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I’m not sure whether anyone will be interested; this is one for those who are nostalgic for the early days of the game.

I have been building some original Rogue Trader-era models as Heresy miniatures. It started with coming across some unbuilt models deep in my pile of shame, and remembering how, decades ago, I built my original (dark blue) RTB01 Marines as Heresy models. I think I was inspired by Epic Space Marine. I never finished that project - the lack of alternative weapons, then 2nd Edition, killed it. So I thought it would be fun to try and finish what I started, before these old kits are completely unavailable.

Acquiring more RTB01 beakies (in decent condition) from eBay was quite an expensive process. I had quite a few unbuilt, but none of their iconic missile launchers and I was short on bolter arms. I managed to snag an almost-complete box for a semi-reasonable amount, but the cost per model was already getting silly. I wanted a Land Raider, but new-in-box examples go for stupid prices. I eventually got an incomplete one largely unbuilt without getting totally violated. However, most expensive acquisition was a Predator; these seem have largely disappeared, and are priced accordingly.

I went with Space Wolves and Iron Warriors, because they’re easy to paint. I’m giving them a few upgrades and additions, but trying to avoid adding too much detail - I want them to be fully compliant with the Heresy rules, but not lose their original character. I was tempted to paint them in the classic 'eavy metal style, with goblin green bases, but have decided do them in the current style, with heavy weathering. Which, weirdly, is exactly how my original beakies were done over 30 years ago…

Here are the Rhinos - built as per the kit, but with all the rivets replaced. I tried to minimise the amount of additional stuff, as I didn’t want to lose the feel of the original models, but the dozer blades are too cool not to have. The exhaust nozzles were always prone to breakage, however, so I replaced them.

Space Wolves characters - a Praetor, Caster of Runes and Sergeant. We used to put all sorts of heads on the original plastic beakies (including elf and Skaven heads); these are Mordheim beardy heads, which are of a suitable vintage and small enough not to look stupid..

All of my beakies will get shoulder pads with moulded legion insignia (cut down firstborn shoulder pads). Easier to paint these than apply transfers.

Very nice. Love me some old rhinos.

The Rogue Trader Land Raider, configured as an Explorator. I was quite a sophisticated kit for GW when it came out, although it didn’t compare well to other manufacturers’ military kits. I didn’t ever build it as a Marine vehicle when it first came out. It came in a box of 2 initially; I built one of mine as a looted Ork vehicle, and the other ended up in the spares box.

This one went together better than I remembered, mostly because it didn’t suffer from the shrinkage that was a feature of these kits (especially on the tracks). I decided to add the front-mounted lascannon (using a spare Rhino hull front), which really changes its appearance. I wish I could get hold of another one of these at something approaching an acceptable price - I’ve become very fond of it in the course of building it.

Delightfully ugly. I have a looted one I got off ebay but it's painted in enamels and probably hopeless.

Great work on the hull mount.

And finally, the Predator. I thought this was a pretty poor kit when it came out - the detail was toy-like, and the attachment of the sponson weapons on top of the side hatches was really crude. I decided to give this kit more of a makeover, including replacing the autocannon with twin lascannon. I rather like it. In fact, I like all these old vehicle kits. They are quick to assemble, easy to customise, and they’re a modest size. Sure the detail is basic, but do wargaming models really need to be much more detailed than this?

Nice! I've been dreaming of having the time to do a similar project. I've got about a company's worth of RTB01s and a bunch of vehicles that need "restoration" that can go into a full Rogue Trader era army. Currently painted are 10 RT Terminators and one Land Raider. I've even got Bikes, a Dreadnought and a Land Speeder. One glaring ommission is the fact I don't have a Predator.

I look forward to seeing your progress! I'll post some pics of my finished models when I get a chance.

 lord_blackfang wrote:
Delightfully ugly. I have a looted one I got off ebay but it's painted in enamels and probably hopeless.

It certainly is ugly, and I think the additional lascannon make it even more so! I painted all my RT models in enamels, and I haven't found a way of removing the paint without destroying the plastic.

 Insectum7 wrote:
Nice! I've been dreaming of having the time to do a similar project. I've got about a company's worth of RTB01s and a bunch of vehicles that need "restoration" that can go into a full Rogue Trader era army. Currently painted are 10 RT Terminators and one Land Raider. I've even got Bikes, a Dreadnought and a Land Speeder. One glaring ommission is the fact I don't have a Predator.

I look forward to seeing your progress! I'll post some pics of my finished models when I get a chance.

That's a lot of plastic beakies! Are they unbuilt? People are selling them for over US$20 per sprue on eBay. I adopted a 'plastic kits only' approach to this project, which rather limits the choice of units. I was thinking of trying to do some RT-style Land Speeders using the 3rd Edition plastic kit, but it's a lot of work and the kits also tend to be expensive.

Please put up some pics when you can!

Nah, most of mine are built, and some fairly terribly at that. Some painted (not well), and some not. The whole collection is sorta a mess

I'll try to do up a squad soonish, and then pic it with some of the other finished things I have around. I DID get the chance to clean-build a rhino kit from the era a few years ago. That was a nostalgic treat! It also sits unpainted at the moment though. :(

I’v got a chunk of RTB01s that are slowly being cleaned up and added to my HH force. Enough for a few tac squads and a ML dev unit, pair of rhinos and some characters.

Love the old stuff. Do not love how young me cleaned mold lines and assembled stuff.

 Nevelon wrote:
Love the old stuff. Do not love how young me cleaned mold lines and assembled stuff.

Yes indeed. Although the lack of fine detail like tiny rivets does make clean-up quicker. The most time-consuming aspect of building these old beakies is actually getting the posing right. It’s very easy to end up with poses that look silly. In order to use weapons from more recent models, I had to add an armour piece to the back of every original hand.

I’ve finished building and converting some of my RTB01 squads:

And because I know everyone was waiting breathlessly to see more…

Love 'em, real blast from the past. Can't wait to see the vehicles painted up!

Second Space Wolves Rhino built:

Space Wolves Grey Stalker squad. This is my favourite of the RTB01 units I’ve done, as I had always wanted to model them with melee weapons. It's now confirmed that Grey Stalkers will disappear with 3rd Edition, so that's another reason for sticking to 2nd Edition for this project.

And here are the whole lot of them, in all their Technicolor glory. Still half a Breacher squad and a full Tac squad to build. The little Land Raider is a WIP Rapier. I’ve decided that this will be a 2nd Edition Heresy army, whatever happens with 3rd, thus doubling the nostalgia aspect of this project.

A beautiful sight.

Aww thats a nice collection of beakies!

I just did a cleanup of a squad of mine. They had some awful glue on them (featured in the foreground of the pic ), but thankfully it just popped off the models with a little prying. It looks like shoe goo or something, lol. I basically pulled them apart, scraped glue off, then put them back together in the way you see here.

High res:

It’s crazy that, whilst the scale is now off, a kit older than many Dakkanauts still holds up today.

 Insectum7 wrote:
Aww thats a nice collection of beakies!

I just did a cleanup of a squad of mine. They had some awful glue on them (featured in the foreground of the pic ), but thankfully it just popped off the models with a little prying. It looks like shoe goo or something, lol. I basically pulled them apart, scraped glue off, then put them back together in the way you see here.

They look brand new - no sign of the previous glue. You've done a couple of nice poses that I'm going to copy for my remaining Tac squad. The open left hand only meets up properly with the bolter in a couple of poses - something that was always a bit annoying with these models. I have carved out some undercuts around the shoulder pads, so they look a bit less solid. I find the ammo pouches really improve their appearance, adding more detail and a bit more bulk around the middle. Let me know if you need any bits - I will likely have quite a few arms left over, as well as a pile of bayonets and knives.

Thanks! And thanks for the offer! I've been considering printing out some accessories matching the originals, as it would be pretty easy to model them up. But if you have extras when you're done I'll be happy to pay for them and give them a loving home as well.

One thing that bugs me about these guys is a lot of them have holes in their legs from the mouldiing process. My next step is to fill all those up before priming.

I have used all of my curved magazine and 'box' pouches, but I have quite a few of the other pouch (not sure how to describe it) spare. I also have several chain bayonets, a lot of knives, and a few missile launcher packs. You're welcome to these.

The shrink hole on the inside lower leg is pretty common. I find it's best to fill it before basing the models. I use Tamiya putty and a layer of Tamiya 'sandable' superglue over the top - that does the job. I also use greenstuff to fill any gaps where the arms meet the body, although I realise that's borderline OCD. Interestingly, the sand-coloured plastic is much easier to work with than the blue or green, although there are 2 types of sand plastic - a very soft version and a harder, more brittle version. Modern polystyrene cement acts on the plastic quite aggressively, and I find it's a good idea to leave them for several days for everything to set properly before priming them. I guess GW were still experimenting with their plastic formula at that point (or it depended on who the supplier was).

I just ordered a 3rd Edition plastic Landspeeder; I'm going to convert it into an approximation of the Rogue Trader Proteus speeder.

Nice to see the old RTB-01s going to get a modern build & paintjob! I also got some of em still unpainted, but will only be using the odd bit here and there for my army, due to the scale creep.

You'd need a metal "Fury" to round these out after the landspeeder.. and some Black Shadow bikes!

Also, if you know someone with a 3D printer, this could be a sweet one?
https://cults3d.com/en/3d-model/game/retro-hover-attack-tank

 tauist wrote:
Nice to see the old RTB-01s going to get a modern build & paintjob! I also got some of em still unpainted, but will only be using the odd bit here and there for my army, due to the scale creep.

Mine are all standing on chunks of plastic to give them more height. Some of the features of these old models are over scale, so you can mix and match later stuff more easily than you’d think. Although I think the power axes I used are a bit long.

You'd need a metal "Fury" to round these out after the landspeeder.. and some Black Shadow bikes!

Funnily enough, I was looking at the viability of backdating some of the original plastic Marine bikes to Black Shadows - or even Bullock jet cycles. It would be a lot of work. I also found these lovely 3-D printed Furibundus Dreads on eBay:

WIP Iron Warriors Breacher squad. I know the shields are a bit undersized, but I think that they do the job. Beside them are 2 WIP Rapiers, which are based on LI Land Raiders. I'm hoping to snag some Graviton cannon from the new Rapier set for these; they’ll be rather oversized for the chassis, but should still work in the context of the RT aesthetic.

Great project, love to see all the different variants and characters converted out of the classic beakie