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sooooo....this thread is in serious need for pictures...WIP pics...

so...i think i need to be the one that DELVERS...







so...the idea is that these will be stationary teleporter...i will build six of them, two of these are able to hold a guardsman sized model...
materials atm i have used is multiple sets of ice cream pops maker...and granny grating...
later on lots of hot glue will follow to form energy/plasma structures...we´ll see about that...


hope you´ll like, cheers, vik

Still in the planning stages. Rough size mockup using some pre-built hills.


Portal is going to be flat, like a Star Trek transporter pad, with the webway arch over it. The two botom hills will be grass, top one (and the arch) will be wraithbone.

Top of the pad should be about 3” off the table, total footprint should be a square foot-ish.

Dragged in the insulation foam that has been sitting in the garage awaiting me to make terrain with it for around a decade now. It was originally used to line a crate as padding for when The Wife shipped the liquor cabinet she made to a woodworking competition. Recycling!

Lots of good fighting talk everyone, great to see some extra bods, we are in trouble mind you, because we are attracting the big boys (looking shifty at Solar), going to have to up my game to get second this time round!

OK bring it on, got a monstrous idea brewing.

Looks like you've got a Killing Jar there Vik. XD Now where did I put that Siouxsie & The Banshees CD...

Heh, this is my first try at making anything more complicated then a scrap of paper with “difficult terrain” written on it. Never worked with insulation foam before, but I have plenty of it to screw up for practice.

I’m learning as I go here, I’ll be happy if I make it out of this with something not on fire.

You can always ask for help and advice, or C&C as we call it, Nevelon.

Nobody building a Star Gate? Or the Gates To Hell ? Tsk, Tsk.

Well some wip this is what i thought i was gonna be doing
And after a bit if flaming this is what i came up with, not perfect, but still git to get a swirling effect


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Well this after

Very exciting all round! Loving the creative sprue action

Victor!!! Those domes are cool! Those look like transporter pod thingy mebobs, and nevelon ,,,,the quality of the just your base work i think this is gonna be a awsome challenge

my wife mentioned the stargate...but i didn´t want to...too obvious...or rather i thought i couldn´t get it sturdy enough...

and thanks for the education matey... i probably never actively listened to Siouxsie & The Banshees...yet...your wisdom is so wide....


and nevelon....nice start... and i love eldar terrain...had thought about a webway portal too...
from my own experience with insulation foam long sharp knife...and slight cut and snap technique works best...


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kingpin.... what an interesting idea.... that will create a nifty effect....

Being a colossal Stargate fan (eldest son is called Daniel after Daniel Jackson, which was actually down to my wife), I'll not say no to a Gate but it's all about meeting your needs. Great wips already guys!

Well mine gonna go with my imperial ghost chapter, gonna have two portals, one that brings a warior from each chapter to one place and then sending thrm to a destination to defend the imperial.

 Viktor von Domm wrote:
my wife mentioned the stargate...but i didn´t want to...too obvious...or rather i thought i couldn´t get it sturdy enough...

and thanks for the education matey... i probably never actively listened to Siouxsie & The Banshees...yet...your wisdom is so wide....

I had to make a killing jar when I was in the 7th grade ( 12-13 year olds) and to use it for a class project an insect collection. Pour a bit of plaster into a mayonnaise jar, let that set, then pour some nail polish remover (acetone) into it so that the plaster soaks it up. A nasty thing. The song though, pretty cool.

I could do a gate. I mean I've wanted one for ages. Though really you need two...

Just got post apoc on the mind and thought there would already be more than one stargate style entry. I could totally take a stab at one...

You know, I've been trying to figure out something to base my gate on that was more than 'dwarven and rock'- I think a Stargate (Well, Stonegate- maybe Planar portal?) could do the trick quite well.

I've been wanting to watch Stargate (all of them!) for a while now, since reading some awesome fanfictions crossing over with that world, but I can't find them anywhere. Anyone have any relevant legal sources? It's for... research purposes.

A bit of not-progress, but some learning:


Enlarged and printed out a template. Laid it over the foam and traced it with a firm hand in pencil, to indent the foam. That part worked OK. The carving, not so much.

I’m not sure if I need new batteries in the cutter, or didn’t let it warm up enough, or what. But it did more of a jagged tear then the smooth carve I was expecting. I tried to score and snap, but that didn’t work as well as I’d like. I suspect I might need to use something more then the #11 exacto blade here. Oh well, I knew there was going to be a bit of a learning curve here.

If I recall the foamcutter shares some properties with a hot glue gun. You've gotta let it get maximum hot for results, red hot in this case, and using it will 'use up' the heat...like how a hot glue gun that's fully hot will have a really easy trigger action and the glue will practically rush out at first, but after a little bit you get further back up on the stick where it's not been heated yet and the glue comes out slower/barely at all. The foam cutter and hot knives work the same way, though probably somewhat different properties cause it.

Basically, it's gonna lose heat eventually and come to the point where it'll drag, and definitely drag if you don't let it heat up enough first.

Also watch out, hot knives and foam cutters cut a pretty wide swathe through insulation foam when they're fully fired up, moreso than you may expect, can practically deform the stuff just by being in proximity let alone contact.


Darn you guys, now I really can't decide between a stargate and a vault entrance =/

 GrimDork wrote:
If I recall the foamcutter shares some properties with a hot glue gun. You've gotta let it get maximum hot for results, red hot in this case, and using it will 'use up' the heat...like how a hot glue gun that's fully hot will have a really easy trigger action and the glue will practically rush out at first, but after a little bit you get further back up on the stick where it's not been heated yet and the glue comes out slower/barely at all. The foam cutter and hot knives work the same way, though probably somewhat different properties cause it.

Basically, it's gonna lose heat eventually and come to the point where it'll drag, and definitely drag if you don't let it heat up enough first.

Also watch out, hot knives and foam cutters cut a pretty wide swathe through insulation foam when they're fully fired up, moreso than you may expect, can practically deform the stuff just by being in proximity let alone contact.


Darn you guys, now I really can't decide between a stargate and a vault entrance =/

Thanks for the advice, I’ll give it another shot.

As for the gate/vault: why not both? Do a vault chamber to secure the stargate!

Sigh. That's how these always start for me. I wanna do X. Then Y. Then oh... if I'm gonna do two things why not a whole 2x2/2x4/4x4 table while I'm at it....

See the Vault entrance is a strong choice because it would let me tie my battle systems scifi scenery in with TNT (and well anything else that would be in a desert/wasteland). Of course the stargate is pretty versatile too as you can put it literally anywhere even floating around in freaking space.

Both could technically occupy the same board with a stargate in the wastes and the vault adjacent to it for whatever purpose. Dunno.

We'll see.

My phone and dakka are not getting on when it comes to uploading images for some reason, however I am going to use this as an excuse to create a base for my Abyssal KoW army.

A portal through which a monster emerges; counting as a horde of larvae. Fairly standard chaos gate design made from some wooden packaging material from some furniture and some offcuts of foam from insulating the house.

Plus I am sure some other bits and peices as we go along!

Edit: Image!

Ok I've been on my supply run, pound shop special. Not pictured; a giant bag of tiny pebbles and a sheet of chicken wire fence.



Found this image earlier whilst looking for portal inspiration, going to use this as part of my design.



And so it begins!

oh that arc/ portal is beautiful...

looks like a big project...


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at nevelon... if sharp edges don´t work with either knife and wire...then just accept the roughness... later on you can carve and even sand it down t you needs... by the way... depending on your plans i would suggest covering the whole piece with liberal amounts of PVA...(spray primer will melt it...but you surely knew that...)...or...covering it with tissue paper...

and at silver...interesting...

I'm betting that you're trying to cut to full depth all at once- that's what most people do to start with, but it'll give you raggedy edges. What you want to do, even with a super sharp knife, is a whole bunch off light, shallow cuts- that'll get you a much, much cleaner edge. It works for pretty much any type of cutting, on pretty much any material, too.

See this is why I love LoER - communal learning whilst in competition with one another!

Basic shape coming together. About all I got time for tonight. I'm looking forward to covering it in Polyfilla (someone stop me quick if there is a good reason not to do this ) and adding lots of detail. I bought some really handy stickers (you can see them in my stash pic) which are going to make the flooring easy. The cardboard I used on the base is really solid so I'm hoping no curling will occur.

Anyway, tonight's effort;



It's looking a bit rough at the moment, hoping I can clean it up with filler. Since this is my first piece of terrain, I'm really trying to build something playable, so the design will not be too exciting on this one. Still, feeling optimistic

Really sorry, bit late maybe, silly bloody RL......

Nev I have done this..... borrow the bread knife from the kitchen, a slow saw action, after a little sanding you get a smooth sharp edge. And you could always make it ultimate foam core, by lining it in cereal packets, that will give you a paintable smooth surface with nice sharp edges.

Oh clean the knife thoroughly before using it in the kitchen again.

Fantastic stuff gang, really exciting. Sweating a little here, I wont get a start on this for a few as other things on the bench and RL being a pain. I am totally up for it, got an awesome idea, just need some free time.

Oh and Anvil is absolutely correct too, lots of clean small cuts make a great job, just need patience.

OK, a little more playing around, with some decent results.

Serrated knife seemed to help a little. The longer steak knife also was useful. The big issue was the curves and the width of the blade. Might try a hacksaw, or something thinner.
Getting those cutouts on the back to all be the same is going to be rough.
Sanding fixes all sins. I was just using some rougher stuff I had on hand, will need to get some finer grit. It actually shaves a lot of material down quickly.
Need a larger template. With a rough cut followed by sanding, I’ll need wider margins to end up with the shape/size I want. This is particularly noticeable in the thin tip.
Dust. Lots of it. Need to get a mask. Or cancer, one of the two.

Thanks for the advice all!

 GrimDork wrote:
Maybe. I may do something a little different just to be... different... but I may not. How thick in inches do you reckon a fallout vault cog seal would be? Half inch? Whole inch? Whole inch is nearly 5-6 feet thick in scale so maybe start with a piece of foam core for a more reasonable thickness to the door?

Maybe 1/2 to 3/4" - it's a pretty big portal (opening), roughly 1 meter by 4 meters across (from memory) with a fairly thick door as well.

Anyway, discussed it with our family experts (my engineer hubby and son who've both played Fallout as well) and this is what they agree on lmao

Haha so about 4" diameter, sounds about right. Gonna focus on that first since I want to build it into a large hill.

Alright, update time!

So a lot of the actual construction of my piece for this contest is going to be Virtual- I want to really put my new 3d printer (a Micro3D if you want to know- little, cheap, super easy to use but still of decent quality) through its paces, and get used to using it. I'll print the parts in a couple runs, and put them together by hand, including all the necessary cleanup and surface texturing- I may need to either sand or putty over the printing layers near the end... and of course, final painting.

But in any case- I'm going to be making something I'm calling a Dwarfgate- it's Stargate inspired, but with a Dwarven flair- I'm going to be making it to be usable with DnD type modular terrain, as I really, really want to get into tabletop RPGs again/more (seriously, if anyone wants to play an Online, Skype-based game, let me know), so I figur, since I'm probably going to end up being the DM in most of them, I might as well re-purpose my Miniatures hobby into, well, that.

I might as well get some feedback, though- Do you guys prefer Option 1 or Option 2?


Option 1- the surrounding wall is thinner than the 'chevrons'- (which I'm calling Teeth, like the teeth on a gear or cog)


Option 2- the surrounding wall is thicker than the Teeth.


I like both of them, and can't figure out what to do. I suppose I could maybe do cutout windows showing them- heck, it might be possible (probably is, even) to construct this so that the Teeth can spin around inside the wall. The portal itself is going to have a thing printed out too, in clear plastic that I can then paint or whatever.