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Sculpting, casting, kit-bashs and conversions - Stormhammer cometh... update 09/10/17  [RSS] Share on facebook Share on Twitter Submit to Reddit
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Made in gb
Hardened Veteran Guardsman





Lisburn, Ireland

Hello!

A while ago I had posed a question to the good people here; did they know of any casting companies out there that would reproduce a IG variant head that I had sculpted for my own use? Now the general response was 'why don't you just do it yourself?' and so yeah, i thought, why not? I have, I think, finally come to the conclusion that I will probably NEVER completely paint even a fraction of my armies, I spend most of my hobby time with the glue and the Green Stuff rather than with the brush as I just can't leave a stock model alone and love creating something unique. So, on taking the stellar advice of you folk out there I have taken the plunge into sculpting and casting my own bitz for my ever growing Guard army that will now no doubt definitely NEVER get painted! But hey, we all do it for the love of it right? There's no end goal, for me this hobby is ongoing, no army is ever really completed is it? I spent a good bit of time researching materials and in the Dakka tutorials section looking at what others had done, looking for tips and techniques. I had in the past done some simple open cast moulds with GS and siligum and insta-mould which for small items like a holster or an aquilla , for example, is fine but for an object like a head, a torso or a pair of legs where the detail has to be completely all encompassing I knew I'd have to up my game! I came across this tutorial by EonsOfBattle (cheers mate!)

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/626920.page

and just thought, wow, this could be simpler than I thought, I have some old Lego still somewhere to make the mould box, I've used insta-mould in the past too, all I needed was some resin and away I go. So this is my Painting And Modelling blog where I'm going to lump together all the little projects I'm flitting to-and-fro from at present, It'll mostly be IG orientated but I do have other armies that I might throw down some lovin' on to too, I've also finally figured out how my crappy camera works too and can now take a half decent photo (something that had put me off starting a blog for quite some time). You never know I might even get round to painting something, but I really want to share with you the learning curve that I've experienced so far with sculpting and casting, maybe show off something you might like or think is cool, please give me advice if you have wisdom to impart, definitely give me your comments and critiques!

And so this is the aforementioned head I had posted previously, at the time it was a work in progress..



This is it now, fully complete and ready to be replicated..



And this is what I was able to do just using that simple mould box technique..





For pouring I'm using Mouldcraft SG2000 liquid plastic which I think is just fantastic, when you get it right, but I'll talk more on it and how I've found using it later! I put a black wash on the heads so you can see the detail somewhat better. And so that is it for now, I'll leave you with a teaser of what's to come, thanks a bunch for taking the time to have a look!







This message was edited 14 times. Last update was at 2017/10/09 11:50:57


Know your enemy... and then learn about his favourite sport - Nelson Mandela 
   
Made in fi
Hurr! Ogryn Bone 'Ead!





Finland

Wow looking great so far! Would really like to hear more about the liquid plastic and using it.. Keep it coming.

   
Made in au
Purposeful Hammerhead Pilot






Newcastle, NSW ,Australia

Good on you for doing it yourself. I have always had an interest is casting my bases and bits but have never invested in the idea. Maybe following your blog I will try it my self. Can wait to see more.
Please feel free to check out my Tau blog I just started.
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/670437.page

For The Greater Good - Desert Tau Painting Blog!
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/670437.page#8273427
Chaos Space Marines 4100 Points
Tau Empire 3000 Points

Blood For The Blood God !!!
 
   
Made in gb
Pious Palatine






Looking good.

EDC
   
Made in gb
Hardened Veteran Guardsman





Lisburn, Ireland

Hey!

Thanks guys for taking an interest in the beginnings of my humble blog, IXLoiero95XI, i did have a look at your Tau, thanks for the invite, I'm a big fan of baize and your riptide looks class! So, for you and Xenon and anyone else who wants to have a go, I'll give you the low down on using the Mouldcraft in my casting. I am, at best, a Gentleman Amateur in this and have encountered some problems and setbacks but its all been a case of trial and error so far and hopefully I've managed to learn from my mistakes.

So this is my set up..



All fairly straight forward, got my Lego mould box as you can see, its pretty small but suitable for my needs, enough to do 2 torsos or a couple of heads. By a happy coincidence a stick of insta-mould when cut in half fits exactly into the mould chamber and voilà, you have the upper and lower halves for your casting out of one stick. There's a couple of plastic medicine spoons, a disposable pipette and the Mouldcraft parts A and B.

Right, so I will admit that as a complete novice obviously things didn't just go perfectly from the off, and as they say 'bad luck comes in threes' here are the 3 fails I've encountered;

1. Insta-mould loss of detail - mildly annoying, but easily rectified by reheating the mould halves and starting again, meh

2. Air bubbles - quite annoying, and I'm still encountering them! When I first started this caper I simply poured the liquid plastic straight into the mould but as you can guess I got a few air bubbles in the casting which when it cured left the piece looking like its had a chunk taken out of it. They can be saved though as I pack the hole the air bubble created with GS or ProCreate and put it back into the mould case, like so..



Top left was the first torso I tried to replicate, top right was the resulting copy, there were quite a few air bubbles created but it was salvaged and went on to be of use in making the mould for the bottom 2 torsos - a flak jacket based on the old plastic RT IG. But I'd rather eliminate the problem altogether than correct the mistakes afterwards! The great thing about the Mouldcraft is that it cures in 30-45mins to hard plastic and ready to be used, glued, filed or drilled, having to pack the voids with filler and then let it cure isn't really the answer. So I've started inserting air channels into the mould in an effort to reduce the problem - the chance of air bubbles is greatly reduced as the air has a way of escaping as the resin enters the mould - a great tip I got from Dakka's very own Gogsnik (cheers man) who also suggested using a syringe to inject the resin instead of just pouring it in, hence the plastic pipette, I got 100 of these from ebay for less than £2, cheap, disposable one-shot-weapons!

3. Mouldcraft not mixed properly or i fethed up the ratio - very annoying in both cases as it either takes forever to cure (over a day sometimes), or, and this is the worst possible result, it dosn't cure at all and I'm left with a sticky, goopy mess that destroys the whole mould, rage! Luckily this has only happened once so far and was my own stupid fault for rushing the job. But anyway the Mouldcraft comes as I said in parts A and B which you mix in equal parts by WEIGHT not volume. Part B is actually heavier than A but as I'm working with such small quantities of it each time I don't really have a reliable way of weighing it exactly. The medicine spoon above on the right has a rim set into the small 2.5ml end that I will measure out part A to, then pour into the 5ml end of the other spoon, as part B is heavier I'll measure it out to below this rim line before again decanting into the second spoon to be mixed. Basically though its guesswork, if I get it right then happy days, if not, disaster!

So yeah, definitely a learning curve but so far I've been very impressed with the Mouldcraft and wouldn't hesitate to recommend it, it cures right in front of you which is pretty cool and you could definitely rattle off a few dozen copies of something in a single day if you needed to! All in all I've spent about £20 on materials and all from ebay, £11 for 250g of the Mouldcraft and that was including P&P, £7 for a six pack of insta-mould sticks and next to nothing for the disposable pipettes.

Thanks again for taking a look, next time I'll post more of the fruits of my labour, so until then!

PS evildrcheese - great name btw!

Know your enemy... and then learn about his favourite sport - Nelson Mandela 
   
Made in us
Stealthy Warhound Titan Princeps







Thinking about getting back into casting myself - looks good! I like your helmet.
   
Made in au
Purposeful Hammerhead Pilot






Newcastle, NSW ,Australia

I'm no expert by any means but have you tried tapping/vibrating the mould after you pour it to cause the bubbles to come out?

For The Greater Good - Desert Tau Painting Blog!
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/670437.page#8273427
Chaos Space Marines 4100 Points
Tau Empire 3000 Points

Blood For The Blood God !!!
 
   
Made in gb
Pious Palatine






Nice update. Thanks for the useful info, one day I might consider my own moulding, but until then it's great to read about the experiences of others.

EDC
   
Made in gb
Hardened Veteran Guardsman





Lisburn, Ireland

Hey!

Welcome back, sorry it's been a while since my last update, I haven't had much time with Christmas on the immediate horizon to regularly post on this blog but that's not to say I haven't been idle - i've even managed to knock up a DIY lightbox made out of a drawer divider! But anyways, check this image out, I love it - Harakoni Warhawk in dynamic action pose!



I do love it when GW throw in a pic or make mention of an obscure or lessor known IG regiment in a codex and the Harakoni Warhawks have been something I've been thinking about ever since Mad Robot Miniatures released their CDF legs, BOOM! once I saw them I had to make some Warhawks! So with the legs sourced what else would I need to get as close to the above image as I could? An armoured torso with some kind of crossed straps or hose (from the IG Valkyrie kit), a helmet including a set of goggles (again from the Valk but with an added GS rebreather), armoured arms (Tempestus Scions kit) and of course a grav-chute (from Mad Robot again). So cobble these together and this is what I got..





Now, I know what you're saying, 'the lasgun ain't the same in the pic and where the hell are the grav-chutes?' Well firstly these days those lasguns with the folding stocks are really quite hard to get hold of in large numbers and so for simplicity's sake I decided to just modify the Scion hellguns instead (never liked them anyway, why didn't the designers go with the Ksarkin hellgun instead?). Secondly, the grav-chute is actually there on the Harakoni rifleman, but the side grav bits on the Mad Robot packs are really quite flimsy and have since broken off :( Before I stick any more grav chutes on the rest of my guys I think I'll need to reattach the grav bits in a more robust way somehow..

Here's a rear shot of the lasgunner showing the Mad Robot grav chute, minus the side grav thrusters..



Here's an earlier WIP pic of what the grav chute should look like..



And, lastly some closer shots of the Harakoni helmet i came up with..




Oh, and before I go again, to IXLoiero95XL, yes, tapping the mould to get the air bubbles to rise to the surface is something I do without even thinking about it... which is probably why I forgot to mention it in my earlier post, doh! But you are right to bring it to folk's attention!

Cheers for now, thanks for looking!

Know your enemy... and then learn about his favourite sport - Nelson Mandela 
   
Made in gb
Pious Palatine






Really cool. I actually prefer the lasgun you've used to the one in the picture.

These guys are looking really cool.

EDC
   
Made in gb
Hardened Veteran Guardsman





Lisburn, Ireland

EDC, cheers!

Here's another standard trooper in the works with a better shot of the lasgun, the power cables were removed and the cowling too and I added a metal barrel from Curious Constructs (the sniper rifle variant)..



Squad sergeant WIP..



My Harakoni bits master and Mouldcraft copy..




As close a shot of the Harakoni helmet as i can get..



And some squad heavy support WIP..



Thanks all again for looking!

Know your enemy... and then learn about his favourite sport - Nelson Mandela 
   
Made in nl
Did Fulgrim Just Behead Ferrus?





The Netherlands

Hmm, you should make some original kits and sell them!

Bits Blitz Designs - 3D printing a dark futuristic universe 
   
Made in us
Longtime Dakkanaut






Dear god I am in love with this thread.

My mostly terrain and Sons of Orar blog:
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/568699.page#6349942
 whalemusic360 wrote:
Alph, I expect like 90 sets of orange/blue from you.
 
   
Made in gb
Hardened Veteran Guardsman





Lisburn, Ireland

Wow, thanks for your awesome words of encouragement guys, glad you are enjoying it so far!

I would love to some day Malika2 sell some bits if there was demand for them, my original sculpts obviously! That's still a ways away though, I've only been messing about with casting for about 6 months now, once I'm confident enough to mass produce them then you never know! I 'd like to look into using a more advanced mould material in the New Year, liquid latex maybe or something like that, if anyone out there has any good product suggestions I'd love to hear them!

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2015/12/20 13:00:05


Know your enemy... and then learn about his favourite sport - Nelson Mandela 
   
Made in gb
Hardened Veteran Guardsman





Lisburn, Ireland

Hello and Happy New Year to all on Dakka!

A small update for you; came up with a modification to the Mad Robot grav chute that is more in keeping with the piece of Harakoni artwork I posted previously. I'd like to add in the power cables on the grav thrusters but for now it'll serve! I like the way it makes the grav chute more visible when looking at the model front on, although its a bit fiddly to convert each back pack like this and I've got at least 15 to do; a command squad and a full Guard infantry squad...




Squad sergeant given the same treatment...



Some specialists WIP...




Thanks as ever for taking a look, now the holidays are out of the way I might just get a bit more hobby time to devote to them, cheers for now!

Know your enemy... and then learn about his favourite sport - Nelson Mandela 
   
Made in us
Yellin' Yoof





Clearwater, SC

Awesome work love the look of the custom bits.

   
Made in gb
Hardened Veteran Guardsman





Lisburn, Ireland

Hey thanks Raskana!

Here's a few other bits and bobs I've been sculpting lately, not Harakoni related but IG nevertheless.

Female dress uniform torso and male carapace armour torso variant...



The female torso was made from a resin MicroArts amazon torso, I just added some clothes to it! The male armoured torso is based on a plastic Cadian bit.

Legs, legs, legs...




Kinda unhappy with the bottom right legs sculpt and gave up on it, the stance just looked too unnatural, which is a pity because of the 3 pairs of legs I sculpted the best boot to go with it!

And a Steel Legion knock-off made from more Mad Robot bitz and a GW Empire Huntsman...



Thanks a bunch!

Know your enemy... and then learn about his favourite sport - Nelson Mandela 
   
Made in us
Lone Wolf Sentinel Pilot




Chandler, AZ

Great thread! Converting guard should be a national pastime, lol.

 
   
Made in gb
Hardened Veteran Guardsman





Lisburn, Ireland

Thank you Steve, you make it possible!!

Know your enemy... and then learn about his favourite sport - Nelson Mandela 
   
Made in gb
Hardened Veteran Guardsman





Lisburn, Ireland

Hello again!

Sorry I haven't updated this for a few weeks now - really thought I'd have posted more on these guys once Christmas was but a memory but anyways, I have a few pics for you all now!

Command squad Vox Officer...



Shotgun armed troopers, these 2 are part of the drop infantry squad...


Grenade Launcher specialist, also part of the regular squad...


Meltagun trooper, he'll join the command section along with the plasmagunner i've posted previously, and another regular grunt...


WIP loader for the heavy bolter weapon team...


So apart from adding the grav-chutes, these guys are pretty much nearly finished! I've still the command squad officer to do and a medic and then on to painting, yes, painting, you heard that right! Actually quite looking forward to getting paint on them now and finishing this little project though I haven't really decided on a colour scheme yet.

Cheers for having a look!





Know your enemy... and then learn about his favourite sport - Nelson Mandela 
   
Made in au
[MOD]
Making Stuff






Under the couch

So much shiny...

Nice work.

 
   
Made in gb
Regular Dakkanaut




Rugby

Impressive stuff
   
Made in gb
Pious Palatine






Love the guys with the shotguns!

EDC
   
Made in fr
Inquisitorial Keeper of the Xenobanks





France

Good job, I always loved the Warhawks, nice to see them in real.

   
Made in gb
Hardened Veteran Guardsman





Lisburn, Ireland

Hey guys

So my Harakoni's had stalled recently, i really just wasn't happy with the changes i made to the grav-chute and also found my attention drifting to other forgotten projects (dammit, stay focused man!), this happens to me all the time! So after having a quiet word with myself i endeavoured to get back on track with them and figure out what was bugging me so.

Of course if my fat fingers hadn't have broken the Mad Robot jump packs in the first place they probably would have been finished by now. But anyway you will remember i came up with this modification to reattach the grav thrusters to the back pack...



And so i was happy enough at the time, the only problem it was really time consuming and fiddly to assemble, involving micro pinning and all that. Daunting when i thought i still had to do it another 14 times. But i carried on anyway even though i still wasn't convinced about the look, i thought i could do a bit better and try and get a bit closer to the Harakoni piece of artwork. I made some little stanchion structures out of plastic strip and added them to a guy to see what it would look like...



Hmmm, on to something here, what if i add some thin copper wire to represent the power cables...



Looking better but why stop at wire and not go the whole hog and actually use some ribbed power cables? Problem was the cable would have to be of a very thin diameter and all i had in my bitz box was a few metal Victoria Lamb gasmasks that i could cannibalise...




Much better looking but still ridiculously awkward and fiddly to assemble and you'll see in the bottom image the left hand thruster part of the cabling has since snapped off and been lost to the warp, meh!

But i really did like this configuration, maybe if i scaled everything up a notch i could create a master that i could cast up and remove all the fiddly sub-assembling.

Go bigger or go home...



I used the feet of a plastic IG mortar to make the basis of the thruster supporting arms, plastic rod and strip for the rest, much thicker metal cabling and the original Mad Robot jump pack thrusters to top it all off. Now at this point i would like to make it known that i asked for permission from Steve at Mad Robot Miniatures to reproduce these and he very kindly agreed to let me, so a big thank you goes to him for getting me to where i am now and quite possibly keeping my sanity intact!

Here's the first Harakoni then, kitted out with the new mouldcraft thrusters...






Hope you like, thanks as ever for taking the time to have a look!

Know your enemy... and then learn about his favourite sport - Nelson Mandela 
   
Made in gb
Hardened Veteran Guardsman





Lisburn, Ireland

Hey...

Been quite a while, eh?

I can't believe it's been over a year since i last posted in this thread! You'd think my Harakoni's would be done and dusted by now... Wrongo... Like all good endeavours of mine they've fallen by the wayside, at least for the time being anyway.

For the better part of last year i had to put my hobby aside...

BUT not completely, because i kept one project on the go and fiddled about with it every now and again when i had any spare time... a Stormhammer!



Forgive the crappy photo, but its taken from an old White Dwarf from way back!

I absolutely love the Stormhammer design of 90's epic fame, twin turreted goodness and a nostalgic nod to back when i actually played 40k with my mates. I have a Baneblade and 2 Shadowsword/Stormlord kits that i initially had planned to build both just as Stormlords, one got built years ago but the second one i wanted to be able to convert into a Stormhammer by scratcbuilding a replaceable super structure... 2 tanks for the price of one! The recent FW version is pretty cool, i quite like the long multilaser toting side sponsons, but i wanted to go for the classic look.

So this is the beginning...



The superstructure and top plate are removable and can be repositioned in any of the original configurations...





The upturned lego bits act as connectors for the new top armour...



The first thing i built was replacement frontal armour in keeping with the Epic 40k model...



Well okay, the epic model pictured didn't have the demolisher cannon so it's only slightly in keeping! But maybe it was slightly undergunned pattern, who knows...?





The new front armour sits nice and snug over the original chassis...



And then i built a new forward top armour section for the first of the turrets...





And then i got another Baneblade top piece and cut it up to reposition as so...



Don't worry, this is all going to be overlaid with plasticard and finished to look like the Baneblade only slightly adjusted so i can fit two turrets on to the tank!







For the turrets i got 2 Stormwalkers from Anarchy Models... They're slightly smaller than a Baneblade turret and also look cool as feth!







Thanks for taking a look!

Know your enemy... and then learn about his favourite sport - Nelson Mandela 
   
Made in gb
Using Inks and Washes





Edinburgh

Beautiful sculpting and some really unique guardsmen, really inspiring work. Thank you for the tutorial on casting as well - I didn't realise it could be done with such simple equipment! Lots of motivation to do something with my own sculpting. Will be watching with interest!
   
Made in gb
Hardened Veteran Guardsman





Lisburn, Ireland

Thank you very much Scarper

Inspiration is truly something that should be shared around, i know i've had a good fill of it over the years here on Dakka!

I'll have some more guard bitz of mine that i've cast up recently to show and more progress pics of the Stormhammer in the next few days

Cheers!

Know your enemy... and then learn about his favourite sport - Nelson Mandela 
   
Made in us
[DCM]
Boom! Leman Russ Commander





United States

I very much like the Baneblade conversion! Why send 'one tank' when you can send a battery?

How did you do the rivets to scale for the plates/panels you're adding? I've used the leather punch method, which gives me rivets down to about 1/16", and I've tried clipping the ends off plastic canvas- those come out a bit smaller. Bother are still too large to look good on most of what I build.

"He fears his fate too much, or his desserts are small, who will not put it to a single touch; to win- or lose- it all."

Montrose Toast


 
   
Made in us
Stealthy Warhound Titan Princeps







Love me a multi turret tank!
   
 
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