruin it if you painted it lol! But yeah, you gotta get it painted up.... At some point anyway.

It was a real treat following this build. Congratulations!

Delicous-heavier-than-your-obese-cat-Thunderhawk build! It was a wonderful project to watch and the fact it has family behind it increases the signifigance.

Learned some dandy tricks from watching you. I need to pick up some small brass tubing now. Great work Heliodore.

Thunderhawk... HO!!!

That's a beauty

Hehe, glad you like it! Yeah, I ended up carrying it home, about a 2 km walk! My hands were a bit shaky by the end! Sadly I don't have a scale there, so I won't be able to weight it till I take it to my new place, which is much further away!

Many thanks shasolenzabi!

Cheers Briancj! I promise I'll get the weight once I have my T-hawk in the same place as a working scale!

Much appreciated Calibanite Lion! Hehe, too bad I don't play Silver Skulls!

Thanks again for following along all this time Zeke 169!

Thanks Stormwall, glad you could benefit from my posts. I kind of wish I had taken better pics of all the pinning I did, but when you get to the point where you've been drilling for hours, dry fitting, and sanding, you just want to get the glue flowing and not stop to take some pictures, hehe! Anyways, here is a shot of the 4 sizes of brass rod I used. The thickest is what I used on the wings and engines. The middle two were for heaving pinning, like the cannon and structural supports, and the thinnest was for all the basic pinning, for panels and what not!



Thanks as well Ruglud!

For aka_mythos, the metal T-hawk next to a Storm Raven:

Interesting comparison, I always felt that the T-Hawk should be much much bigger, that comparison makes it look just a bit longer and the wings wider.

Thank you very much for the shots btw.

Yeah Knightly, hehe, I agree, it is on the small side, but I think big enough considering the material it's made of. The FW resin kit is definitely a bigger model, but weights far less! It's amazing how far GW has come in 20 years!
My pleasure, I'm happy to do requests with any of the models I have on hand!

Take a look at a marine from the era of that T-hawk next to a marine of today. It will explain everything about the size discrepancy.

Yeah Gitsplitta, that's definitely true! Although, even then I think the metal T-hawk was scaled down a smidgen anyways. The kit came with two SM pilots, the same two that came with the 2nd edition metal land speeder, and they look incredibly cramped sitting next to each other in the open cockpit (more so than on the land speeder), which is why I opted not to include them in my build. I'm not completely sure, but I believe that even in 2nd edition fluff (40k and whatever Epic was called at that time) the T-hawk was said to be able to transport dreadnoughts, and looking at the size of the nose and assault ramp, a 2nd edition dreadnought could probably not fit inside, let alone embark or disembark.

Wow, I guess this explains why the thunderhawk from that old battle of terra diorama looked so small.

I look at the completed T-Hawk next to the newer plastic Storm Raven, and realize GW has always been a company that simply used representational models, not accurately scaled.

In fact, I wonder if they ever would bother making accurate scale minis

Yup, it's smaller than most people think. I'm glad I put up a comparison pic since it's hard to tell in most pictures on the web.

Yeah shasolenzabi, I agree to some extent, that's certainly how things are now. I think the scale between marine and vehicle was much closer in the beginning. The plastic Rogue Trader beakies are an ok size to the mkI Rhino and Land Raider,but even then they were on the big size. Then GW started up-scaling their marines, so the newer Rhino and Land Raider got up-scaled as well, but not quite as much as they should have. For instance, no marine could go in and out of any of the current copulas thanks to the current size of shoulder pad, not even the marine gunner and spotter that come standard, which is why I never use them. Although, it seems to me that the old beakies are probably the perfect size for a marine to be in-scale to all the current SM vehicles. FW does a pretty good job, especially with their flyers, but even all the HH tanks have copulas a basic marine could never go in and out of. So yup, representational!

Proper scaled Land Raiders would be 11" x 8.5" with the wider cupola hatches to take the power armor into account.

Hehe, that would be a big Land Raider, just goes to show you! Although, there are odd instances where it seemed GW was attempting to rectify the shoulder pads/ cupola issue. For instance, the gunner's cupola on the original Razorback kit had three separate hatches, a square shaped central one flanked on both sides by semi-circular shaped ones, in order to accommodate the gunners shoulder pads. Also, the original Vindicator kit came with a gunner/commander figure who was a fairly manageable size, and was not wearing the customary bulky SM shoulder pads. I'm pretty sure if placed in a current Rhino's cupola he'd look as if he could actually go in and out of it with relative ease.

Well, speaking of cupolas, I just added some to this cool Hover Tank model I acquired off of eBay. According to the box it was made by a company called John Larson Productions. It looks fairly old, and the name of the company suggests it was a one-man operation. It's a very nice kit with a lot of detail, and it's pretty darn huge for a solid resin hover tank model. It's probably based on Hammer's Slammers, but who knows?



Added a storm bolter and a hunter killer missile for fun! Here's a shot of the back!



Hehe, I'm taking it easy after that metal T-hawk build!

OOOOOooooooohhh.... Me likey!!!

The turret on the hover tank is really nicely shaped!

And I think you deserve to take it easy after that immense Metal T Hawk build!

That is a big hovertank!

Glad you like it MagosBiff!

Yeah, when I stumbled upon it on eBay I had no idea what it was, where it came from, or what I could use it for, but I knew it was awesome! Oh, and cheap! Yup, I too was impressed by the turrets shape and overall build!

Hehe, thanks, I need the time to let the calluses on my fingers heal!

Very cool Heliodore. That looks on-par with my old resin Eldar Tempest grav tank... perhaps even bigger (certainly taller).

Thanks guys, glad you like it as well!

@Gitsplitta: Yeah, I do believe the Larson hover tank is bigger. I've never actually seen the old Armorcast/Biasi Eldar Tempest in person, but looking at some pics online it does look to be smaller. I'll take a pic of the Larson hover tank next to some of my other models and post it here tomorrow!

There you go, not the best pic, but good enough to see the size comparison next to my Stormblade and third party APC!

I think there's going to be a flood of PMs and such asking where that third-party APC came from. I'm curious myself, so yeah! XD

@Kepora: Hehe, I don't think that many people follow my thread! Well, it was actually made by another Dakka member, OneManNoodles, and he sells them on ebay. Here is his WIP thread, he's a pretty great scratch builder, as are all the members of the League.
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/509255.page

Here's another pic of the tank next to an old Armorcast tank!

Hover tank looks great, I'm sure I've seen it somewhere before but I can't put my finger it. The armour cast tank looks awesome as well, I never really saw the armour cast stuff, do they have a catalogue anywhere of the old stuff they used to do?

Thanks Calibanite Lion! Yeah, I know what you mean, there are several hover tank models out on the market, other than this one I have the one made by Demonscape. The Larson kit looks similar to something, could very well be a real world tank or what no. I know next to nothing about John Larson Productions, even using Google there are only a handful of pics, and there doesn't seem to have be anything else made by them.

Yeah, the Armorcast tank above was produced after they had lost their 40k licence from GW. My guess it was first released c. 2000 along with various interchangeable weapons platforms and a dedicated APC version. Armorcast is still up and running, although it is no longer owned and run by its original founders. I believe the APC and weapons carrier tank were still being sold for quite some time, but not any longer. You can still buy some of the weapons at their website. If you want to see what they sold during their 40k hay-day check out:
http://www.collecting-citadel-miniatures.com/wiki/index.php/Resin_Vehicles_&_Titans
For anything after that you have the current website:
http://www.armorcast.com/
However, for oop items like the aforementioned tanks, I know they produced a catalog in 2000, I've seen it on eBay, but other than snagging a copy I'm not sure there is any other such resource.

Hey , ate... some awesome looking models there...
As I mentioned previously I really like that hover tank..... but that IH super heavy tank is incredible! Seeing it in that pic reminded me how cool it is....... GET SOME PAINT ON IT..... please! :-) hehe......

 Heliodore wrote:
Thanks Calibanite Lion! Yeah, I know what you mean, there are several hover tank models out on the market, other than this one I have the one made by Demonscape. The Larson kit looks similar to something, could very well be a real world tank or what no. I know next to nothing about John Larson Productions, even using Google there are only a handful of pics, and there doesn't seem to have be anything else made by them.

Yeah, the Armorcast tank above was produced after they had lost their 40k licence from GW. My guess it was first released c. 2000 along with various interchangeable weapons platforms and a dedicated APC version. Armorcast is still up and running, although it is no longer owned and run by its original founders. I believe the APC and weapons carrier tank were still being sold for quite some time, but not any longer. You can still buy some of the weapons at their website. If you want to see what they sold during their 40k hay-day check out:
http://www.collecting-citadel-miniatures.com/wiki/index.php/Resin_Vehicles_&_Titans
For anything after that you have the current website:
http://www.armorcast.com/
However, for oop items like the aforementioned tanks, I know they produced a catalog in 2000, I've seen it on eBay, but other than snagging a copy I'm not sure there is any other such resource.

I'll have a look through those, thanks for the links. I may end up doing an ebay trawl for hover tanks now , just don't tell my partner lol!

Aw man, left you guys hanging! @Magosbiff90: Hehe, yeah I totally want to paint it up, but it will have to wait till after my move, lots to do as usual!

@Calibanite Lion: Hehe, loose lips sink ships! A company called Daemonscape makes some nice hover tank resin kits, I have a pic of one somewhere in this thread!

So yeah, been a bit busy with moving, but I've had time for some other builds. Built a fake Xiphon, but then bought a real one! Got my hands on a Plasma Oblietrator, what a mess to say the least. Finally, been working on a Land Raider armed with a grav cannon and plasma cannon side sponsons for my Iron Hands using the Mechanicum rules in HH1. I lost a crucial piece by acident and have been sitting on it until I can get it replaced, oh well.

Gah you tease us with nothing but words! Good luck with the move as well

Hehe, thanks! Don't worry, I'll definitely take pics of everything I mentioned!

Just had a look at your metal Thunderhawk build. Holy crap that thing must weigh a lot!! Excellent work :-)

Thanks angelofvengeance! I finally got around to weighting it, although I may not have used the best set of scales. The metal T-hawk came in at about 3 kg or 6.6 lbs. So, it's not as bad as one would think, but it is still pretty hefty. I'll weight it again if I get the chance to use a better set of scales.

Still moving, but making a lot of progress, here's the plasma obliterator I built next to an old piece of GW terrain, hehe. The obliterator was a huge pain to put together not a lot of room for error, which is fine as long as your pieces aren't warped. One of my floor sections was badly warped and miscast, but not badly enough to warren an exchange, I just trudged on through. Let's just say it looks fine from a distance!



Now, I actually really like the old card stock terrain sets. Got this one secondhand and mounted it on some hard board, which I will paint and flock up one of these days!

Dsteingas has a thread that showed how to make the old card stock pieces over in plasticard and more sturdy and 3-d like.

All because of the character the old card stock/plastic frames stuff is

Yeah, I totally saw that! Now that's dedication!

Whew, it's been awhile! I got my move done with and with only light casualties, and have finally reached a new semblance of normalcy! The last couple of weeks have seen the completion of a number of smaller projects, one of which has been a thorn in my side for the last three months!

I mentioned previously that I was working on a grav/plasma land raider based off the Mechanicus section of the FW's first HH book. Well, making it was an excuse to use Chapterhouse Studios' LR upgrade kit, as well as to put some plasma cannons on a LR due to this old piece of Rogue Trader art:



I also recalled an obscure reference to a Hecate pattern LR, but saw that this was actually a proto-Redeemer, so I figured I'd just do whatever I wanted with it. So, looking at the above pic and having a friend point me in the direction of the Mechanicus LR rules I figured why not. In the rules you can give the LR T-linked plasma culverins in the front, but I opted to give it the graviton cannon instead, since that seemed more Iron Hands-ish, and of course plasma cannons on the side sponsons. So, it took the shipping company that CHS uses a month and a half to get to me in New Zealand. Then, do to my own bad luck, I accidentally lost or threw away one of the pieces that makes up a side sponson. I asked CHS if I could buy a replacement, and they said sure thing. Sadly, that one piece also took a month and half to arrive and turned out to be the wrong side that I was missing. So, as Tim Gunn always says, I had to make it work, hehe! Using plastic card and cutting the detail from off the extra piece I fabricated the missing part and so far so good, all done!



I did some preliminary base coating on the graviton cannon area because that top piece ends of obscuring it all when put on. As you can kind of see, I used parts from FW, as well as Machinator treads, quite the amalgamation!

The next thing I have to show is a fairly rare piece from the Rogue Trader days. Most people have heard of Armorcast, Forge World USA, and Epicast, but there was another company in the UK that for a very short time had a license to try their hand at making resin vehicles for 40k. The company was called Monolith and was founded by Steve Mussard, who had worked for GW for a time. The specimen I got my grubby paws on was one of his Leman Russ tanks. As you can see it was based on Citadel's first Epic scale Leman Russ model, which looked more like a WWI era tank than what we today typically think of as a Leman Russ tank.

http://www.galactic-intrigue.com/epicollector/Pages/2-Catalog/Imperial-Catalog/Imperial-Photos/Tanks-LemanRussMKI.jpg

Now, from everything I've read, this kit was sold for a limited time because Monolith did not have the license with GW for very long. I'm guessing the time frame would have been the early 90s when the only plastic vehicle kits GW had was the Rhino and Land Raider and obviously before the plastic Leman Russ kit came out. The quality of this kit is quite poor, probably because it was meant to be a test run, since if you've see some of the stuff Monolith made for Epic, they can do pretty detailed work. Anyways, I probably depreciated the value of the kit by building it, but I'm a modeller first and a collector second (and a painter 10th hehe). In order to avoid any anachronisms with the build, I only used bits from off the mkI Rhino, using the Epic model it was based on as a reference. Well, here you go, these may very well be the only built pics of this model online. You can see it in pieces on the collector's wiki.





In order to get the track assemblies to fit on the hull I had to thicken up the hull with plasticard. You can't tell from the pics, but this guy is pretty small, I may put a comparison pic up at some point!

Nice work on the LR variant... interesting look.

Thanks Gitsplitta! I guess it comes down to whether one likes the CHS kit. I thought the way that the front hull piece is centered was aesthetically nifty for mounting a graviton cannon. This way it too is centered, instead of being off to the right like on a LR Achilles.

 Gitsplitta wrote:
Drilling out the gun barrels is a sign of a true hobbyist.

gak, I consider that the bare minimum. That and mold line removal. I don't think you're actually building models until you do some custom work, until then it's just building a kit.

Here's a comparison shot between the Monolith Leman Russ, mkI Rhino, and mkI Land Raider. In terms of size it looks totally fine considering these were the only GW vehicle kits out at the time. Of course, next to the actual plastic Leman Russ kit, I have a FW alpha pattern (not pictured), it's pretty small.



I got lucky on eBay and was able to find an auction for just the new sprue that makes up the Warhammer World exclusive LR Excelsior and Rhino Primaris kit. As such, all I needed to do was hunt down a naked rhino and land raider, which can be done for fairly cheap in this day and age! Here's the LR Excelsior:



And here's the Rhino Primaris next to FW's Damocles Command Rhino, since many were saying the Primaris was channeling the Damocles:

Nice finds!

Yeah, that Plasma obliterator was a pain. Mine was flawless except for the central tube where everything connected. >.>

Those modified rhinos look great!

Great work on that metal T-hawk.

You're @ braver hobbist than me by far!

D

Sorry guys, it's been a busy month! Got married among other things!

Thanks Stormwall! Yeah, I royally messed up that central tube on my first try, glad I don't have to put a second one together!

Thanks as always Gitsplitta!

Much thanks evildrcheese, it was quite the experience! I spent two years psyching myself up to build it, hehe!

During this time I haven't been completely idle. I finished a hefty model kit I bought a couple of months back from Sci-Fi-Guy Modelworks LLC, who did their own take on the Codex Titanicus Epic scale Reaver Titan. Here is a pic of the feet assemblies and then a pic of the completed legs.





I have since finished building this guy, but have yet taken a picture. I'll post one up eventually!

Looks good, a lot better than the old armorcast one.

Thanks Kid_Kyoto! Yeah, there's so much more surface detail and it's closer in size to FW's Reaver, although I still have a warm spot in my heart for Armorcast's Reaver!

I wonder if it would be easier to convert this one to a lucius reaver than the others...

Congrats on the marriage dude!

The titan is looking awesome. That sure is a lot of surface detail, did you add the rivets on the feet or just fill some bubbles in?

Looking forward to seeing the rest!

@Zuul: Hmmm...if you mean something along the lines of The_Blackadder's conversion from a FW Reaver (http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/542441.page) then I'm not sure easier is the best word, hehe! I'd say using the one from Sci-Fi-Guy Modelworks would certainly be the cheaper starting point.

Thanks Commander Cain, it was a pretty great day! Yeah, the detail is pretty impressive. Nope, I didn't add anything, everything is built into the actual model! It does kind of look like I green stuffed some of it only because with so much detail on a large garage kit you are definitely going to get a lot of air bubbles and whatnot. While tedious to fix and clean, I wouldn't say it was difficult in any real way.

Well, here it is fully built, not the best photo due to the lighting in my room, but you should be able to make out the marine at the titan's foot.



This shot should show more detail on the torso and weapons!

Beautiful... and very scary.

Wow. That's one beautiful titan.

Thanks again guys!

Whew, my life just got crazy busy, so I'll be out of action for awhile. Till then here is one last pic of my titan next to to an Armorcast Warhound for scale!



And finally, to add another specimen to my extensive 40k bunker collection, hehe, is an old Epicast bunker, which was released under their GW licence. I'm not sure if one was ever released with an imperial eagle instead of the winged skull, I recall reading somewhere that they did, but I've never seen any physical proof.The top is magnetized to I can open it up! Front and back have some fun details for such an old model.





Till next time!

oooOOO NICE BUNKER! That looks cool! Certainly plenty of scope for adding details!

I have that bunker! Also have the two story one to go along with it and an armored open platform.

Thanks MagosBiff90, who knows what I'll do with it when I get around to painting!

Hehe, cool Gitsplitta, it's fun having these old models on the table top! Yeah, that two story bunker, is it made from hard foam? I have one of these:
http://www.coolminiornot.com/183039
The person who posted the above pic and the seller I bought one from said it was made by Epicast, but I've never seen one in its original box and the material is hard foam and not resin.The aesthetic is pretty much spot on so I'd believe it. Yeah, the armored readout is a nice piece a well, don't see them for sale very often!

Hey! I hope everyone had a nice winter break/ happy holidays and a restful New Years! I've been crazy busy/ occupied with publishing my thesis and the usual holiday cheer. I have been able to do some hobby stuff, but just basic kit building, like a FW knight for my brother and a falchion for myself, and other odds and ends. I have been enjoying the Betrayal at Calth minis as well, but nothing much on the scratch-build side of things. However, I do have some pics of an especially rare and obscure piece of 40k history that I have been fortunate enough to add to my collection thanks to my brother who snagged this piece off of ebay and gave it to me for Christmas!
As some of you may know, Armorcast had in development several 40k resin kits that never saw the light of day due to GW pulling or not renewing their licence to make and sell 40k resin vehicles and titans. From what I've been told, and from what I've seen on the collector's wiki, many prototypes of said kits are still in existence to differing degrees of rarity. One such kit, the kit I got a hold of, is the Stormblade! Of course, it's the original Stormblade as seen in the early iterations of Epic, so the kit utilizes Armorcast's Shadowsword chassis and adds a honking plasma blastgun barrel, a rack of missiles, and a turret weapon of some sort on the right hand side sponson. I've seen this kit on ebay quite a few times, but always for exuberant amounts of money. The one my brother bought was actually a reasonable price, but only because it was missing the mount for the missile rack that sits on top of the left hand side sponson. As you can see in my pics I fabricated the new mount out of plasticard and a thick plastic washer, I also fixed some of the broken missile fins with plasticard. Not to mention the whole kit was assembled and caked in paint, so I had to do a complete scrub down and refurbishment.

That is an AMAZING piece. So wonderful to see you refurbish it and bring it back to life Heliodore! As a guy who was around when these kits were being produced (or not)... my hat's off to you.

Nice to see you sir.

That is a heck of a kit. I remember having it in Epic form.

Now that is a BIG gun.

Cheers guys, glad you both like it, much appreciative of your continual support!

Heliodore you are a legend.

Please paint that beauty in retro theme.

Very cool. Even if that plasma weapon has a particularly unfortunate shape...

EDC

Heliodore have you found or done up this gem yet?

@evildrcheese: Hehe, that it does...

@Stormwall: Like all my stuff, I'll probably paint it Iron Hands, but I get the feeling no matter what I paint it it's going to look pretty retro no matter what!

Cool, I've seen that before, and I actually have a small Arbites force. My Arbites army was actually my first foray into building a 40k army, although I didn't get very far, dropped it and then got everything back from my brother years later. That's a cool proto-Repressor, I may very well do one if I ever feel like expanding my Arbite army! Thanks!

*pokepoke*

While necro is very bad, your blog is too good to let slide. However, I have some questions for you, I think that allows me to post right?

Where do you find all these gems? Ebay or just locally? Also, how hard was the cardstock for to assemble? I'd imagine the cardstock to be fragile now, especially in gameplay. Is that true or am I just plain wrong?

Also, unrelated to you but, to my plog actually, is your username based of the gemstone or something else?

Lastly, (I apologize for the haste, it is late,) have you tackled anything new recently?

Furthermore, I forgot to congratulate you. Congratulations.

Stormwall!!!!

Hehe, no prob, always happy to see my thread poked!

That's a good question. First, I've been around the block so to speak. I got into 40k at the tail end of 2nd edition, and even then, thanks to my collector tendencies, I wanted to know more about everything that came before. I didn't really take things "seriously" until maybe a decade later when my brother pushed me back into 40k after a long break (thanks college and grad school!). Finally, after a trip to India, as I mention at the very beginning of this thread, I got down to just researching the crap out of everything Space Marine, from Rogue Trader, obscure art work, odd White Dwarf articles, Citadel Journal, Epic and other old GW games. It pretty much started as an ongoing project to scratch-build anything GW never made a 40k kit for! Even now I'm still finding new things!
Ah, it seems I misread your question, hehe! Anyways, yeah, I find a lot of rare gems on eBay primarily. I'd like to think I've gotten pretty good at eBay searching at this point! Most of the time it is just luck, but you help yourself by being persistent.

On the matter of cardstock, yeah, it can be fragile, and you don't want to be caught in the rain holding your scratch-build! In terms of game-play, I generally use cardstock for terrain. After it has been primed and painted it's probably going to last pretty well, seeing as terrain doesn't usually get picked up and moved around constantly. Of course, like anything on the tabletop, it can succumb to wear and tear more quickly than resin or plastic terrain the rougher you are with it. So while a plastic bastion can probably survive getting stepped or leaned on, a cardstock building may not be so lucky. Simply, if it's being used in a place where everyone is mindful and respectful there should be nothing to worry about. Now, if your building cardstock tanks and then using said tanks in games, you will probably need to do some repair work from time to time. You can get some pretty thick cardstock, which will make your model sturdier, but at that point I'd just use plasticard! This is just based on my experiences.

Yup, it sure is, I believe it's a type of golden beryl. Heliodor(e), plus the "e" in case someone else is using it, was originally my eBay name. When I first created my account I was using a friend's laptop in his dorm room. I was sitting there trying to figure out a user name, so I picked up my friend's book of gem stones and flipped through it until I found something I liked!

Yes, I should be making a small SM related update soon. You may find it hard to believe, but I've been putting together LotR miniatures for the past month.

Thanks, I appreciate it!

Super-mini post! As you know, I search far and wide for strange and obscure SM vehicles, but even I have my limits. Most notably, some of the strange concoctions found within the pages of the old White Dwarf insert Troll magazine. There are some gems found within its pages, but not for SMs. I have a good chunk of them in my collection, so there could easily be something I have yet to discover! Beyond that, I've even searched through several old 40k fanzines, such as Inquisitor magazine, The Dark Library, and Louis Porter's Fallout. From issue 2 of Louis Porter's Fallout (1992) I present the strangely named Widow and Widow-maker SM tanks. Both are essentially MkI Rhino variants. Both with plasma cannon side sponsons, and the Widow-maker sporting a cyclone missile launcher in addition to the plasma cannons.





As you can see I made them using refurbished parts. Wanting to keep somewhat true to the time period (1992), I used LRuss side sponsons and Rogue Trader Ork plasma cannons. I could have used the old Predator side sponsons, but getting two pairs was not worth the expense. Same for the plasma cannons, where I could have tried hunting down 4 metal Rogue Trader SM plasma cannons, but those things are crazy rare. As there wasn't any solid design for a vehicle mounted cyclone missile launcher in that time, I opted to use the missile launcher from a contemporary model range, an old Kryomek Nexus tank. It looks oddly at home on the old Rhino.

I've honestly enjoyed hunting down old fanzines from the 90s, but there are still several issues that are hard to track down. I only have issues 2 and 5 of Louis Porter's Fallout, and I know that the magazine ran for 6 issues. If anyone out there has any they are willing to sell or photocopy for me I'd be might obliged!

Excellent work on those tanks. The crazy old days when you could stick nearly anything on a hull and call it good did have their charm. I think the old ork plasmas work well and help to impart the feel of the era.

Ah the good old days, I still model most of the time on those principles. Those two are looking good.

Wow, I've been quiet for some time! First post of the new year, hehe! I've certainly not quit 40k, I've just lost my usual time and space for doing project-related activities. While this post is not intended to be an epic return to form, it is a bump of sorts.

I've found some time to return to a mini-project I started awhile ago after acquiring another rogue trader predator off of eBay. I figured I'd like to customize at least one rogue trader predator to better emulate one of the early, if not earliest, Space Marine/ Epic Predators. These two:





As you can see, there are some subtle differences between these two preds and the Rogue Trader pred, mainly the location of the exhaust pipes, and the boxy style turret from the first pic. I'm only customizing one tank, but I am building both turrets for it. The tank body is done and actually took awhile to do, seeing as some of the little details were tedious to make (or I'm just getting lazy). The turrets still have a ways to go! I've kept the side sponsons simple. I re-positioned the original ones to better emulate the odd looking side sponsons from off the Epic preds. It's hard to tell what's going on with those side sponsons, maybe I'll scratch-build something that looks more exact, but honestly, I didn't want to waist the original ones.





I know, not too exciting. I did, however, get a FW Mastodon for Christmas, which I am in the process of building, should be a fun kit to show off in a later post!

Hey Heliodore, awesome thread! There's so much nostalgic stuff regarding the Reaver, is it a worthy investment? I recently picked up an armorcast Warhound and Reaver and want to add to my legion

Hello Kurnost,
Just saw your post in my thread, thanks for the bump! Sorry for the late reply, Dakka doesn't tell me when my thread gets bumped, so I only know on the off chance I take a look at it. I've been busy, so it has been awhile since I last updated, but I wouldn't call it dead yet!
So, I assume you are asking if I think the Sci-Fi-Guy Modelworks Reaper (Reaver) titan is worth it? You have an Armorcast Warhound and Reaver already? Overall, yes I do! It's a great kit with a lot of detail. It's incredibly sturdy, but also really heavy, which may be a negative to some. It will be more work to put together and clean than either of the Armorcast titans. Sci-Fi-Guy has actually updated the mold since I bought mine from him, so if you get a new one it will be a tad easier to build than the one in my thread. For instance, the feet and toes are now cast as a single piece. Another thing to not is that the Reaper is a bit larger than the Armorcast Reaver, but not horribly so. I think it goes well alongside the Armorcast titans, aesthetically speaking! Hope that helps.

Now that this thread has been awakened I'm afraid you need to show us some shiny pictures Oh Great Master Heliodore. Just a little something, I'll be happy with whatever you can whip up I'm sure!

Thanks very much I'm raising the bases on my armorcast titans a little anyway so that's cool. Planning at least a maniple for my admech.
And I agree with Commander Cain: more stuff please!

Thanks Commander Cain, I would love to be able to do more projects and post new updates. We'll see, hopefully I'll be able to get my Mastodon up and running!

Awesome Kurnost, sounds good. Yup, that's more or less what I'm doing with my old school titans! 2 Reavers, 3 warhounds, and if Sci-Fi-Guy ever gets his "warlord" done, I'll probably get that!