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Right, so here´s the thing. I like the idea of the imperial guard, however i fell that they are sorely lacking in the transport department.

The chimera is EVERYWHERE! I can´t make even begin to describe how tired i am of that tank.

However, some of the FW models that have been released lately make me smile.
Finally some new transport options.

Only problem? I don´t want to transport 50 men in one tank, and i don´t want to pay a gazillion bucks to do so. (I´ll spend that money on buying other forgeworld stuff, thank you very much!)

So, I came up with a plan to convert the lowly Chimera into something that looked a bit more like the Gorgon Heavy transport, while still keeping the basci principles of the Chimera.

In case anyone has doubts, the chimera is a twelve man transport with medium front armor, but less than stellar side-rear armor. The Gorgon is a 50 man transport that looks awesome.

Day 1: So, I started by going out and grabbing a Chimera kit. Obviously.

A sturdy steel ruler, some good knives and a pair of scissors, and i was set to go.

I assembled the tracks as usual, but put the hull together back to front, since i was going to need the exit ramp up front, and the slope in the rear of the tank.

I made card mockups of everything, makes life way easier, plus card is cheaper then plasticard. I got the front ramp thing assembled pretty easily, but initially had trouble imagining how it would attach to the hull. Eventually i decided that since the chimera is amphibious, they´d want an airtight seal, but might have some sort of piston arrangement to take the shock when crashing into enemy fortifications. For this i decided to use the Pistons for the plow on the addon frame.

I used the little spare bit of hull on the frame for finishing off the lower rear end of the tank, nad added some doors plus a fuel drum. At this point there were holes pretty much allover the place, but i was confident to solve problems as i got to them.

Day 2:

I started by cutting out the actual cover for the top of the tank, and making supports for it to sit on. I also made support struts for the outside of the cover, but these were not attached until day three. Didn´t get much else done, due to work and such things, but i started on the greenstuff filling work.

This turned out to be a great part of the build, since i foun that greenstuff works wonderfully with plasticard, it´s able to smooth out the gaps when you have two sheets meeting, or for hiding cuts and such.

Sweet. While you're at it, take a look at some WWII landing craft, especially those that were meant to drive up on land.

Day 3:
I got the cover fixed in place, finished the supports, and added the turret. I then got on the first paint of green paint, and added lots of detail work.

No day 3 pics?!?!

You're such a tease. Great work on the chimera thus far by the by.

Nevermind.

Heheh, yeah, there were no pics cause i clicked submit instead of attach

Fixed it now.

So far, i still need:
More colors.
More addons.
More junk heaped on it (i intend for this to be part of my inquisition long range force).
And finally, when all that is done, weathering.

That's awesome!

I'm usually not a fan of Chimera conversions but this is inspired

Thats a lovely bit of work. Gunna look great when finished.
I had thought of making a Gorgon out of a baneblade but It's just a pipe dream for now.
What do you use for weathering btw? I've just bought some Tamiya weathering master powder sets myself. Haven't tried them out yet.

Looks great. After doing my own scratchbuilt Thunderbolts, I highly recommend drawing up a printable pattern for armor plates. It makes replication so much easier, particularly for something like this where you'll want anywhere from 2 to 5 of them in an army.

Are you going to add rivits to the plasticard? It looks kinda odd with just the GW portions of the model having those details and not the scratched side of it.

Looking very nice!!!!!!!

If you could duplicate the riveting from the chimera hull onto the new upper hull, it would really tie it all together nicely.

edit - woops,... beat me to it,.... I guess I shouldn't leave the window up for 20 minutes without hitting the submit button.

Nice work. The slimmed sidepods are good. The only change I'd have would be less front overhang, as the tank looks a little "tippy". No biggie - it's a very nice piece.

Damn, that ramp looks good.

I feel sort of weird saying that.

Thanks for all the positive comments guys. Nice to get thumbs up from here.

As far as rivets go, yes i´m going to need to add a truckload of those. Any tips on how best to do "imperial style" rivets?

And as far as weathering is concerned, I think i´ll have to get a hold of some of those Tamiya powders, but a lot of the stuff i´ll be adding is in the form of dents, scrapes and oil/rust.

Oh yeah, the sidepods, I forgot about those

The original wide ones were just annoying me, so i wanted to do something different with them. Also, this gives me the possibility to build a Battle tank version of this at a later point, with sponsons.

I´m thinking of doing at least one battle tank, and using the same hull, but styled more like the heavy battle tanks on FW.

Edit: Forgot to mention, the exhaust stacks on the back are from Sentinels. They come with the forge world drop sentinels, and I´ve been looking for somewhere to put them.

Looks pretty good. Especially the turret.

Your my hero thats awsome !!!!!!!!!!!

Man, this is great!

Day 4:

Okay, a bit of progress here. I´ve been thinking about rivets quite a bit, and so far the only obvious choice seems to be GS´ing them on. This will take time, but i´m okay with that as long as it ends up looking good.

So far i´ve added rivets to the extra armour panels that i added to the top cover. Some of these need to be cut down in size a bit, but that´s for tomorrow.

What do you guys think?

More armour panels on top?

Rivets good so far, or do they just look silly?

I think it looks very good. The way the model is designed, you could use some rivets on the "tunnel", but that's about it.

Get a leather punch. All of the ones I've seen have a variety of size holes, many of them quite small. Then just punch out a bunch of them for rivets.

The tunnel bit will probably have some thin plasticard strips added to it. It is supposed to be movable, so i´m thinking like "Runners"...

Any of this make sense?

I am inspired by this bit of work you have here. I have always suggested that the Imperial Guard should get a platoon level transport, maybe not 50, but something for about 30 - 35 would do very nicely (one command squad with any advisors included and two squads of ten, maybe some remnants).

I was thinking something in the lines of a transport truck, much like the modern militaries using 2.5-ton or similiar vehicles (my unit had a major surplus of 5-ton trucks, much bigger). However a truck would just be for the rear line duties and such, and would mostly be a fluff piece. But this fits in with combat vehicles much better, and looks great to boot!

My only critiques I have at the moment is that with all the trouble you went through, I am disappointed that you used the original Chimera chassis track bitz. Their small size makes the vehicle look cumbersome and unwieldy, as if it would have a difficult time turning when not in forward motion. But that does not retrack from the obvious skill and inginuity that was obviously needed to create this piece.

I agree with prior posts that it needs more bolts/rivets. One easy resource for these is using thin polystyrene piping. It is available in many hobby stores and some brands even sell a "variety" set of tubes for those that do not need much of one specific size. I bought one such set and I have found it extremely useful thus far.

Good job and keep up the great work!

Thanks for the rivet tips. I´ll have to wait till thursday to check it out since the only good hobby store around here is closed on wednesdays for reasons best known to someone else.

(I secretly believe that wednesday might be the day they have set aside to worship Errol, the mighty paperclip god)......

Errol worship is secluded to Tuesday.

Wow I'm humbled; That is gorgeous work...Good Job!

Oh wow, this is awesome. I just clicked from the picture on the main page. My first thought when I saw the pic was "Oh cool, someone's working on their new Gorgon!" Not even realizing at first look that it WASN'T the FW kit! (For the record, I haven't seen said kit too many times, and not for a while.)

This is very inspiring, and thanks to KiMonarrez for the leather punch tip; I need a good rivet-maker too, and cutting them from plastic rod does NOT work for me! (Or rather, I can't do it effectively to save my life!)

Second on the leather punch. Though you ar emor elike ly to find it at a craft store like Michael's or Joannes.

The vehicle is looking awesome. Great work.

ender502