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I guess that makes sense in making sure that they're glue-free for clip, push and play for the boardgamer market.

In my formative Warhammer years, there was a bloke called Dave. Dave was in his (I think) late 20’s when I was a late teen, but we were both in the same Warhammer circles, and he was definitely a good bloke. He commission painted for some people and had a huge collection of models. He used to put together some amazing looking conversions and kitbashes back in the days before plastic kits became the norm. I’ve got a few of his conversions in my own collection, as well as some that I used as the base for further conversions of my own.


No helm = Dave’s conversion. Horned Helm = Dave’s conversion massively re-converted by me.

I lost contact with Dave over the years, as these things happen. But I recently found a Khorne Chaos Dreadnought conversion that he gave me to paint back in the day. Well, it used to be called a Chaos Dreadnought, but now we’d call it either a Chaos Helbrute or a Ferrum Infernus Chaos Dreadnought.

As I thought it looked bloody amazing, especially in relation to the godawful 2nd Edition Chaos Dread, my payment was to be another Dread of the same type. I found the model again this weekend, and sat down to finish off the final bits of detail that were left to do. Given the amount of time that’s passed, I’m not expecting anything in terms of payment, but I’ll be happy enough just to get it into Dave’s hands.



So here it is. Well, most of it. He never gave me the weapon arm. I think he was working on something unique before passing it onto me. Also missing the Hellfire Missile rack, which was converted from a non-Citadel model. I’m sure I’ll find it, then finish and post it out.



I’ve got an old phone number that belonged to Dave years ago. I called it yesterday evening and again this morning, but only got an answering machine. I’ll call again later today and hope to get through. After that, I know of some clubs he used t frequent on the other side of town so I’ll see if I can track him down that way.



The base is an MDF drink coaster. A little big in my opinion, but it’s Dave’s model and if that’s what he built and he’s happy with it, more power to him. The model is based around a stock-standard metal Castra Ferrum Dreadnought – AKA 40k 2nd Edition/Angry Washing Machine. Feet are Epic 40k Drop pod bases of some description.



The head is from the 2nd Edition-era Juggernaught of Khorne grafted onto the front of the Dreadnought Sarcophagus. The spikes come from the Chaos Dwarf Boar Centaur Warmachines – Tenderiser or Whirlwind. The Close Combat arm is made from a standard Dread CC arm with a plastic Adeptus Titanicus Warlord Titan chainfist replacing the power fist’s “hand” and a converted melta barrel replacing the storm bolter barrels.



The skull-codpiece is an old metal chaos shoulder pad, the Imperial Guardman’s corpse is an Aliens Colonial Marine casualty from some long lost range, and the lasgun is from the Necromunda Accessories sprue. Dave can add flock, static grass or tufts or any other foliage, to taste once he gets the model in hand. The three parts of the model are only sitting together in the above photos, rather than glued – with the torso loose and the arm blu-taced to the body. Once he gets it, Dave will be able to pose it however he likes, or even attempt to magnetise the arm and sockets.



It’s a pretty cool design in a lot of ways, and moreso considering that it’s entirely made of metal components. It weighs an absolute ton! One day I might try to build one of my own – inspired by this one, but using plastic components…

Oh man, now I'm intrigued by this Dave person. Hope he still plays and this results in this dusted-off old Dreadnought seeing some action after all these years!

Dave's not your own alter ego is he? to justify the models you have :-) even if he is, I love those first two conversions and paint jobs, they scream early 40k and have such a wonderful creepy vibe even though they're brightly painted, probably more creepy than the current realism that is preferred today.

That dread has a nice oldhammer vibe to it, especially when paired with the clean, bright red. Keep on hitting us with those nostalgia bombs!

That's a great looking model. It's amazing how close to the iron clad chain fist that conversion is. Someone was tapping into the future with that conversion.

@Mymearan - Well, I've tried the old number a couple more times (including right now) but keep just getting the Telstra answering service. I also tried a number I found for NWA wargames club that I know he used to occasionally attend. Yeah, Straight Outta Nunawading!

@Brook - The original plan for the dread was for a Wayne England-inspired scheme inspired by his Legion Gryphonicus artwork or the Marines on the cover of WD110, only in red.
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-0HW7cy37k1c/VktfIb8DNAI/AAAAAAAAJl0/jmwUehtntRA/s1600/white-dwarf-110.jpg
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/564x/b5/b0/23/b5b023a2e1f03db81c96a8c2b1034dd3.jpg
It was a hell of a task, and when I found the model (the first time, shortly after moving in here) I went for a much more achievable clean red, with the Khornate rune on top. Result was I was able to get most of it finished, and then when I found it the other day it was a matter of a few small details. I've got some really old stuff upcoming shortly. As in drying from the spray varnish outside, so hopefully bloggable inside a week. Thanks to a productive January off work, I've got a bit of a showcase backlog.

@Nerdy - heh, nope. Dave was a "proper" adult with a job and everything while I was still in my late teens. I did buy a lot of my oldhammer stuff off him though, as he would regularly buy blisters just to get a certain figure or even a certain bit, leaving him with lots and lots of spares.

@Archer - good spot there mate. It's very much the same model, only without being the same model!




This guy was started about 3-4 years ago, when we started a very-occasional Pathfinder campaign run by our friend Orez. My character is (was?) a Dwarf Cleric, and so I trawled through my Dwarf minis storage box to find something appropriate. This guy was what I came up with. Hammer. Staff. Gems. Surly Expression. Yep, he fit the bill well enough. I could have blinged out his rather bright cloak a little more, but given how beaten up and ragged it is, I decided not to in the end.



Since we play …infrequently, the figures from the Pathfinder project kinda got sidelined and semi-forgotten. As a result, this guy was sitting on my painting desk for a couple of years before I noticed him recently and decided to just get him finished. Even if he doesn’t do a lot of Pathfinding, he certainly has a place in the Dwarven Army that I’m slowly building for KoW and even AoS if/when I get around to playing it as well.

Fits the bill nicely

Thank you mate!

The next Orc off the rank is this guy. A Kev Adams sculpt from shortly after he left GW, and originally from Heartbreaker in the 1990’s (when I purchased it), this figure is still available today from RPE/Ral Partha Europe as “2004 Orc w/scimitar” for a very reasonable 2 quid.



I’ve painted him with quite dark skin, though he’s nowhere near the size of a Black Orc. It’s a fairly simple paint job that gives him a little bit of individuality compared to the Citadel models I’ve been painting lately while being similar enough for him to fit in wherever I need to drop him down.



It’s a simple figure, all in all – but I think it’s a cracking sculpt that doesn’t need to reply on the character of old-school models, nostalgia or the act of painting it to endear it. Those things all add to this model, but I think it stands confidently on its own even without those additional elements.

That's a nice orc. I was a little confused at first, though, because his helmet and equipment looks more Gobliny. I assume he's orc-sized?

Some good stuff here buddy . Love the Chaos Lords in particular!

 JoshInJapan wrote:
That's a nice orc. I was a little confused at first, though, because his helmet and equipment looks more Gobliny. I assume he's orc-sized?

A bunch of Kev's Heartbreaker orcs straddle that line - the facial details here are also kind of in-between the two types of GW archetype. He's the same size as the 3rd edition orcs, but the sizes of both O&G have fluctuated so much through the years. He was (and still is) sold as an Orc, though. So that's good enough for me. Heartbreaker's Goblins from the same era are very GW-style gobliny, though.



@AoV - thanks mate - some more 40k coming up again real soon!

These are some quite pretty orcs, all told. I really like the red treatment you've given this latest one's scale skirt and the bold blue of its pack.

Thanks mate. I've got a bit of a habit of painting scale mail in coppery tones. A figure like this goblin could well look quite boring with too much silver/iron since that's what most of the model's clothing is made of.

What? A Castraferrum Dreadnought? Are those even still a thing? It’s ok. I have a Contemptor lined up for later. Anyway, enough sarcasm.

The Minotaurs Space Marine project that I’ve been working on (albeit slowly) has featured a lot of models that aren’t considered particularly exciting these days. Late-RT/2nd Edition Metals, Assault on Black Reach marines, 2e starter box marines and so many refurbished marines. On that very same theme, my first Minotaurs Dreadnought is simply an AoBR (5th Edition starter, 2008) plastic dreadnought.



As with most of these things, I started it ages ago (less than a year ago this time!) and only completed it recently. Almost by accident, really. One positive (I guess) of my “butterfly” painting style is that there’s pretty much always something reasonably cool that just needs a little bit more to push it to completion. My randomly picking up this dread off the desk on a Saturday afternoon and making myself actually complete it being a prime example…

The model is pretty much stock AoBR. The only additions being the smoke launcher on top and a few bits of Forge World’s Minotaurs Brass Etch – the Icon on the front of the sarcophagus and the Lambda with wreathed Phi on the left shoulder. A single Minotaurs transfer on the right shoulder and a Lambda (from Warlord Games’ Spartan set) on the right greave.



Luckily, the arms are tight enough that they don’t require any glue or anything at all to leave them both poseable and potentially swappable. The painting method was achieved with the same method as the regular Minotaurs – the model was sprayed silver, then zenithally highlight-sprayed a brighter shade of silver and then the bright brass was achieved with washes and a very careful highlight drybrush and some edging. Various elements of the dreadnought’s “skeleton” were subtly shaded with a blue tone, while others were done with brown, or only with black. Red was the only accent colour used, aside from green on the lenses and bone scrolls.



While I considered using some additional colour, or adding something to the left shoulder-front, I didn’t want to get too carried away as I feel that the Minotaurs should feel quite Spartan. (Pun intended, obviously!) The whole thing was finished with a satin varnish rather than the usual matte since I wanted to retain some of the soft shine that the model had when the paint was done. I’ll need to matte in the drilled-out holes of the multi-melta barrels, though.



Coming up with appropriate text for the small scrolls was annoying. A simple reference to Minos which has just got to be the name of a world they recruit from, or at least a key vessel in their warfleet. Aeres of course is the name of the warrior entombed in this Dreadnought. Chosen because it sounds good, fits nicely in the small frame of the scroll, because I could paint it decently enough, and probably because I was listening to a podcast talking about Austin Aries the other day when I was working on the dread.



Finally, a shot of Aeres alongside a few of his battle-brothers. May their enemies quake in fear!

The dread is looking awesome buddy. Lovely stuff!

I know what I like - And I like that. A lot

Dreadnought looks great. I love dreadnoughts. Something about that blocky form that appeals to me.

If you were interested I have the chainfist and hurricane bolsters from the iron clad kit that would probably fit just as well to that dread body.

ooooooooo. That sounds tempting. I don't believe I have those parts at all.

Nice work on the Dread. The brass effect is fantastic. I may need to find an excuse to copy it.

Although the AoBR stuff may not be the New Hotness, I'm still quite fond of them. I used them for the core of my (very small) Howling Griffons force, and they hold up just fine, IMO.

If you like I can shoot you a couple of pictures of the parts (they are glued into the arms).

Thanks guys for the kind words. The Next dread will be the Iron Warriors FW one that's been waiting a long, long time for resurrection. (And I've lost the FW Plasma Cannon that came with it!)

Archer - if you're using the arms on an existing model I don't want you to lose them? I'm a touch confused to tell the truth.

No, no, they are spare. I assembled my Ironclad with the seismic hammer and power fist (and I don't do the swapping thing).

So hopefully being more clear, I have a dreadnought hurricane Bolter arm and dreadnought chainfist arm all assembled but will never see paint or gaming while in my bits box.

That sounds great, Archer - very kind of you.

AoBR is something I'm hugely fond off actually. I collected orks at the time and 5th Ed was my favourite edition of 40k. My dreadnaught and the terminators from it did end up looted however.

The dread looks very nice Azazelx, the little extras make a big difference.

I am always happy to see some minotaurs from you Az, maybe as happy as when I see your Iron Warriors! it always gives me that push to get more organised with my own small Minotaurs contingent :-) so I ask of you, what and where did you use for extra 'spartany' type extras? heads, decorations, loin cloths etc?

Thanks guys, I'm very happy with how it came out. I considered weathering it, but then I decided to leave it be. I figure that the Minotaurs have got a finish of brass plating on their armour rather than metallic paint, given the hint of verdigris on the official artwork from FW. I've only got 2 more models in the works (right now) for the Minos - A Librarian that's about 2/3 done, and a Captain who is still in the build phase. I've got plenty more to build afterwards, just not sure where to go next following 2 Tactical Squads, a Dread, Libby and Cap. Perhaps Tartaros Terminators with a twist?


Damo, The "Spartan" style heads are from Anvil Industry (on the heavy bolter guy - who came from you originally!) and Puppetswar (on the Vet Sergeant). Shoulderpads are FW, and the Pteruges are again from Anvil.

Speaking of Iron Warriors....



Yesterday I finished adding the transfers to a batch of figures. The figures in this case were the last of my “Legacy” Iron Warriors – those being the set I converted over 10 years ago because I thought the IW looked good, and because I thought that basically weathered silver armour would be a fast army to paint. Little did I know…



Every one of the initial set of models was converted – using the parts available at the time. This meant bits from the plastic MK7 Space Marines kit circa 3rd edition, stuff from the (still current) Chaos Space Marines kit and the (even more sadly still current) Khorne Berserkers kit. I added in additional bits from the Metal shoulderpads that were available around 2nd-3rd edition and metal parts from what are now the Iron Warriors and Iron Hands Squad boxed sets, both of which are still sort-of available now as upgrade packs. But without the shoulder pads for the IW.



The circular saw arm comes from the same (Not-Orks) “Org” from that game I still can’t recall the name of, while the right shoulder is a metal one. His head is an Iron Warriors head with lots of cybernetic implants. The rest of him comes from the plastic kits of the day. As with many of the other models, I kept a link to the Legion with the IV added to his left shoulderpad.



His partner also features a mixture of parts. Torso and Head are from the metal Iron Warriors parts, though with the horns removed. I’m not huge on the whole “Iron Warriors as Space Vikings” thing.



Both arms and weapons are from the Khorne Berserker sprue, though the bolt pistol was added to the right hand and the angle was chained on the chainsword hand for a more open pose.



Once again, we’ve got one metal shoulderpad (got to be economical!) which is the Chaos star one. I could paint that central point in as a gem, though I’m not entirely sure if I should do so or just leave it. Red? Brass? Or just leave it as a large (iron) stud?



The left leg is from the Iron Hands kit, and the right is from an Assault Marine. I cut the IH leg pair in half so as to get two unique bionic leg sets from the one piece. I said economy, didn’t I? Finally, it’s backed up by a 2nd Edition-era plastic SM Backpack.

That’s it for now. I'll have the next pair up in a couple of days!

Always a pleasure to see your Iron Warriors buddy . Great stuff!

The Hazard stripes are so perfectly done. They really make the models pop. You must have a very steady hand.